I think that food cravings are how we get what we need. If you're craving certain things I think you should eat them. The exception would be if you cut out fruit, and then you find improvement along some important dimension to you: cravings, weightloss, etc.

One time I plugged in all the foods I had been craving, or that I typically crave, and saw that they were all high in copper. Even though these are serial cravings, it could be interesting to plug them into a nutrient analyzer and see if there are some patterns emerging.

Well, I fall in the Lustig camp, which will probably get me downvoted here, but I think that there's something specific to fructose that triggers metabolic derangement and cravings. I've known lots of people who "went paleo" and traded in all of their HFCS sugary drinks and desserts into eating lots of fruit or "paleo treats". My guess is that you're really sensitive to fructose and your body really wants it. I bet that if you hold out long enough (whole 30ish approach), you can kill the sugar demons.

I take a middle-road approach on everything food-related.

I eat moderate carbs, rather than zero or very low or low or high. I also eat plenty of protein and whatever amount of fat tastes good with it--no more, no less. I eat yogurt that I make with 3/4 whole milk and 1/4 heavy cream.

I eat between 1 and 3 cups of fruit every day. Today, for example, I had a persimmon and a banana in my yogurt and a grapefruit as the appetizer for my bone broth stew.

I don't agree with those who say we shouldn't eat fruit, including sweet fruits, and I don't agree with those who say we should live on fruit.

I do find that fruit can trigger cravings if I eat it alone, either for more fruit or the evil processed carbs. For me, it works best as an ingredient or as an appetizer.

As for craving specific items, I've always done that. I don't want whatever's in the fridge or in the cupboard, I want a specific thing. Nowadays, happily, it's usually a salad or allowed recipe so there's no problem. I just have to do the prep, which I admit I don't always feel like when it used to be so easy to open a box or a bag. Thankfully, I no longer like the easy stuff and I have to get my butt in gear and do the prep.

As long as we're not fooling our taste buds on neolithic crap in box that wouldn't be palatable without the extra flavor, MSG, or color, and we're over our wheat addiction, and are also over our SAD sugar addiction, our cravings going to be trustworthy.

It's a signal that there's some nutrient that we need more of. Our hunger and thirst signals are fairly reliable when we're not broken, and when we're not trying to store fat for the winter.

So if you're adapted to VLC already, and don't crave wheat any longer, or sweet snacks, you can generally trust your cravings. i.e. if you can do intermittent fasts regularly and not feel hunger.

That said, there are a few things we're hard wired to binge on for those of us whose ancestors adapted to a cold climate: fruit for example was only available towards the end of the summer, and we'd eat as much of it as possible so as to store fat for the coming winter.

Cravings can be caused by a number of courses. If you are eating a very low carb diet, that could explain fruit cravings. Inuits used to dig out mice's winter stash of stored root vegetables etc. and replace it with dried fish. I guess that most people simple don't thrive in the long run an a very low carb diet (Inuits very probably eating 50-100g of carbs a day or roughly 10E%). In case your diet isn't low in carbs, then there is likely a different explanation.

What's wrong with eating fruit? Why not eat what you are craving? Grapes? Common... you are concerned about a grape craving?

I was glad to find your post when I searched under "fruit craving." I am the exact same way! I crave very specific fruits, and it goes on for a while. The first one I noticed was grapefruit for about 2 months. Then I really didn't want grapefruit, but I had to have Asian pears. Then green grapes. Then melon. I would not eat these to exclusion of other fruits, but no other fruit will satisfy the craving for whatever my fruit-of-the-month might be.

Also, I would eat more fruit than you, it sounds like....Probably 3-5 pieces/cups per day. I was just going with it, thinking I must need whatever was in the fruits.

Now I am trying to go low carb and cut the fruit for a while in an attempt to treat inflammation and decrease belly fat....It has been only two days, and I have to say that my mood is more calm and my energy level more stable with fewer carbs. However, my fruit cravings are still here (for how long, I wonder?) I LOVE fruit, so these two days have been difficult :)