Women have a special relationship with chocolate mostly because our culture tells them to. It goes back to the old claptrap about sweet treats being for ‘ladies’, while savoury tastes for men.

As society, we haven’t quite figured out what a new structure for meals would look like that isn’t just a hasty sandwich in the car on the way to something more important.

Every culture seems to have certain challenging vegetables that children find hard to love at first bite.

In Japan, food filters into every aspect of the culture.

Hara hachi bu is a Confucian principle, popular in Japan since medieval times, that you should eat until you are only eight-tenths full. This principle has since been given backing by nutrition scientists who note that when we eat there is a time delay between the body receiving the food and the brain registering that we are full. When the urge comes to have a second helping, it’s worth waiting twenty minutes, and the feeling may pass.

It’s not birthday cake in itself that is the problem. It’s the surrounding culture of food, where sweet treats are ever-present, consumed without ceremony.