I heard this for years and years, but it doesn't pass the sniff test for me.

Go try to eat a stick of butter. Drink some straight cream. Chew on the fat that comes with your beef roast. Sip sausage grease. Drink straight olive oil.

All of these things are hard to do. If I get past two or three hundred calories with any of them, I am workin for it.

I have this drink in the morning, 240 calories of butter and coconut oil in tea, and oh my goodness is that thing substantial. Finishing it is sometimes a bit of work.

But how easy is it to drink 300 calories of sugar and not notice it? Veeeeeeeeeery easy.

I think the idea that what makes food easy to overconsume is volume... I think this idea is so obviously wrong that I wonder if it was ever tested. It certainly doesn't seem subjectively true. Everyone knows rich food is hard to eat!