Food Theories

I recently went to an international luncheon. We talked about food! Really! One woman was from Korea. Her husband is also Korean. A number of years ago, he became ill and had to have surgery. Since then, she has been very very careful about the food she makes for him. Two years and 8 months, no eating out, no salt for most of that time, etc. She talked about the microbiotic diet they were on. She has definitely thought and read a lot about food.

She read that people are healthiest if they eat the food of the country they are living in. Not the food of their birth country. Live in Japan, eat Japanese. Live in Korea, eat Korean.

I noticed back in the early '80's, when war orphans were returning to Japan from China to visit their relatives, that they looked NOTHING like their relatives. Of course their clothing and hair styles were Chinese, but even their faces and bodies resembled Chinese people of that time, rather then their relatives. I began to think about how our diet, rather than DNA affects the way we look.

Then, I read an article about babies who tend to like what their mothers' ate while they were pregnant with them. The study was about carrots. The moms who ate lots of carrots while they were pregnant, gave birth to kiddos who loved carrot juice much more than other kids.

This article interested me, because, Jun's birth mom probably ate a lot of Japanese food while she was pregnant. And, Jun really prefers Japanese food to western. Now, maybe it is as the study says, and maybe she likes the strong salty and sweet flavors of Japanese cooking, but...hmmm.

I also read something about food memories. Regardless of the junk we may eat during college and single years, most of us tend to return to the food our parents fed us during our growing up years when we settle down and raise our own families. I told one relative this and she looked at me, shocked. Her sweet girls were chowing down a bag of tortilla chips with root-beer! HAHAHAH!

How about you? Any Food Theories?? Bring them on!