(Text/John Allen) "In promoting food, one word' crispy' is worth 1, adjectives ... People are naturally fond of crispy food," star chef Mario Batali once said. Indeed, crispy foods such as tempura, nachos, potato chips, French fries and fried chicken are the vanguard of countries, especially developed countries, occupying the international catering market. Brittleness breaks cultural boundaries.
It's interesting to say that people are naturally fond of crispy food. As an anthropologist who is interested in both cognitive evolution and human diet evolution, I think that the nature of loving crispy food may give us a deeper understanding of the cognitive evolution of human food.
The result of evolutionary adaptation
Eating is as important to human survival as social, language, sex and gender roles, but it has not been paid attention by evolutionary psychologists and other behavioral evolutionary scientists. Diet is naturally influenced by culture, and culture will also shape people's dietary concepts, such as what they can and can't eat under what circumstances. However, diet is also influenced by evolution. In the course of millions of years of evolution, human beings have developed some special tastes and taste preferences. When food is sufficient, some things can't stop eating, and they often eat too much.
the temptation of backup food
what crispy food do our primate relatives eat now? What about the former primate ancestors? In ancient times, there were two main sources of crispy food in the natural environment where primates lived: insects and some parts of plants (especially stems, some leaves, beans and possibly roots). Modern people have different views on eating insects. In western society, people usually think that insects are extremely disgusting, dirty and carry germs. However, in many other cultures, people eat insects more or less, and some eat larvae (not so brittle); More people eat adults. Many ethnic groups like to eat the crispy chitin exoskeleton of adults, and they will fry it and sprinkle seasoning to make it more crisp.
Delicious fried crispy worms, it must be said, look good ~ (Photo: edwardkhoo.com)
No one or large primates can live by eating worms, and the nutrition is simply not enough. However, some small primates, such as lorises, marmosets, tarsiers and smaller lemurs, basically live by eating insects. This primate is similar to the primitive primate 6 million years ago in shape and habits. Most paleoanthropologists believe that insects are one of the important food sources of these primitive primates. Therefore, even if some people don't like eating insects today, our ancestors all ate insects.
Many people don't like vegetables that much. Vegetables are not as sweet and juicy as most fruits. Fruits attract animals to eat their own seeds in this way, but the plant parts that we regard as vegetables usually contain toxins, just to avoid being eaten by animals, and their nutrients are relatively low. Many animals, including some major primates, have evolved special digestive systems that can live on leaves and stems. However, chimpanzees, the closest relatives of human beings, are still mainly fruits, supplemented by leafy plants and insects (they also love meat, but eat relatively little).
Primate ecologists refer to the non-preferred food that apes or monkeys eat when there is no other food as "backup food". Obviously, humans and other primates have evolved a preference for sweetness and saltiness, and they may also like oil and umami-the taste produced by meat and some other foods. As the name implies, reserve food is not the preferred food of animals, but there will always be times when the preferred food is not available or insufficient. Therefore, for the most easily available backup food, animals will adaptively like some characteristics of these foods. For humans, the attraction of reserve foods (such as insects and fresh vegetables) may be "crisp". Crispy taste can make relatively common and not very delicious backup food more acceptable, and the "nature" of human beings who like crisp food may also be the result of evolutionary adaptation.
cooking is an art; Of course, so is crispy. Calm down and listen to the sound of frying. (Photo: Modernist Cuisine) Advantages of Cooking At some point in human evolution, maybe more than one million years ago, our ancestors discovered and learned to use fire. Primatologist Richard Wrangham said that this is one of the most important events in the history of human evolution. This enabled primitive humans to open up new food sources and make better use of the whole hunted or searched animals, instead of being limited to soft parts such as brain, liver and spinal cord. Now they can cook (and thus soften) the most nutritious fibrous muscles in animals. Fire can also be used to cook tough roots, which is a source of heat that other apes or primitive humans have not developed.
Cooking has brought a series of new crispy foods to human beings, as well as possibly more important and rich-flavored foods. Heating promotes Maillard reaction-carbohydrates and amino acids combine to produce a series of flavors and aromas (and brown colors). In dry and hot cooking such as barbecue, baking and frying, Maillard reaction will occur on the surface of meat or vegetables, which will enhance the taste and form a crispy skin on the surface of food. As wrangham said: The nutritional advantages provided by cooking undoubtedly make it a key step in the process of human evolution. At the same time, cooking also combines crispness with more attractive taste (compared with crisp backup food), which may also make humans become more and more good at cooking.
