Curate Your Cravings, Craft Your Comfort Foods

Note to readers: You can listen to this article by clicking on the voiceover recording above.

As the holidays approach, I like to write about health habits. This is the season when people tend to fall off their health goals, so it’s a good time to clarify intentions and make conscious choices. Holiday foods carry strong associations and can trigger powerful cravings. But short-term pleasures often lead to long-term regrets and undesirable results, such as weight gain, rising blood sugar and blood pressure, chronic inflammation and weakened metabolism. In an ideal world, this would be enough to deter us from indulging in foods that don’t serve us – yet many people feel powerless to overcome these cravings. We lack sufficient will, so we’re told. But what if we could take a different approach, and completely change our cravings so that we don’t have to resist them?

This article explores that question from both a behavioral and a nutritional perspective. Let’s begin with the psychology of building a new habit.

The birth of a habit

Many years ago I fell in love with archery. It was my boyfriend who got me into it, he and his bowhunting buddies here in rural upstate New York. Target practice combined physical strength, hand-eye precision, and outdoor social interaction – my idea of fun. One spring day, I stumbled across an opportunity to buy a brand new compound bow, small enough for a woman, at a second-hand price. Taking the offer as no coincidence, I decided to invest in the bow.

Two hours later I stood in my backyard, aiming for a paper plate tacked to a bale of hay. The arrow sailed over the top of the grassy block and disappeared into the grass. My boyfriend, a seasoned archer and hunter, stood beside me and laughed. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Ten thousand more shots, and you’ll be fine.”

I took his words to heart, and calculated how many shots I would have to make each day in order to reach this goal. I wanted to be proficient by the time bow season opened in the fall. To make 10,000 shots in six months, I would have to shoot 55 arrows every day. Not unreasonable, but difficult to integrate into my busy life. I lowered my goal to 8,000 shots, which brought the daily number to 44 arrows. More attainable. I didn’t reach this number every day, but on some days I exceeded it. More important, I was enjoying myself along the way and getting results: more arrows hit the center of the plate, and fewer missed the hay bale completely (which often damages the arrow, depending on where it lands) – and my arms were getting stronger.

After a while, I lost count of how many arrows I shot, forgot about the numbers, and no longer needed the structure. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had created a new habit – archery was now an “automatic reward pattern.” By early summer, the hay bale lay in matted shreds across the lawn, along with the tattered remains of countless paper plates. And that October of 1998, I shot my first buck with my compound bow, harvested the meat, the pelt, and the organs, and felt a great sense of accomplishment.

This brief anecdote is an example of how we may establish new and desired habits. First you identify your desired outcome, then you figure out the necessary steps to get there.

It’s crucial to divide your long-term goal into achievable, measurable steps. A step is not an outcome. Applying this idea to diet, a step might be drinking kombucha instead of wine, or eating plain yogurt with berries instead of blueberry cheesecake. An outcome is lower blood sugar, reduced inflammation, less acid reflux, and loss of weight. Keep taking steps in the right direction, and eventually you’ll reach your destination.

Research shows habit formation can take from 18 to 254 days, depending on the level of complexity and challenge, with the average being about 66 days. According to AI, to learn a word in a new language takes at least 15 repetitions within a certain time frame, though more are needed for full knowledge. With this in mind, we can set realistic expectations and a timeline we can trust. This way, after giving up sweets for fourteen days, for example – or shooting 50 arrows a day for two weeks – we don’t lose faith from lack of visible progress, but see where we are on the trajectory we mapped out for ourselves. Just like the old proverb that even a journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step, finding a way to chip away at our goal on a daily basis is the key to consistency – and consistency is the key to success.

Can such a habit hold up under holiday pressure? You bet. Once consistency is established, your confidence is based on experience, and this can carry you over bumps like the current of a stream slides over rocks.

What do habits have to do with cravings? To answer this question, let’s explore the microbiome, the cradle of your cravings.

What are cravings and where do they come from?

Your cravings are not necessarily what they seem – they may not even be “yours” – that is, they may not originate in your conscious brain. The trillions of cells in your body are greatly outnumbered by the living microbes in your gut. These bacteria, fungi, viruses, and phages, whether good or bad, thrive on the food you eat. Bad food cultivates bad gut bacteria, while healthy food encourages beneficial microbes to colonize and grow. The cause and effect is simple: if you eat a lot of corn, bacteria that loves to ferment its starchy contents will proliferate in your gut. If you eat pasta on a regular basis, pasta-loving bugs will thrive. If you stop eating pasta, they will trigger cravings through your gut-brain axis, jerking your neural networks to issue the call to feed them.

