silly me

"... they [the French] use internal cues -- such as no longer feeling hungry -- to stop eating, reports a new Cornell study. Americans, on the other hand, tend to use external cues -- such as whether their plate is clean, they have run out of their beverage or the TV show they're watching is over.

As a child, regardless of time of day, day of week, meal, snack, whatever, I was never ever allowed to be excused from the table unless my plate was cleared of all food. Being a kid, I was never the one to fill the plate up with food, so this resulted in a seemingly never-ending battle between my mother and myself. At family holiday dinners when plates were usually over-flowing anyway, a six-year-old version of myself was forced to sit at the damn dining room table for over three hours because apparently puking from being too full does not constitute a pass to be excused from the table.

To date, I have struggled with over-eating on a daily basis. At restaurants I have to either have a server remove my plate immediately upon feeling full or just cover up every visible piece of food with a napkin. If I can't see it, I'm okay. If I can see it, I will eat until I'm either sick and running to the bathroom, or until every last scrap is gone ... both happening before I'm even conscious that I've continued to eat again.

Fuck you, America parenting.

Wow, logic.

whatever fatty.

1) The Great Depression is why our parents made us eat everything on our plates. We never knew when we'd eat good again.

2) Re: "... they [the French] use internal cues -- such as no longer feeling hungry -- to stop eating, reports a new Cornell study."

It's easier to take notice of your "internal cues" when you eat slower. Having been to Paris, I can attest that the Parisian diners I experienced, tend to be more interested in their dining companions and the conversation between them, than the food on their plate. If you're more interested in talking than eating, you eat slower and thereby feel the fullness more astutely, rather than if you were trying to hork down a 36 oz. steak like it's your last meal on earth. Which reminds me how inarticulate and anti-intellectual most American men are.

I love French culture.

#7 - In Europe you're given the time to eat. In the U.S. they plop the bill on the table when you're halfway through because they want a faster turnover rate.