It's a well-known fact that food makes us happy: studies and research have abundantly demonstrated how some foods contain specific substances capable of activating certain receptors in our brain (such as chocolate, which aids the production of serotonin and dopamine). What we want to talk about here is the ability of food to evoke emotions and sensations that have nothing to do with their composition. We want to talk about what madeleines were for Proust, or what ratatouille represents for the critic Anton Ego in the Disney film Ratatouille. We want to talk to you about memory, recollections, and how food always manages to move us.
What Would the World Be Like Without Coffee?
If you were asked to think of the smell of home, what would you think of? Probably coffee. Whether it's with milk or pure, it's the drink of choice whenever you need energy. And if we said that coffee smells like home, it's easy to understand why even the smell alone instantly lifts our spirits. But, beyond the love for our home, there's a very specific reason why the smell of coffee makes us happy. Its aroma can connect two very different areas of the brain: according to a study, it can unite the cerebral cortex, which controls movement, and the limbic system, the most emotional part of our brain. This is why coffee, even just smelling it, instantly puts us in a good mood.
Kindness Smells Like Bread
We can probably all agree that there's no smell better than freshly baked bread. That scent that evokes tradition, sharing, and moments spent with family. A scent that accompanies our dinners because, let's face it, bread is never missing from our tables. Just like coffee, the smell of bread transports us to a warm and familiar dimension. But that's not all.
A study published in the Journal of Social Psychology and conducted by the University of South Brittany in France demonstrated how this typical smell affects emotions and kindness towards others. The experiment was conducted as follows: a group of volunteers were asked to drop a paper tissue or a glove near two shops, a bakery and a clothing store. 400 unsuspecting people were involved in the study, and the results were truly surprising: 77% of people returned the object in front of the bakery, while 52 % returned it in front of the clothing store. The study demonstrated how a pleasant smell could positively change people's attitudes towards others. So if you pass by a bakery and feel kinder, know that science is on your side.
If It Were Always Christmas
The lights, the markets, the decorated houses, and one scent above all others: cinnamon. Because yes, if Christmas had a smell, it would be exactly that. The very moment our sense of smell is inundated by this characteristic aroma, our minds take us back to pleasant sensations, to festive moments, and to the joy that this season brings.
A study by Seo et al. in 2009 found that subjects associated the smell of cinnamon with the Christmas season. A subsequent study also demonstrated how the time of year affects the subjects' perception: in fact, most of them gave positive evaluations when they smelled cinnamon during the Christmas season compared to summer, when they found the smell more unpleasant, further strengthening the close connection between Christmas and cinnamon. So how can a nice cinnamon roll not make us happy?!
Proust, Madeleines and Involuntary Memory
We cannot fail to mention the probably most famous example in this field: that of Proust and his madeleines. The French author, in the first volume of his novel In Search of Lost Time, describes the sensations and emotions he felt the exact moment he ate a madeleine dipped in tea, just as his aunt Léonie did. A simple gesture that reawakened memories he thought he had forgotten, a flavor that managed to bring back what his mind had archived.
But how is this possible? Thanks to involuntary memory, which has the ability to bring back memories spontaneously and unexpectedly, often triggered by sensory stimuli such as smells, tastes, sounds, or images. In Proust's case, we can explain why this happens thanks to neurogastronomy.
Neurogastronomy, or How Food Makes Us Feel
The birth of this branch of neuroscience, neurogastronomy, which studies how our brain creates flavors, dates back to the early 2000s. Gordon Shepherd, the father of this science, studied how the perception of flavor affects human memory and the mind. Why does a smell sometimes stick in our head? Because flavor is not created by the mouth, but by the so-called retronasal sense of smell: when we eat something, its smell rises to the nasal cavities, which then transmit information to the brain. This is why Proust didn't forget madeleines or why cinnamon makes us long for Christmas.
And if we talk about memory, neurogastronomy demonstrates how this aspect is particularly important in our taste experience. Think about how many times you've craved a dish and already found your mouth watering. Just thinking about it activates areas that involve memory, expectations, and emotions, setting in motion all the mechanisms that contribute to the sensation of flavor. Linking the taste of a food to a particular moment in our lives makes our taste experience even stronger. This is why we tend to always seek out our favorite foods: because, on the one hand, they are obviously the ones we like the most, on the other, they most likely evoke emotions we never want to stop feeling.
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