These patterns establish themselves through your enteric nervous system – also known as the “second brain” that lives in your gut. As part of the involuntary/autonomic nervous system, this brain in your belly contains over 100 million neurons and can operate independently of the central nervous system. Your vagus nerve, the largest and longest nerve in your body, is the bidirectional superhighway between the two. It’s more of an upward flow, however, with the gut doing most of the talking, and the brain listening. The gut is not just a digestive tube; it’s a nutrient-sensing neuroendocrine organ with multiple parallel detection systems. The gut contains hundreds of millions of nutrient sensors known as enteroendocrine cells (EECs) – the so-called “taste buds of the gut” that are constantly sending data to the brain. They line the intestinal mucosa and act as chemosensors — detecting carbohydrates, fats, amino acids, peptides, bile acids, and microbial metabolites. The flow of information is unquantifiable, and this is partly why the gut itself burns so much energy in order to function – up to 30% of your resting energy expenditure.¹

In response to signals from your gut, your brain adjusts the hormones that control hunger and satiety, energy and metabolism, detoxification, sleep patterns, stress response, and even mood. Try searching for “gut bacteria and mental health,” and you’ll get numerous results – and that’s just the beginning. Many more studies are in progress, with new findings every year about the extraordinary gut-brain axis.

Up to two-thirds of your immune system and ninety percent of your neurotransmitters are produced in your gut. This is your body’s interface with the outside world, where you take in the nutrients that make up every cell in your body – and where your immune system judges and responds to the millions of microbes and other substances you ingest. Month by month, season by season, the foods you eat shape this internal environment. It’s a long-term process that’s constantly evolving.

This is why I titled this article “Curate Your Cravings” rather than the original title I had in mind, “Curb Your Cravings.” The latter is a matter of deprivation and will. The former is a way of engaging a creative process. A museum curator may take years to gather enough works of art for a cohesive and thought-provoking exhibit. The term “curator” has also expanded to include “content curators” who manage and organize digital information and media, and less formally, who curate selections in areas like fashion, food, or music. Whatever the venue, curators must have far-reaching vision, and build their collections diligently. Similarly, we may use our decision-making frontal cortex to curate the bacterial species that live within us, and by doing so shape our bodies and our brains.

To set this upward spiral in motion, it helps to diversify the foods you eat. Casting a wide net introduces more species of gut bacteria. The more the merrier! The best way to strengthen and enrich your microbiome is to include several fermented foods in your meals each day, and at least thirty types of plants in your diet each week. This includes herbs, teas, and spices. To build a strong community, keep bringing in those friendly folks. (For more on this subject, see my article Diversify Your Diet).

“Thanks to the dynamic field of microbiome research, we know that we can start to change our microbiome very quickly . . . Through diligent attention to increasing our diversity – in our food and supplement choices, reducing stress and medications, increasing probiotics and prebiotics – we now know we can start to change our microbiome in as little as twenty-four hours.”

– Dr. Joshua Axe, from Eat Dirt: Why Leaky Gut May Be the Root Cause of Your Health Problems

It’s also important not to vandalize your inner neighborhood. Alcohol and antibiotics directly destroy beneficial gut bacteria. Sugar, refined starch, inflammatory oils and pharmaceutical drugs all degrade the microbiome and encourage the overgrowth of yeast and other pathogens. Gluten, carrageenan, gums and emulsifiers weaken the delicate mucosal lining of the gut, causing a frayed and leaky gut barrier. Any disharmony in the gut may cause or contribute to unwanted cravings.

For all these reasons and more, consistency is key. In order to create healthy cravings, you must make a habit of eating the foods you want your body to crave.

Reframing rewards

By changing your microbiome and instituting a new pattern, you are also reshaping your neurotransmitters – especially dopamine. Dopamine is the reward-seeking hormone, and triggers cravings to repeat anything that stimulates pleasure. I imagine this as part of my limbic system, which is involved in emotion, memory, motivation and rewards, and behavorial drives such as hunger, sex, and social bonding. Dopamine acts as the “spark” that powers limbic motivation and emotional circuits. You can change this pattern by changing your behavior – but it takes patience. Noticeable improvement often starts after 3–4 weeks. Substantial rewiring (true habit change) takes 2–3 months; and deep, stable change (automatic new reward patterns) may take 3–6 months.

Take sugar, for example – the most common addiction on the planet. For most people, reducing or even eliminating sugar and refined carbs is the single most important dietary change they can make to improve their health. When you eat sugar, it causes a rapid dopamine surge in brain regions that are part of the limbic “reward” pathway. Your brain learns:

“Sugar → dopamine → pleasure → do that again.”

