"the ikea effect" and food

Okay, go read this first, so you'll know what I'm talking about. Go on. It's short.

You back? Alright. I have a few thoughts. First of all, I was thinking of my own dinner last night. On the way home from the gym, I was thinking that I had a package of hamburger in the fridge that I had to cook one way or the other because it was at its sell-by date. This didn't fill me with any great joy, because I was tired and I'd have preferred to skip the whole cooking dinner thing. But because that wasn't an option--I had meat to use up--I was running down the options of what I could do with it, considering what else I had in the house. I could make tacos, but that's such a production, what with all the toppings to prepare, and it makes a mess. I could make meat loaf which is less of a production, but it needs to be in the oven 50-60 minutes, so I'd be eating late. Or I could just make cheeseburgers, easy peasy, but which would mean there'd be leftover hamburger and we'd be eating cheeseburgers on Sunday too. Well, by the time I was in the door with my coat off throwing the junk mail into the recycling and putting my gym clothes in the wash, I made the decision to go with meat loaf.

And despite my not not not wanting to cook it, it was delicious when it was finally done. I make good meat loaf.*** Just sayin'. If the theory posited in the article is correct, maybe it was extra delicious because making it was filled with effort I hadn't wanted to expend.

On the other hand, do you see the flaw, the glaring flaw, in the premise? If in 1965 the average married woman was spending more than twice the time her counterpart 30 years later was cooking and cleaning up after, perhaps this theory explains why she was less fat than the 1995 chick. But what about her husband, huh? Average married guy in 1965 spent no time and effort getting fed. He didn't even have to push a few buttons on the microwave. He sat down at the table and, glory hallelujah, someone put a nice (or not-so-nice, not everyone who cooked everyday got it down to palatable****, but at least it was food) home-cooked meal in front of him. So why the fuck shouldn't he have been fatter than 1995 dude who presumably had to do some work in the kitchen at some point?

But I may see a way around this, if we take into account that striatum business. Maybe the act of having someone cook us a meal hits up our dopamine receptors because it's so emotionally satisfying and pleasurable--it is at least for me--and thus we are satiated that way.

Or maybe this is all a bunch of bullshit and the reason Americans are getting fatter is the HFCS in every goddamn thing they eat. Excuse me, "corn sugar." That's what we're calling it now, aren't we?

xoxo

***Actually, I have been buying almost solely the "nature's promise" meat from Stop & Shop or, once in awhile, the actual grassfed stuff from Whole Paycheck, and D and I are both convinced it tastes better than the cheap meat. I made pork chops the other day, just sauteing them in a little olive oil with rosemary and salt, and they were so freaking good, and I'm not even a pork fan.

****I had a couple of aunts...oy.