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Fragrances & Colors That Cause Hunger

While people obviously must eat for the sake of nutrition and sustenance, hunger often can be triggered by more than just an empty stomach. The environment around you --- be it the color of the walls in your favorite restaurant or the aroma wafting from the neighbor's kitchen --- can often stir food cravings or feelings of hunger. There are specific colors and smells that are known to trigger hunger pangs.

  1. Red and Orange

    • Red and orange are believed to stimulate hunger. This may partially be because these colors appear in many foods, unlike blue, which is not a common food color. Red and orange also inspire passion and heat, emotions that are sometimes associated with food. Both red and orange are popular colors for kitchen utensils for this reason. Red and orange's ability to stir hunger also inspires many restaurant owners to use those colors when painting the walls of their establishments.

    Earth Tones

    • Earth tones like brown and beige do not arouse the same feelings of hunger that red and orange are believed to stir up, but they do make a space conducive to eating. These tones are warm and tend to make people feel comfortable and safe. Since food is often associated with family and being taken care of, browns can make people feel like they want to sit down and share a meal.

    Aroma of Food

    • Unsurprisingly, the most common smell to trigger hunger is the smell of food. This is usually only true if the smell is coming from a food that you like. If you happen to love pot roast and walk into a kitchen with a pot roast cooking in the oven, that smell is going to make you feel hungry. The same goes for the smell of hot buttered popcorn in a movie theater. Smells associated with salty and sweet foods seem to be the strongest scent triggers.

    Fragrance of Memory

    • Just like the earth tone colors will make you feel comfortable and warm, thus making you want to eat, certain scents can give you an emotional desire to eat. The most common is the scent of cookies baking in the oven or other warm spicy scents like cinnamon that often remind people of family or holidays. This effect is different than smelling popcorn, knowing you like popcorn, and thus wanting to eat popcorn. It's not the cookies themselves that make you want to eat, but the comfort and emotional ties to the smell.

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