Tag Archives: other-journalists

FOOD BUZZ : A Dr. Oz-like analysis of 52 paintings depicting the Last Supper finds that Jesus' portion control is severely lacking. As in, his plate has grown 62% in the last thousand years. Memo to JC: it takes your stomach 20 minutes to realize it's full. Eat slowly, and stop eating when you're full. Pretty sure I read all that in Acts. The Best Links: A breakdown of 4 paintings. A video lecture! Using computer aided design technology, the brothers compared the size of the portions, bread and plates with the average size of the heads in 52 paintings. Entrees increased 69 percent in size during the 1,000 years, plate size 66 percent and bread size 23 percent, the Wansinks reported in a study published in the April edition of The International Journal of Obesity. “I think people assume that increased serving sizes, or ‘portion distortion,’ is a recent phenomenon,” said Brian Wansink, director of the Cornell University Food and Brand Lab and author of “Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think.” “But this research indicates that it’s a general trend for at least the last millennium.” But maybe it’s worth entertaining another hypothesis: that the images we see—and the Last Supper is one of the more ubiquitous art images in the Western world—subliminally affect our notion of what’s a portion size. the Mindless Eating site The International Journal of Obesity, where the article cannot be found. Read