Welcome back to another episode of the talk.

Today we are continuing our conversation with Dr. Alex D. Felice-Antonio,

all about ultra-processed foods and the brain.

Okay, my question to you is, we've talked a lot about the negative effects ultra-processed

food has on the brain.

Is there a way to harness the way you know your brain

works to try to make healthy foods more craveable or interest into your brain?

Like, I'm even thinking about the fact that, oh, okay, you already have an answer.

Okay, let's hear it.

Well, so I think that people, and this is something we've been talking about a lot,

we're working on a paper right now where we're trying to understand like what nutritional

factors kind of increase the addictiveness of certain foods, the addictive potential of certain foods.

And we really are trying to get away from this idea that there's some sort of like single

nutrient that is going to,

to, you know, lead to some sort of poor health outcome. You have to take a really holistic

approach. And so I really, I would say anything that increases your fruit and vegetable

consumption, right? So like we know that people in the U.S. do not eat enough fruits and

vegetables. And then I think we get this idea of, like, oh, well, if I put, like, cheese on the broccoli, it's not healthy anymore. And it's like, no, put cheese on the broccoli. Put salt on the broccoli. Right, right. Right. Those are things that are going to signal to your brain, like, oh, yeah, this is really good and over time you'll really learn to like the other flavors that are associated

with that.

And so if you don't like vegetables, we know that exposure, so repeated exposure to foods will lead to liking.

And if you can't make yourself eat them like steamed, yeah, don't eat them like steamed and plain.

Put something really tasty on them. And over time, you'll eat them like steamed and plain. Put something really tasty on them.

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