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I'd lean toward the idea of that not being the case (not that I couldn't stand to lose five pounds or so, but I'm blaming winter for that). Most people I know eat well, but not necessarily high-cal, and generally not in excess.

Lilartist has a point too. Unless the Serious Eats staff are using body doubles...

Bite your tongue! But, don't actually eat it 'cause that would indeed indicate a food problem brewing.

I think it depends. I definitely know people who enjoy eating and you can see it in their waistlines. I think it's a question not of how much you love food, but how much you can moderate that love. If you indulge all the time, well, you'll probably end up on the heavy side. I work out a lot and tend to be slender. I also don't have a huge appetite, so I'm always amazed when I eat with foodie folks how much they consume! I just don't have the gastronomic capacity.

I'd say no, most foodies aren't fatties. In fact in my own life, I've become MORE of a foodie trying to lose weight. When the focus shifts from fast, pre-packaged & processed to local, fresh and organic goods I prepare myself, the weight falls off and I enjoy cooking so much more.

However, if I ate for a living (not competitively, but as a reviewer, blogger, etc) I'd definitely need to log far more hours at the gym.

Depends on what kind of foodie you are. Some foodies are into going out all the time to fancy restaurants, and i would imagine that would pack on the pounds faster. However, due to both funding concerns and location, I am more of a stay-at-home foodie. I take the most pleasure out of knowing as much as I can about every morsel that went into what I'm eating. Even when it's heavier than usual on butter, bacon or other fat, I still feel like it's a hell of a lot healthier than something cooked commercially. Plus, when you cook for flavor, you just don't end up eating as much, so you don't gorge yourself on salt, fat and flavorless starches and in general don't pack on as much. Ok, too much thinking, I need a cookie.

I'm a foodie that'd be a fattie if I didn't exercise regularly. As I like to say, "I run to eat!"

The food lovers who I know are also among the fittest. I think that "loving food" doesn't necessarily mean treat it with excess. I'm reminded of Michael Pollan's recent New York Times Magazine piece: "Spend more and eat less."

Overweight foodie here. I'm working on it, and some is due to weight I gained during chemo (steroids). It's starting to come off and my intense cravings for carbs are going away as the steroids and other drugs become a memory for my body. Still, I was about 20 lbs too heavy before this all started. The road back to a healthy weight is long and filled with a lot of seafood and veggies. Lucky for me, two of my favorites!

I'm a fat foodie. I think being a foodie (and having a lot more stress in my life) has made me fat.

Well, I started out fat. Then lost a ton of weight on Weight Watchers, eating tons of packaged foods, never going to restaurants, and never drinking.

Then I discovered good food and good restaurants. My income increased, so I could go out more and buy better quality foods for at home, and I became a lot more stressed.

So I eat a lot of really good food. I know it is a problem, and I'm working on it, but good food is so easy to get in trouble with.

Oh and of my friends, it is about half and half fat vs. thin for the foodies. Non-foodies are about the same.

Eat anything & everything in moderation & accept one's natural weight--we are all different.

I was a fattie first, way before I became a foodie. I'm fine with the cards I've been dealt, if anything my weight have became a lot more manageable since I started being more aware of the quality of the food I'm consuming.

A decade ago I learned to cook well and healthy. I went to a dietician and she said never eat carbs without protein. She said if your going to have a bagel put a protein on it.
I started grilling and adding healthier things to meals for fiber and more natural flavors.
This being said I have an addiction to carbs. I love bread, pasta, potatoes and rice. I now use an ice cream scoop to serve things. You get one scoop and that is it. I usually try to eat only 1 cup of pasta. I tend to portion control things. The bad side of this is learning to cook for just what your going to eat.
We have a Mae West diet in our home. "When I'm good I'm very good, but when I'm bad I'm better." When we eat good we are very good and when we are bad we eat better than we should.