Over time, this forms a conditioned association — certain cues (seeing dessert, feeling stressed, or finishing a meal) predict that reward and trigger the craving.

When you stop eating sugar, the brain initially experiences:

• Reduced dopamine release

• Fewer reward “hits” from familiar cues

• A sense of loss, fatigue, irritability, or craving

This is similar to withdrawal from an addictive drug. But with time, your brain’s reward threshold adjusts downward, and natural rewards (like stable energy, exercise, or savory foods) regain salience.

“The reward of patience
is patience.”

– Albert Einstein

It helps to enjoy the journey along the way. Notice (and perhaps write down or share) the sights and sounds, the new sensations, no matter how subtle. You are entering new territory, as intended. Stepping into the unknown can be scary at first, but it’s also exciting. With an understanding of the process, you can coach yourself through it. Set some small milestones for yourself, and reward yourself when you reach them. Thus, losing five pounds is a cause for celebration, even if your goal is to lose fifty. Focus on what you have achieved, and use that experience to build more motivation.

It’s also important to identify obstacles on your path. Family and peer pressure at social gatherings and the constant presence of sweets, snacks, and alcohol only add to temptation. Restaurant food is no help, either, with its fattening and inflammatory ingredients. Yet this is also an opportunity to walk your talk and strengthen your resolve. Forming a new habit under pressure is like climbing a steep hill while carrying weights – the extra burden makes you that much stronger. The key is to take the challenge willingly, and think of the hill as your friend.

What if we are not only building a new habit but also breaking an old one? Especially in the case of addiction, this is never easy. Addiction, whether to alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, sugar, or other dopamine-jerking foods – may sabotage our thinking, even as these habits sabotage our health. Undoing a bad habit may be as important as creating a new one. It’s an individual process unique to each person, often with deep roots reaching back to childhood. This is all the more reason to lean on structure while making changes, and if necessary reach out for support. Explore your motives, and rethink your presumptions. You might want to keep a diary of self-talk, just to shine the light of awareness on your mental chatter. Does it support or undermine your health goals? What is most important to you, and why? The very moment when you are challenged the most is a powerful opportunity to be your own best friend, take charge of your thinking, and transform the trajectory of your life. How can you keep that in mind when someone offers you a cocktail or a slice of chocolate cake? That’s a question worth pondering before you walk into that holiday dinner.

What is true comfort food?

Many people turn to comfort foods when they’re anxious, sad, or stressed. Common comfort foods include peanuts, chips, cereal, cookies, and all manner of ultra-processed junk food. Too often, these comfort foods are designed by food manufacturers to be addictive. With high levels of refined sugar, excess salt, and inflammatory fat, they taste good in the moment, but also add to unhealthy body fat, degrade your gut, stress your liver, disrupt your hormones, contribute to chronic inflammation, and most of all, undermine your health goals. Once swallowed, these foods quickly lead to feelings of regret – and more cravings. What comfort is there in that?

A true comfort food is one that brings you satisfaction without doing harm, and ideally also does good. These are nutrient-dense foods. Examples include: whole fruit; yogurt with nuts or seeds; raw vegetables with goat cheese or avocado; a probiotic pickle; an apple with tahini or nut butter; pesto on sliced tomato; unsweetened hot cocoa; or a beautiful salad dressed with your favorite olives. These foods are guilt-free, and full of healthy fiber, fat, and protein.

Hint: healthy comfort foods generally don’t come in packages; and they may not be finger foods. They may require a dish and utensils. Nuts are a notable exception, and an excellent source of low-carb protein, fat and fiber. But for some folks, these “open-ended” high-calorie snacks may not serve your ideal body weight. Craft your comfort foods according to your individual needs.

If tactile stimulation is what you want while relaxing with your comfort food – perhaps decompressing from work, maybe watching TV or a film – try doing something physical instead, like brushing your dog, braiding your hair, painting your toenails, knitting a scarf, beading a bracelet, giving or receiving a foot rub, or my favorite – pinching the skins off soaked almonds. Consider, too, that this desire for oral or tactile stimulation is a form of restlessness that may be channeled into physical movement instead. A brisk walk for just five minutes or a few minutes of yoga or weight-lifting might just be enough to override your craving. Try it! Motion changes your mindset (and your e-motions) – and can shift your metabolism, too. More on this below.

It’s wise to stock up on healthy comfort foods before you have cravings. Keep them on hand for when you need them, while also eliminating unwanted foods from your kitchen. This is like curating an art show by clearing out the paintings you don’t want to exhibit and making room for the ones you want. A good curator draws upon many resources, following leads until they have gathered a complete collection. Stock your gut with healthy gut bacteria, and your microbiome will become a biological work of art. Harmony and homeostasis is the ultimate expression here, well worth your curatorial efforts.

