Incredibly, this has nothing to do with the mouth, but with the nose. When we have the flu, we lose our sense of smell. And if you can not discern an expensive perfume from the smoke of a burned tire, you also can not taste. It is that 80% of what we call taste comes from smell, not taste. The confusion happens because people associate the taste with the taste buds, which remain on the tongue. What they do, in fact, is just to distinguish five basic flavors: salty, sweet, bitter, sour and umami, a taste recently discovered that matches the taste of aji-no-bike glutamate seasonings. If the tongue perceives only these five flavors, the smell distinguishes simply 20,000 odors! Therefore, it predominates even at the time we feel the taste of something.
The chewing itself leaves these aromas more intense, as it releases the smell of various chemicals from food. “This information of smell interacts with that of the palate so that the brain can taste the food,” says the otorhinolaryngologist Reginaldo Fugita, from the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp). Want to test the predominance of smell? When you get the flu, get a piece of chocolate and one of, say, banana. Close your eyes and bite one of the two with a closed nose: you will hardly distinguish which one is in your mouth! Even if you bite the piece of banana but smell the chocolate, you’ll get the feeling that you’re actually eating the candy – unless you can tell the difference in texture. of the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp).
Want to test the predominance of smell? When you get the flu, get a piece of chocolate and one of, say, banana. Close your eyes and bite one of the two with a closed nose: you will hardly distinguish which one is in your mouth! Even if you bite the piece of banana but smell the chocolate, you’ll get the feeling that you’re actually eating the candy – unless you can tell the difference in texture. of the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp). Want to test the predominance of smell? When you get the flu, get a piece of chocolate and one of, say, banana. Close your eyes and bite one of the two with a closed nose: you will hardly distinguish which one is in your mouth! Even if you bite the piece of banana but smell the chocolate, you’ll get the feeling that you’re actually eating the candy – unless you can tell the difference in texture.
