distract, but rather enhances your experience.
Remember, reward, memory, and emotion
pathways in the brain are all interconnected.
The same series of biochemical events that
connected you to that downtown-bakery
cookie could be used to reinforce your love
and appreciation of healthy, home-cooked
meals shared with the ones you love.
Taking time with your meal also means
chewing your food carefully. Wolfing down
food not only harms digestion because it
arrives in your stomach without being
properly broken down, but it doesn’t give your
satiety hormones a chance to send their
signals, either. As you eat, receptors in the
stomach are activated as it fills with food or
liquid. These receptors communicate your
level of fullness to the brain through various
hormones (including leptin). But these signals
take time to start to register in the brain—at
least ten minutes. By eating too quickly,
you’re not giving your hormones enough time