Changing your comfort foods may mean becoming an oddball for awhile. We are surrounded by unhealthy food-like substances in our society. In many places, such as gas station convenience stores, gym lobbies, and cafeterias, these are the only choices available. In order to buck this system, you may have to set yourself apart. Bringing an apple and pumpkin seeds rather than ordering something in a deli may raise your friends’ eyebrows and trigger teasing about how “strict” you are. Be prepared with a pocketful of white lies (“I’m allergic to sugar” or “My doctor put me on a special diet”) and if necessary, return the volley with quips of your own (“I’m aiming to live to 100” or “I’d rather eat this than spend time in the oncology ward”). Think of yourself as a pioneer and a positive role model for others.

Exercise as an enhancement for change

Nothing potentiates good health and good health habits like exercise. Any movement is good, from walking to yoga to sweeping the kitchen – but aerobic exercise and weight training are crucial for human health, and offer superior benefits. Try to think of it as movement, not exercise, which for many people carries an association with chores. Movement, however, is part of life, and the more we move, the healthier we are. Small exercise “snacks” throughout the day are as valuable as a concentrated workout. Especially after eating, activity opens up your insulin receptors and lowers your blood sugar. Breathe fresh air deeply through your nose, and you’ll also trigger the release of nitric oxide, a beneficial signaling molecule that relaxes the tiny blood vessels in your brain, lowers blood pressure, and acts as an antioxidant throughout your body.

When you fall off the horse with your dietary health goals, you can quickly dispel the setback by doing an extra workout the next day. You may be surprised by how easy this is, especially as an add-on, such as an extra walk or a quick ride on a spinning cycle. Add the extra activity at a different time of day. You’ll feel like you’re back on track that much sooner.

With each day of eating clean food and reaching your exercise goals, you’re strengthening your own personal integrity. Living in accord with your values is your greatest source of happiness. Put your money where your mouth is, and soon your mouth will be craving foods and activities that serve you. In time you’ll be able to trust your frontal cortex again, and give in to your healthy cravings with pleasure. You might even become addicted to the aftereffects of your exertion: better energy, a comfortable body weight, and a healthy metabolism. Isn’t that what you want to look back on after the holidays?

Nearly four years after giving up sugar in all forms, nothing I crave is off limits. Sautéed red cabbage with leeks; roasted beets sprinkled with olive oil and feta cheese; steamed peas with fermented carrots and coconut oil; sliced cold, cooked purple sweet potatoes with goat cheese; daikon radish with hummus; arugula with avocado and canned wild-caught mackerel; stir-fried green beans with almonds and butter; black beans with chopped clementines . . . These are the foods I can’t resist, and don’t need to. Now when I walk into a café, my eye goes not to the pastries – they look more like Christmas tree ornaments or painted rocks than something edible – but to the menu of spiced green teas. A good cup of tea can last through a long and satisfying conversation. If there’s nothing healthy to eat, I just reward myself when I get home with some wonderful Greek yogurt, perhaps with stewed cranberries and walnuts. What could be better? Eating at home also saves money. With each passing year, my cravings are more and more aligned with the foods I eat on a regular basis. Truly, I can eat whatever I want.

Think back on your own experience – how can you leverage your past successes to motivate the changes you want to make? It’s an individual path crafted by you, for you, and only for you. This journey of self-discovery is yet another reward of achieving your health goals. You’ll strengthen parts of yourself you didn’t even know exist.

As in the figure 8 in the above illustration, your eating affects your thinking, and your thinking affects your eating. Around and around it goes. To take control of this process, eat what you want to crave, and your cravings will follow suit. Step by step, you can align your habits with your intentions, and serve your optimal health and longevity.

To your good health –

Yael Bernhard
Certified Integrative Health & Nutrition Coach

Yael Bernhard is a writer, illustrator, book designer and fine art painter with a lifelong passion for nutrition and herbal medicine. She was certified by Duke University as an Integrative Health Coach in 2021 and by Cornell University in Nutrition & Healthy Living in 2022. For information about private health coaching or nutrition programs for schools, please respond directly to this newsletter, or email dyaelbernhard@protonmail.com. Visit her online gallery of illustration, fine art, and children’s books here.

Information in this newsletter is provided for educational – and inspirational – purposes only.

Have you seen my other Substack, Image of the Week? Check it out here, and learn about my illustrations and fine art paintings, and the stories and creative process behind them.

1. Statistic from ChatGPT.