Learn how to get taste out of clean foods. It's easy to make a simple dish completely bad for you by adding vegetable oil or butter.

i cook as healthily as possible, and then relax when i eat out. if i cook at home 6 nights a week, healthy meals, i can afford to eat whatever i want at a restaurant. i also eat frozen yogurt every night, because eating something sweet after dinner sends a signal to my brain, "okay, you're done eating now". i'm also training for a marathon, so i guess that's helping me out a little!

Absolutely! Most foodies are fatties.

I am a fattie ...I was a fattie before I was a foodie but being a foodie helps keep me a fattie. At some point I became less of a fattie but then I became more of a foodie so now I am about the same fattie as I was before.

I'd have to agree with JEP. Everything in moderation. My biggest problem is I love to cook but don't get as much enjoyment out of the eating part. I love to go out and eat just to see what interesing dishes people are putting together but when I'm cooking I think I lose my appetite in the process. This helps me eat in moderation and make those I cook for shove their faces.

I think my extra tummy is more from beer than from food. I do play multiple sports and exercise (not enough, but.) so it hopefully all evens out.

@ aungeinphx - Haha, I like that quote. It does make sense.

And I think that actually opens up a different question...chefs or bakers or those that prepare food should have to taste test everything...meaning they are required to eat all the time, but food lovers on the hand can just eat when they need to.

Hillary
Chew on That

This is such a good question - and so timely. I love to cook but refuse to be a statistic. I really resent it when publications depict all chefs as overweight and male.

I go to the gym and eat right most of the time so I can enjoy the fruits of my labor when I'm making a celebration food for a party or for a friend.

I don't want the world to think you either have to be a plastic stick figure like Sandra Lee and not make real food OR Paul Prudhomme and Jan Birnbaum - before they lost weight.

Personally, a lot of the friends I know who love to cook are definitely overweight. This disheartens me because it doesn't have to be that way - and I'd like for them to be around a while.

i would be a very, very big fatty if i did not work out religiously, eat tons of fruits and vegetables, pack my own lunch every day, eat out only very occasionally and only order two appetizers when i do, eschew all alcohol, start off every dinner i cook for myself with a gigantic bowl of lightly dressed romaine lettuce, and make constant bargains with myself about what i will and won't be eating.

i know this because i used to be quite a bit heavier than i am now and it's taken a tremendous, sustained amount of effort to change my habits.

i love to cook and i was not too self controlled about serving rich, heavy, multiple course meals every night when i lived with a man who was six feet four and had a great metabolism. he could eat my cooking without sustaining too much damage, but i could not.

as much as i love food, thin {and despite all my efforts, i am hardly that} does taste much better.

Tony Bourdain and James Beard were both foodies; Bourdain is one of the skinniest men you'll ever see, and Beard one of the fattest. A lot of it must be metabolism. I've never heard of Bourdain abstaining from anything, and neither did Beard.

For myself, I'm fat, but not as fat or unhealthy as I was when I was ashamed of hunger and ate only things that could be bought and eaten immediately--processed food. I was ashamed to be seen eating and ashamed to be seen in the kitchen.

To me, being in tune with my body and my appetite means paying attention to food, "eating thoughtfully" as they say. Sometimes I'm so interested in cooking, I eat less while preparing the food. Or I say, why waste your time with that chocolate bar or slice of bread when you've got that terrific salad planned for tonight.

I used to eat processed food because I didn't have the patience to cook. Now I know to keep a little cheese or nuts or tomato juice or salad around the place just to amuse my mouth when the main meal is on the way.

oh, forgot, I'm skinny, so is my entire family.

Most of my foodie friends, and me included are, as BaHa put it, "metabolic swines". But I think that's just coincidence. In the big picture, I don't think there's too much correlation. I think being a foodie probably makes one a little more heavy than perhaps if you weren't, but then again, lots of people have unhealthy relationships with food which makes them just as heavy.

I currently fall into that range known as "normal" on every chart you can imagine. Some people think I'm think, but I think that's because the population, on average is getting a little larger, so normal starts looking svelte.

