A new study from Penn State University has found that adding a little spice to your meals might help you eat less.
Researchers discovered that spicing up food just a little – enough to give it a mild burn in your mouth – made people eat more slowly and take in fewer calories overall.
The study looked at how spiciness affects eating habits. The idea was simple: when people eat slower, they often eat less.
So the researchers wondered if adding a bit of chili to a dish could make people slow down without ruining the taste.
To test this, scientists at Penn State’s Sensory Evaluation Center created two popular meals: beef chili and chicken tikka masala.
They made two versions of each – one mild and one spicy. The spice level was carefully adjusted using a mix of hot and sweet paprika, so the flavor stayed the same but the heat increased.
The study involved 130 adults. Each person got one version of the meal and was filmed while eating.
The team used the videos to track how fast people ate, how big their bites were, how long the meal took, how much food and water they consumed, and how much they enjoyed the meal.
The results were clear: when meals were made spicier, people ate more slowly and consumed less food and fewer calories. Importantly, they still enjoyed the food just as much as the mild versions. The spice didn’t make them dislike the dish – it simply changed how they ate it.
Lead researcher Paige Cunningham, who earned her doctorate at Penn State, said that slowing down while eating gives the body more time to signal when it’s full.
This helps people stop eating earlier than they normally would. “We found that spicy food slowed people down and led to eating less, without affecting how tasty they thought the food was,” she said.
Professor John Hayes, a food science expert at Penn State and one of the study’s authors, explained that water intake didn’t change between spicy and mild meals. So drinking more water wasn’t the reason people ate less. Instead, it was really about the slower pace of eating.
He also pointed out that participants felt just as full after the spicy meals, even though they ate less. That’s an encouraging sign that spiciness might be a useful tool for anyone looking to cut back on food without feeling deprived.
The team now wants to explore whether spicy food could also reduce snacking and help with other eating habits.
This study was supported by funding from the McCormick Science Institute and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. An undergraduate student, Isaiah Smith, also helped with the research through a special internship program.
This research shows that something as simple as adding chilies to your lunch could be a small change that leads to big benefits. If you’re looking to eat less without feeling hungry or sacrificing taste, adding a little heat to your meals might be worth a try.
The study is published in Food Quality and Preference.
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