Date or dealbreaker? The 5 food types that land you a hot date

We asked 220 people to answer the questions:

1. Which food types are most likely to land you a date?
2. Is food revealing something about your personality?
3. What is correlation between food choice and personality type?

Specifically, we investigated the role of 8 food types (Italian, French, Indian, Fast Food, Cakes, Vegan, vegetarian, Pizza) on attractiveness potential.

And in this blog post we are going to share what we discovered.

A summary of all the findings:

1. French, Indian and Italian cuisine will more likely land you a hot date.
2. Vegan and Fast food are a no-no.
3. Specifically, 55% of respondents said people who attempt to impress you with French cooking are “Sophisticated and Romantic”.
4. On the other side of the Alps, when choosing Italian food, you become “Sexy”, “Romantic” and “could be a good dad”.
5. However, some appearances might be deceiving, because some great, sophisticated French food, like Duck a l’orange, might give potential daters the wrong idea about you - especially if you are a man.
6. Apparently, not many women see a great French chef like Jean-Christophe Novelli (Head Chef at Hell’s Kitchen) as “boyfriend material”, because the majority of women suggested that a man who tries too hard to impress with French food is more likely to be judged “Posh” and “Pretentious”.
7. Fast food, fried chicken and Pineapple on Pizza eater will be judged negatively and more likely to be “Lazy”, “Nice, but lacks social skills” and “Complete turn off”.
8. For women, impressing a man with Indian food can be a good idea because the majority of men suggested that a woman eating Indian food is “hot and spicy” and “looking for a thrill”.
9. Surprisingly, despite Italian cuisine being rated high, there is one type of food that respondents shouldn’t buy/ cook and that’s Pizza. If you attempt to impress with Pizza are more likely to be judged “a bit in a rush to run to bed”.

The top 5 food types to attract men were:

1.Italian cuisine (except for Pizza)

2.Seafood

3.French Cuisine

4.Indian

5.Sushi

The top 5 food types to attract women were:

1.Italian cuisine (except for Pizza)

2.Seafood

3.Vegetarian dinner

4.French Cuisine

5.Sushi

How much is food linked to personality traits?

We asked our respondents whether food can somehow be linked to personality traits. To find out we have asked:

1. to score from 0 to 100 how much food choices say about your personality and the average score was 64% (quite strong correlation)
2. to give to each food type some connotations about a personality.

64% is very strong, it means people believe strongly that food choices can reveal traits of personality.

But which traits correlates with which food types?

This is what we have found out.

For women: Indian cuisine will more likely land you a hot date

For women, to uncover the relationship between spicy Indian food and attractiveness, we analysed the psychology of it.

According to a research by Pennsylvania University, we found that handling and seeking spicy food has an affinity to amusement parks rides.

We expected the sensation-seekers to rate spicy meals higher, for example, and they did.

And we found that 72% of male respondents judge positively a woman who can handle spicy foods. Some of their quotes:

"open minded"
"fun but dangerous"
"exotic and spicy"
"passionate"
"multicultural, interesting, with a twist"
"marriage material"

For men, we also found that Indian cuisine ranks number 4 on the top 5 food types that land you a date.

Let's analyse the number 3 for men: French cuisine.

For men: French cuisine is adventurous, but too posh

As a woman, you might want to be careful when it comes to French cuisine. Many males see positively a woman loving French food.

However, some appearances might be deceiving, because some great, sophisticated French food, like Duck a l’orange, might give potential daters the wrong idea about you.

Some of the quotes from our respondents:

"Sophisticated pallet"
"Posh"
"might be snob but also very fascinating"
"Cultured"
"Trying to impress"

Italian cuisine is the number 1 choice for impressing a date

It's clear from our survey that both men and women dates could be more successful when Italian food is served.

You probably were expecting this.

But what type of personality the choice of Italian food reveal?

Our data discovered that 75% of both males and females find the other counterpart Romantic and Sexy (vs 0% finding Sexy a date who offer French or Indian food).

Now on to the worse food choices: fast food and fried chicken

We all love fast food and fried chicken (you don't?) and we sometimes treat ourselves with it and let everyone know about it.

To see why these types of food are not recommended in a date, we have needed more data. So we collected it.

And we discovered that these are the most common personality traits associated to Fast Food and Fried Chicken.

Yes, you'll be most likely be judged "Unhealthy", "Lazy" and "Cheap" if you invite your date to McDonald's and KFC.

There is no difference betwen genders either, both males and females would not be impressed.

About pizza, it's Italian but cheap

Surprisingly, Pizza didn't score well in our research. The reason is that it's considered boring and too simple.

It gives the feeling that you want to rush into bed earlier than you are expected to.

And things don't get better with Pineapple Pizza, which is considered completely wrong, it's a sign of poor taste.

Vegans and vegetarians are too difficult to accomodate

Vegan and vegetarian food are increasing in popularity, however tend to isolate people from socialising and dating. It's considered too difficult to accomodate. This is just a matter of how comfortable (or awkward) you would feel having to serve a vegan dinner and lunch every day to someone you are in a relationship with.

In terms of personality, they don't seem to be so simpatico either: some respondents said they are "arrogant and annoying", while others say "boring".

However, vegans score really high in terms of how strong their personalities are and how caring and conscious for the environment they seem to be.

But are these positive traits in a date?

Conclusion

This survey collected and analysed the data about the types of food for landing a hot date.

We are not giving you any advice on this, we wanted to just collect people thoughts and come up with a fun yet serious report on what people think of different foods and personality types.