When you’re living in a big city, it seems like food is everywhere. You’ll see signs upon signs for fast food franchises through your windshield or your train window on the way to and from work. The podcast you’re listening to breaks for the host to tell you about their sponsor’s latest and greatest grill. You remember you need to avoid fast food chains, as you know deep down, this will not help you achieve your short or long-term health goals especially if you’re taking a day to yourself to reset.
Food noise has been a term in nutritionist circles for the past decade but is starting to become recognized in the wider public consciousness. A 2023 survey saw that while 12% of respondents were familiar with the phrase, 57% reported experiencing its consequences. It refers to the brain’s background – and sometimes very much foreground – internal chatter about eating.
Some food noise is physiological. Our stomach will remind us when we’re hungry! Other food noise is very much psychological. We’ll tell ourselves we need a reward for completing a task, or a pick me up for when we’re feeling low. And it’s very tempting, and very easy, to reach for a quick snack that’s high in salt, fat, sugar, and all the other things that our brain’s dopamine receptors love more than our waistline does. The causes of food noise can be myriad. So, let’s have a look at how we turn the volume down.
Recognize your triggers
Food is built into a daily routine, out of necessity. It seems between grabbing breakfast on the way out of the door, to planning what we’re going to do for dinner, it’ll take up a lot of headspace. However, food noise can get louder based on the environment. If there’s a bakery you can’t resist on the way to the office, maybe take a different route. If pouring a coffee out of the pot to take back to the home office also means grabbing a cookie, think about having a Stanley cup on your desk that’ll hold more and keep it hot, lessening those visits to the kitchen.
Stress Management
We’ve all reached for that quick fix that a snack provides when stressed. The human brain is wired to do so. However, stress also plays havoc with our metabolic health, and prolonged stressful periods can lead to weight gain. A Harvard study in 2021 saw 42% of respondents declare they’d put on weight over the pandemic period, with the average being a substantial 29lbs. The reality of modern urban living means stress is almost a constant for some. The new breed of weight loss drugs – Wegovy and Zepbound among them – help control metabolic rate by slowing the rate of food moving through the body, thereby keeping it ‘fuller for longer’. They also target the receptors in the brain that respond to food stimuli, quieting the chatter of food noise.
Plan ahead
Meal prepping is all the rage with those looking to count calories and calculate macros – they can account for everything they’re consuming. Many swear by it as they can effectively control portions. However, preparing food in advance also helps to reduce food noise. Knowing what you’re going to have and when you’re going to have it means the mind doesn’t have to be occupied with theorizing choices and options. Grabbing a prepared dinner from the freezer is instant, tapering off the temptation to order takeout – and the worry of when it’ll come in busy city traffic.
Enjoy your food!
We’ve all rushed down a sandwich sitting at a screen. That sandwich may well have enough calories to keep us fully satiated for the afternoon. However, if we’ve barely noticed that we’ve eaten, never mind what we’ve eaten, the mind won’t have fully processed either the taste or the experience of the meal. That means an increased likelihood of food noise telling you that more food is required, even if it isn’t. Taking a little time to fully savor our food means it’ll last as long in the memory as it does in the stomach.