Sensa Sprinkles First Impressions

In the starter kit box, you get two containers of sprinkles, each with a salty side and a sweet side (like combo salt and pepper shakers), and a DVD.

The DVD is mostly a commercial for the sprinkles and an explanation of how they work. Basically, from what I understand, most of what we think of as taste is really smell--its just smell through the back of the mouth instead of through the nose.

This all started when they noticed that people who lost their ability to smell tended to gain weight, probably because they were eating more just trying to taste something. The idea with the sprinkles is that you’ll taste (smell) more, so you’ll have the urge to eat less and eventually lose weight.

I also learned that not all sprinkles are the same. There are different sprinkles for each of the six months. Changing up the smells is part of it I guess. Not all sprinkles are created equal, chickadees!

Also, in their studies, women tended to lose more weight a few months into it while the men just dropped a bunch right away. Typical. This is why The Biggest Loser will never be fair!

I thought the salty sprinkles smelled a little horseradishy, my son thought they smelled like pizza, and my husband thought they smelled gross (but he hates horseradish). The sweet sprinkles smelled like strawberries to me, good to my son, and like cotton candy to my husband. He really liked the sweet ones! I’m going to have my pregnant friend use her super smelling ability to give me her opinion too. You know how your sense of smell goes nuts when you’re preggers!

You aren’t supposed to be able to taste the sprinkles once they are on your food. And I haven’t tasted anything with the salty ones. I have tasted something with the sweet ones, although not unpleasant.

Maybe I’m just using too many sprinkles. I don’t know. I’m still not exactly sure how much to sprinkle. You’re supposed to try to coat your food, but that’s easier said than done sometimes. Think about sprinkling a granola bar, or a handful of peanuts, or chips and salsa--not always sure if I’m coating the food or coating my plate.

And it’s also difficult to gauge how much is coming out of the container since they don’t have any weight to them. The little white sprinkles show up better on some foods than others. I’m hoping I’ll start to get a feel for it the more I do it.

As to how it works … well, so far it does. The best way I have to explain it is that it’s like eating something you really like that has too much salt on it. No matter how much you like it, or how hungry you are, you just can’t eat tons of it. Eventually it’s just too much.

Another thing I noticed is that even when I’m hungry, nothing sounds good. I was having trouble finding something I wanted to eat this past weekend because everything just sounded *meh*. Maybe that’s just me being hormonal or something though. I’m sure I’ll figure it out after I’ve been doing this a while.

And remembering to use the sprinkles isn’t always easy either. I’m hoping that it just becomes second nature soon.

So there you go, chickadees! That’s my impression after two days of using Sensa. I’m sure my opinions will evolve the more I get into it.