A new study reveals that being addicted to cheese is a real phenomenon, providing a scientific explanation for its being a key ingredient in the most addictive food based on the research: pizza. People crave the dairy product like a drug addiction to cocaine or heroin, whether it is sliced for crackers, spread on bagels, or melted between toasted slices of bread, due to its natural milk protein and food processing.
The study was published in the United States National Library of Medicine. It was conducted by the University of Michigan (UM).
Researchers wanted to determine why particular foods cause endless cravings. They discovered certain addictive foods based on around 500 students' results after filling out the Yale Food Addiction Scale to learn if they had a food addiction, according to Los Angeles Times.
Pizza topped the list as the most addictive food. The main reason is linked to the cheesy goodness.
Researchers learned that certain foods cause an addiction based on the processing method used. More processed and fattier foods were more closely linked to uncontrollable eating behaviors such as non-stop snacking.
The more processed a cheese is, the more addictive it is, including highly-processed "plastic cheese." It often contains extra salt, vegetable oils, emulsifiers (combine liquids with different thicknesses), and artificial coloring.
Such foods can cause more health problems for certain people. That includes those with food addictions and higher body mass indexes (BMI).
Lead author Erica Schulte is a UM psychology doctoral student. She explained to Mic that fat caused eating problems in the study's volunteers even when they showed no food addiction symptoms. The average Americans eats 35 pounds (15.9 kilograms) of cheese yearly.
Cheese is very addictive due to its casein milk proteins. When humans digest yogurt, cheese, or ice cream, the casein releases "casomorphins." Like drugs they then trigger "opioid receptors" in the brain, thus making food addictive, according to Daily Mail.
Milk only contains a small amount of casein. However, making one pound (.45 kilograms) of cheese requires around 10 pounds of milk, which boosts the chemical's effect.
Over 2,000 varieties of cheese are made. Cheddar is the most popular worldwide, and is also the most common one mentioned in scientific studies.
This video shows an interesting experiment with real and processed cheese: