Post #2197561

There's ample research showing that physiological stress affects GABAergic tone. There's plenty of research showing that reduced GABAergic tone alters our food preferences and intake. They've even noticed a thing with poor diets leading to *reduced* frontal GABA but *increased* glutamate. The parallel with carbohydrates and serotonin is very well established. We also very much understand how ultra processed foods hijack our neurotransmitter systems "behavioural handles". Processed foods all exploit three neurotransmitter systems: GABA, serotonin, and dopamine. What I can't find is any study into the cross-cultural comfort food thing. This is my own observation and I can't see it formalised in any literature. But the pattern holds across: ramen (Japan), egusi soup (Nigeria), doro wat (Ethiopia), tagine (Morocco), jollof rice (West Africa), Hainanese chicken rice (Southeast Asia), bolognese (Italy), borscht (Eastern Europe), feijoada (Brazil), sancocho (Latin America), congee (East Asia), dal (South Asia), and many others. The common denominator is long-cooked protein and/or fermentation — both of which produce or concentrate free glutamate. This is not random.