I am the next person, who dislikes the idea of the hunger. But I know that you devs love it and you won't change/delete it. You don't want players to mass-eat cupboards of food, but feast few sophisticated dishes. And I fine with it.
Every activity like woodcutting, leveling, building, mining drains a lot of energy. When you are preparing your base you do plenty of stuff, and you are forced to regain your energy - by eating (mostly) shit, which ruins your FEP. In current state you are punishing players for playing, because they have choice: to do stuff and ruin FEP or log out. Don't force us to consider every activity in terms of "How much hunger will it cost me?"
I think non-FEP food may be a solution. It wouldn't give any FEP stats nor food variety, just refill energy. Put it into your balance sieve to set their rarity, effectivness and overall effort to obtain them.
This will allow players build, fight, destroy, progress, discover world, have fun, and when the time comes (i.e. those damn carrot will finally grow up) feast for might and glory specified food, just like you wanted.