Attraction of modern society
Click-click enjoyment
Crispy food enhances the sensory experience of eating. We know that people will use taste, smell and touch to evaluate the material and "feeling" of food in their hands and mouth when eating, and the one part that has not been paid enough attention to is hearing and feeling of sound.
some restaurants take into account the sound when eating. Many cultures have defined the sound level when people eat. When western etiquette experts try to eliminate the "indecent noise" when eating, other cultures use the warm noise when eating to express their love for food. Crispy food can not only stimulate taste and smell, but also stimulate hearing. Crispness is different from other characteristics of food in essence. Even if the food itself is not delicious, its crispness can make people happy. Crispy food chews louder than non-crisp food.
When people are eating, the internal chewing noise always exists. In fact, it is a typical "listening but not listening" sound. All nervous and sensory systems have a common feature, which is called reaction weakening-they will become numb to a lasting stimulus, just like aesthetic fatigue. Similarly, when we eat, we will get used to the taste and smell of food. If the stronger the sensory signal, the longer it takes for the reaction to weaken, and then every time we eat, we will stay fond of crispy food for a longer time.
a dish of the famous Spanish chef Ferran Adrià. Adria is a chef representative of molecular cuisine, with the title of Michelin three stars, and his restaurant ranks among the top three restaurants in the world. (Photo: anthonyarroyodotcom.com)
In order to overcome the sensory fatigue, a star chef like Ferran Adrià will present a large number of dishes with few varieties and many varieties during a long (and expensive) meal. Anyone who gains weight during festivals knows that different delicacies on traditional festivals will reduce the habituation of the senses and make people eat more unconsciously.
association of sounds and others
When we say or meditate words like "crispy" and "crunchy" [note ]
, we will think of the characteristics they describe. The etymology of "Crispy" is very complicated. At first, it seems to mean bending or wavy. But whatever the etymology, it is most commonly used to describe crisp food. Obviously, the pronunciation of "crisp" is not completely consistent with the actual "crisp" sound, but for some reason, it will evoke this sound in our ears. Similarly, the word "crunchy" is widely regarded as an onomatopoeic word, which evokes a stronger feeling, perhaps a little less elegant.
onomatopoeia may be one reason why "crispy" is so effective on the menu. The functional neuroimaging study of onomatopoeia words shows that when hearing these words, some areas in the subject's brain will produce activities, which is the area that actually experiences the action or the emotional state caused by the words.
Just reading, hearing or saying the onomatopoeic words "crispy" and "crunchy" will make people feel like eating this kind of food. It stands to reason that this feeling is reflected in the brain, that is, the tongue and mouth area of the main motor cortex area is activated (of course, when actually speaking a word, the motor area of the mouth is directly activated). The description of "crisp" is very strong, because in a sense, hearing or saying the word "crisp" will strongly promote the sports imagination of eating-the food with the word "crisp" has been eaten by potential customers to some extent. The word "crispy" has a strong appeal on the menu, especially because crispy food is usually delicious in other ways.
of course, there may be other reasons why crispness is so attractive. In the modern food environment, crispy foods that are commercially produced and vigorously promoted are everywhere, and they are also demonized as causing obesity. These foods, at least some of them, are "bad". But as many people realize: doing something bad, as long as it is not too bad, will be enjoyable in essence. Enjoy a bag of French fries not only because it is packed in a beautiful and creaky packaging bag, which provides salt, fat and carbohydrates. But also because in a sensational and contradictory nutrition culture, it can bring the stimulation of "stealing forbidden fruits".
[ Note ]crispy and crunch both mean "crispy".
the "crisp" attraction, Or listen more authentic ~ Compile the original: Why Humans Are Crazy for Crispy (abridged) Publish information: The website of Chronicle of Higher Education on May 27, 212 About the author: John S. Allen is a researcher at the donis Cognitive Neuroscience Imaging Center of the University of Southern California and the Institute of Brain and Creativity.