275 Quotes by Bee Wilson

Umami is the savoury meatiness in seaweed and miso and soy sauce. It is, to a large extent, the concept that enables Japanese cuisine to be healthy and attractive at the same time.

The concept of “delicious” was born in Japan in 1908 when a chemist called Ikeda discovered a “fifth taste” called umami that was neither bitter nor salty nor sweet nor sour but something more wonderful and compelling than any of these.

In the West the word “delicious” is likely to conjure up something laced with sugar, fat and salt, whereas in Japan it signifies a flavour found in mushrooms, grilled fish and light broths.

Hunger is always a kind of emptiness - an absence of nourishment - but what it will take to replenish it is far from obvious.

We tend to automatically associate hearty meat dishes with men and lighter salads and sweets with women, and these stereotypes are replicated in cultures as different as France and Japan.

Once the pattern of not being hungry in the morning is set, it modifies the way you eat for life.

Prolonged chronic malnutrition affects children for the rest of their lives because it affects both brain development and growth.

If food is a fuel, we should feel that the tank is emptiest when the longest time has elapsed since it was filled - usually in the morning.

Hunger - this mechanism that we suppose to be so basic - turns out to be one of the more intricate bodily impulses.