I saw a special on PBS this week which was all about how "low-fat" made America fat

Check out loaves of bread in your local supermarket and you'll see that almost every loaf has sugar added. Ditto meats in the deli department and just about any processed food. Why? Yeasty bread tastes great, meat should be allowed to taste like meat and it seems that manufacturers believe the US public won't purchase goods unless they taste sweet. Take a look at toothpaste as well: obviously they can't add sugar to that(!) but try to find a tube that doesn't contain saccharin. Why does toothpaste have to be sweet?!

Humans are hard-wired to enjoy sweet foods, which is presumably why manufacturers started adding sugar to everything, but now that the practice is so widespread the only real effect is an increase in daily calorie intake. And to be perceived as "sweet" above the sugar-laden norm requires a massive calorie wallop.

You guys need to convince manufacturers that tastes are multi-dimensional. Natural sour flavours are cool. Yeasty is cool. Unleavened rye and bran flavours are cool. Roughage is cool. Olive oily flavors are cool. Sweet flavours are for dessert, not for every course at breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Maybe the next generation will do it. Significant numbers of young women in particular are finding beauty in various body-piercings and tattoos. I'm sure they'll have no trouble redefining pleasurable eating that excludes sweetness. Perhaps sugary food will one day be regarded like cigarettes. ;-)