I'm at an age where being model-thin isn't important to me, but good health is, so I watch the scale. I'm also at a point where I see no reason why I should have to eat food I don't like. Well, barring the occasional social outings where there's no graceful way to decline.

But otherwise, if I want ice cream, I eat ice cream. Good ice cream. And a little makes me much more happy than a gallon of cheap, low-fat/carb/calorie pretend ice cream.

I have been thin all my life (as is the majority of my family), the type of thin that people stare at you if God forbid you have to pee at a restaurant, and feel like making snide remarks is perfectly fine. I developed progressive, chronic illness at age 20, and a few years ago I was so ill I weighted 78 lbs. at 5'8" because my insurance wouldn't pay for the medication that allows me to eat.

That is resolved now thank goodness and thanks to medicine, food blogs, and my learning how to cook I put on 40 lbs. I'm still thin, but feel as good as I can, and love to be able to eat, because 2 years ago I couldn't, and I pray no one ever takes that for granted.

I am also glad by reading these comments that it seems most foodies know how to be healthy, the rest of the population could take some hints from here on how to eat well, with awesome tasting food, and not become overweight.

I despise the type pf thinklng which tells people that they look fat simply because they enjoy their food. This is a screw-up of the Puritan ethic, which told us that, if you enjoyed something, it would hurt you.

Today's foodies stand against that. We want to know more about every aspect of our food, not so we can shove rich things down our throats constantly, but so we can have a great salad or cookie or pasta dish or veggie casserole or hot dog or grilled cheese or or or...and makes sure it gives us strength and health as well as the calories.

From my perspective, there is absolutely no moral triumph for being thin. You want to be thin, be thin. But when people pat themselves on the back for what they perceive to be better eating habits than someone else... I just find that, in and of itself, self aggrandizement of the grossest variety.

foodvox said: "No, chefs don't have to taste all the time if they are chefs for they know what they are doing and don't have to double-check." This isn't true. I've been a chef for many years, but I was taught to ALWAYS taste before sending it to a customer. There are many variables in cooking. If you aren't a good 'taster', you can not be a chef. The difference between ordinary, bad and sublime can be just a touch too little or too much salt, nevermind such ingredients as acids, etc. That being said, a 'taste' doesn't mean an entire mouthful of food, it is just enough to judge...a few drops could be sufficient.

I am not overweight, as I usually skip the 'house meals', and I go to the gym several nights a week. I eat the majority of my meals at home with my family, and we love fresh fruits and vegetables, organic and local if possible. I love preparing meals for my family even more than I do for patrons at work. Moderation is always key. I do splurge, but not everyday.

Carolina de Witte - chefs can taste if they want to, of course. Some do, some don't. Some do sometimes but not always.

I was never taught to taste during service before sending it out to a customer but rather to be sure that I knew ahead of time by smell and look and by focus on the initial prep and even ordering/checking in of goods that when in the process of putting out anywhere from four orders to 250 orders that they would be good and correct in taste just from the building "from the ground up" so to speak.

As executive chef I worked on instilling this same way of doing things in the chefs and cooks that worked for me. It requires a lot of standardization of recipe and focus on initial ingredients, along with an intensive structure that involves detailed production schedules and a well-trained team who are willing to work together. It's not just about the food itself, its about the people who are putting it together.

This takes away from "creativity" allowed in a free-form way, yes. But the guests get consistency.

It's a beautiful thing when a kitchen of ten can trust each other to come in and together put out a range of meals where some of the plates might be finely detailed "fine dining" and the other plates are fine banquet service for 50 hitting at the exact same time.

Granted, part of this is intuition. But most of it is training, teamwork, knowledge and consistently-implemented procedures that run from step A to step Z.

But to each their own, and to taste on an ongoing basis is one way of doing it, for sure.
But what I said is true and workable also. :)

AARP bumper sticker:

Food has replaced sex in my life.
Now, I can't even get into my own pants.