Thought or craving? How do you know which is which?

http://www.oprah.com/packages/women-food-and-god.html

Based on the videos of Geneen Roth at the above link, she is talking about something that I've been doing for the past 6 years now. Its the video called "Geneen Roth's eating guidelines" and she may help you more than I can with my clumsy words.

I have managed to become aware of food as mere thoughts and separate that from an actual craving. She talks about just this subject in the video. I know that when I'm sick to my stomach, I want oatmeal and a banana. It helps with nausea. To me, that is a craving.
But when I'm upset and or overwhelmed, and start thinking about eating a bagel, then to me, thats just a mere thought of a food that I do not have to chose to eat.

I had a bit of food poisoning last week. Got real sick with very bad intestinal cramps for several hours in the afternoon on Thursday. I was hungry for dinner but was afraid to eat as I had no idea what was wrong with me. I took a few bites of chicken and made myself some plain chicken broth and sipped on that for a while. I then cooked up a sweet potato later that night as that was all I wanted. Sweet potato doesn't require work by the colin to digest it so a good choice for when we have digestion issues.
To me, these were foods that I was craving to help me to heal and feel better.
But when I'm in an emotional state, my food choices can be pretty poor so I've got to be hyper aware at all times and not give into mere thoughts of highly processed foods like breads, pastas, etc.