Homemade food tastes best

Home-cooked food tastes better, especially if it's "healthy" food. This is the result of a joint study by the University of Cologne and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich, in which 120 women participated. On average, they were 26 years old and mostly students.
They were served a low-fat raspberry shake or a high-calorie chocolate shake for the experiment. Some of the women had previously prepared the drink themselves. The others were given only the list of ingredients with instructions, the shake was already finished. The women should assess the taste and assess how healthy and high in calories it is.

Home-made always tastes best. Picture: contrast workshop - fotolia

Anyone who had prepared the shake himself, he tasted better. This was primarily for the raspberry shake with the healthy ingredients. For women who pay close attention to their diet and count calories, the effect was expected to be stronger. Presumably, the taste is also rated better because the human unconsciously has the need to justify time and effort for the preparation. In addition, awareness of the ingredients increases when you make the drink yourself.

The scientists suspect that finished products taste less good simply because they cause little effort. In further studies, the topic should be considered more differentiated. It has not yet been conclusively clarified whether the results can also be applied to men, children and other food groups and what influence cooking skills and nutritional knowledge have.

The findings reinforce the general recommendations for cooking at home and eating less fast food and ready meals. Education and instruction in schools could encourage participation in food preparation at an early stage and thus counter obesity. (Heike Kreutz, aid)