Not ‘Just Salad’ Anymore: Q&A With Researcher Brad Turnwald

Stories From the Field

Not ‘Just Salad’ Anymore: Q&A With Researcher Brad Turnwald

Brad Turnwald

What do you get at a restaurant when you order mixed Tuscan greens, luscious leeks, golden beets, and a splash of daring vinaigrette?

If you said, “just a salad,” Brad Turnwald’s research is just for you.

“Often, we think of healthy foods as depriving,” said Turnwald, a Stanford graduate student and affiliate of Stanford SPARQ: Social Psychological Answers to Real-world Questions. “I wanted to know why.”

In a Q&A with SPARQ, Turnwald described the power of food descriptions to encourage healthy meal choices, discussed Midwestern meat and potatoes, and hinted at the future directions of his research.

SPARQ: What inspired you to investigate how people perceive healthy foods?

Turnwald: When I moved to California in 2013, the foods I started eating and I saw other people eating changed my idea of what made a good meal. It was really different than the kind of meat-and-potatoes mantra I grew up with in rural Ohio. I realized you can prepare vegetables and healthy foods really well. I wanted to share that experience with people and I wondered to what extent my taste experience was socially constructed.

SPARQ: You and other researchers looked at restaurant menus to see how they presented healthy foods. What did you discover?

Turnwald: We found that healthy foods are not presented as enticingly as other options. That’s a problem, because most people prioritize taste when selecting their meals. I thought that perhaps we could level the playing field for nutritious foods by changing their descriptions to at least sound as good as the descriptions often attached to popular unhealthy foods. We are finding across multiple studies and settings that describing healthy foods with language that emphasizes their flavorful and satisfying characteristics can change the way that people view their food. They go from seeing it as something that’s restrictive and unpleasant to something mouthwatering. Changing this mindset that healthy foods aren’t tasty helps people choose healthier foods more often. And they enjoy them more, too.

SPARQ: What are some examples of enticing language?

Turnwald: A lot of it is emphasizing the tasty, desirable characteristics of the food. Many healthy meals instead get described with words that hint at deprivation — reduced, low-fat, light, low. If you instead use textures, flavors, exotic ingredients, and exciting, dangerous, or fun words, you can change the way people view a healthy dish. Ike’s Place, a sandwich shop in the Bay Area, does an amazing job of this with its meatless options. It uses names like “Disco Disco” and “Love Triangle.” That’s a lot different than most places whose meatless sandwiches are described as “vegetarian options” or something equally unmoving. But what Ike’s does wouldn’t work for everyone.

SPARQ: So some enticing food descriptions would not work for certain types of dining locations?

Turnwald: You need to think about the context. A university cafeteria isn’t the same as a hip sandwich place in San Francisco. Diners have different expectations. Stanford University’s dining halls have had success with their “Cardinal Sin” burger, which blends mushrooms with beef to reduce the carbon footprint. It references school spirit, is a little bit intellectual, and a little bit naughty. It works for them. Students choose it and don’t even think about the fact that it’s healthier. But other locations would need to take a different approach.

SPARQ: What do you tell cafeteria managers or other dining professionals who are wary of trying to apply your research?

Turnwald: For one, it can save them money. Plant-based meals generally cost less than meat options. There’s also the environmental impact. Plant-based meals make less of a carbon footprint than meat options in general, especially beef. That could help businesses reach their green goals while not compromising customer satisfaction. And they shouldn’t give up too quickly. People may not change what they eat the first day or two that they see a new dish description. But both first-time and repeat customers may be likely to spring for a new dish if the name is enticing — and the flavor backs it up.

SPARQ: What are the limits of using more indulgent descriptions for healthy food?

Turnwald: It’s not magic. You can’t boil cabbage, call it “spellbinding,” and expect people to love it. The food still needs to taste good. It could push people even further away from healthy food if you serve something really bland and try to label it decadently. You need to create unapologetically delicious food and label it that way so people get enticed to try it.

SPARQ: What do you hope to accomplish with your research?

Turnwald: We often we think of healthy foods as depriving, and if we label them as that, we’re just perpetuating a culture that will turn away from nutritious choices. Using enticing descriptions can help people make better decisions about food and enjoy it more.

SPARQ: What sort of research do you want to do next?

Turnwald: I’d like to look at the cultural products around healthy food. What do people say about it on social media? How do publications write about it? How do restaurants market it? Those answers might shed more light on the notion that how we talk about and portray healthy foods throughout our culture may be driving the mindset that they aren’t tasty or satisfying.