The Great Cheese Experiment

Call it the scientist in me, but I had to see if there was any truth to this:

Eating cheese before bed will give you crazy dreams or nightmares. 

I've only recently heard of this story, but that got me to do some research. 

This led me to one article in the British Medical Journal (1964) "Pargyline and the Cheese Reaction", 1(5395):1441. This was a correspondence article and it was a case study of a doctor in Bulawayo who had recently started prescribing a new anti-hypertension drug; Pargyline. The drug worked well, but the patient had started complaining that he was getting severe nightmares, but the patient was also a big fan of cheese and would consume 30-60g of cheese at night. Interestingly, when cheese was removed from his diet, the nightmares ceased.

So there was a ring of truth to this.

So how did the cheese cause nightmares?
Well, this, and other drugs in the same class, work by inhibiting the breakdown of amines. Apparently they can lower blood pressure due to the accumulation of amines in the brain. I love how drugs are prescribed when they don't know action mechanism, as long as it is safe and does what it is supposed to do.

The problem is when cheese is added to the diet. Cheese, especially aged cheeses, contain tyramine, which is normally broken down in the gut. Drugs such as Pargyline prevent this breakdown and levels of tyramine in the blood can climb. The elevated levels of tyramine can have an effect on the nervous system and increase the release of nor-epinephrine. This is a hormone/neurotransmitter related to the "Fight or Flight Response". Funnily enough, the release of nor-epinephrine (nor-adrenaline) results in hypertension! So people taking the drug to reduce blood pressure will end up with high blood pressure if they eat cheese!

 How would this relate to nightmares? I guess when you are sleeping and you start of an adrenalin response, you would end up with a highly alert and agitated brain that is trying to sleep. The agitation would most likely manifest itself as a nightmare.

So it does sound like there is truth to this, that eating cheese before bed can cause nightmares. Even without the drug, if you eat vast amounts of cheese, you may end up with an elevated level of tyramine that can give you nightmares or wacky dreams. Cheeses that have higher levels of tyramine would be more likely to cause this effect. But cheese is not the only food containing high levels of tyramine, the amount of tyramine in food increases as it ages, so cured meats, smoked fish, Vegemite, some beer and other fermented foods may play a part. People that have migraines would be more susceptible to this cheese-nightmare effect as there has been a link made between tyramine and migraines.

The CheeseBoard in the UK has done a small study, where they gave people a small amount of cheese before bed. There were interesting reports of Stilton causing wacky dreams and cheddar producing celebrity related dreams!

So I've started a little experiment myself. Asking for a round the world participation of the GREAT CHEESE EXPERIMENT.

Basically, you are to eat 20g of cheese for 3 days 30mins before bed. It can be any cheese of your choosing, vegan and soy cheese included! I would also like you to record what cheese and what you ate for dinner that night. As a control, for another 3 nights, you eat 20g of bread or rice 30mins before bed. And record your dreams! (If you remember them). I would love to read all your wacky dreams.

If you would like to participate, download the form below and eat away. Full rules in the document.

This will close on the 31st of May 2015

The Great Cheese Experiment Form


Sweet Dreams everyone!
Sorry if this isn't chicken or Japan related!  Now you can see how unfocused I am ;)


References of Interest:
British Medical Journal (1964) "Pargyline and the Cheese Reaction", 1(5395):1441

Journal of the American Medical Association, "Monoamine oxidase inhibitors, Tyramine and Cheese" (1964)118(13):1108