In the culinary world, just the thought of some dishes might be enough to conjure nightmares in some people. (Grasshopper tacos or maggot-filled cheese, anyone?) But legend has it that some foods actually produce nightmares after you consume them.
The trouble is, the science to back up these claims is relatively sparse. Broadly speaking, we don’t understand the brain well enough to know exactly what prompts nightmares — and dreams in general. But some researchers have surveyed large numbers of people to assess any potential associations.
That’s just what Tore Nielsen and Russell Powell did several years ago after getting persistent media requests about the types of foods that cause nightmares or strange dreams around the holidays. “I got tired of saying we don’t really know because there isn’t any science behind it,” says Nielsen, director of the Dream and Nightmare Laboratory at the Sacre-Coeur Hospital in Montreal.
