A personal observation regarding eating not tasty food:
I served in the Israeli army, eating 3 meals a day on base. The food was perfectly edible... But that's the best I can say about it.
People noticeably ate less - eating exactly until they weren't hungry and nothing more than that, and many lost a few kilos.
Adding my anecdote to everyone else's: after learning about the palatability hypothesis, I resolved to eat only non-tasty food for a while, and lost 30 pounds over about four months (200 -> 170). I've since relaxed my diet a little to include a little tasty food, and now (8 months after the start) have maintained that loss (even going down a little further).
I'm going to bury this a bit deeper in the comment chain because it's no more
indicative than Eliezer's anecdote. But FWIW,
I am in the (very fortunate) minority who struggles to gain much weight, and has
always been skinny. But when I have more tasty food around, especially if it's
prepared for me and just sitting there, I absolutely eat more, and manage to
climb up from ~146 to ~148 or ~150 (pounds). It's unimaginable that this effect
isn't true for me.
A personal observation regarding eating not tasty food:
I served in the Israeli army, eating 3 meals a day on base. The food was perfectly edible... But that's the best I can say about it. People noticeably ate less - eating exactly until they weren't hungry and nothing more than that, and many lost a few kilos.
Adding my anecdote to everyone else's: after learning about the palatability hypothesis, I resolved to eat only non-tasty food for a while, and lost 30 pounds over about four months (200 -> 170). I've since relaxed my diet a little to include a little tasty food, and now (8 months after the start) have maintained that loss (even going down a little further).