One of my listeners, Emily, shared a question that sent me down a nerdy rabbit hole. She grew up in Canada eating potatoes as a staple and can eat a lot of them with no problem but rice makes her full really fast. Her Indonesian friends are the opposite: they can eat a lot of rice, but potatoes shut them down fast.

In this episode, we explore whether there’s any scientific reason behind this so come join me and find out what the data really says!

In this episode:

• Where potatoes and rice originated, how they spread globally and how many varieties exist
• How we define fullness
• Expected satiety
• Gastric emptying explained and what it implies for rice vs potatoes
• Why rice and potatoes aren’t single foods
• The genetics angle
• The answer to the question

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References mentioned in the episode:

• Spooner, D.M., & colleagues (overview chapters / syntheses on potato domestication and diversity). Cambridge / academic syntheses on potato biodiversity and domestication.
• Zheng, Y. et al. (2016). Rice Domestication Revealed by Reduced Shattering of Archaeological rice from the Lower Yangtze Valley. Scientific Reports.
• Irvine, M.A. et al. (2013). Increased familiarity with eating a food to fullness underlies increased expected satiety. Appetite.
• Amr, A.M. et al. (2024). Potatoes Compared with Rice in Meals with either Animal or Plant Protein Reduce Postprandial Glycemia and Increase Satiety in Healthy Adults: A Randomized Crossover Study. Journal of Nutrition.
• Debry, G. et al. (1988). Relationship between rate of gastric emptying and glucose and insulin responses to starchy foods. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
• Holt, S.H.A. et al. (1995). A satiety index of common foods. European Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
• Perry, G.H. et al. (2007). Diet and the evolution of human amylase gene copy number variation. Nature Genetics.