Scientists discover new taste that could make food more delicious
Taste, the sense that allows us to appreciate the beauty of good food, is something scientists understand fairly well. The sensation we feel when eating a piece of cake, chewing on a hamburger or taking the first bite of a piping hot piece of pizza is triggered when chemicals in our food interact with receptors in our mouths.
For hundreds of years, scientists have known about four basic tastes: sour, sweet, salty and bitter. More recently, a Japanese chemist discovered a fifth basic taste, umami, which is triggered by monosodium glutamate, or MSG, as it's more widely known. Umami, perhaps best described as savory, is especially prevalent in truffles, meat and anchovies.
And now, scientists believe they have found a sixth basic taste that could profoundly change the way we eat.
In a new study, researchers found evidence that fat interacts with our taste buds in a way similar to the five basic tastes. We have known for some time that receptors in our mouths recognise fat, which has led scientists to believe it could change the way we perceive food in the same way that tastes such as sour and sweet do. Now there's evidence that it does.
"Fat is likely another one of the basic tastes. I think we have pretty clear evidence for this," said Richard Mattes, a professor of nutrition science at Purdue University, and the lead author of the study.
If people learn to manipulate the taste of fat correctly, he says, it will allow us to make tons of food taste better by either reproducing the taste of fat or introducing substitutes that successfully mimic it.
"We could isolate it and use it in the same way we have used the other basic tastes," said Mattes.
The sixth taste
There are thousands of taste buds on a single human tongue - and on the tops and bottoms and sides of our mouths. And receptors are all over our taste buds - there are as many as 100 taste receptors on each taste bud. How we experience a mouthful of food hinges on how the chemicals in the foods interact with the receptors on our tongues. The basic tastes blend together like primary colours to produce wildly different paintings of flavour.
To figure out that fat could be another of the basic tastes, Mattes conducted two experiments. In the first, more than 100 participants were given isolated solutions that had one of six different tastes: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami and fatty. They were then asked to sort them into as many groups as they believed were necessary. The participants had little trouble identifying sweet, sour and salty as unique tastes, but, interestingly, they pooled the remaining three into a group that Mattes refers to as the "nebulous bucket."
"We're pretty sure that they did that because bitterness, umami-ness and fattiness, when isolated, can be pretty strange," said Mattes. "So they put them in a 'This is bad' or 'This is strange' group."
But then the researchers pressed the issue further, and that's when a clear division surfaced. In another experiment, they only gave participants solutions containing the three "bad" or "strange" tastes, and the participants easily divided the tastes into three groups.
"It was really very telling," said Mattes. "We already knew that people have a taste receptor for fatty acids; now we know that it's a distinguishable taste - that it doesn't have overlap. The combination of those two things is what's important."
The fat taste that Mattes is talking about is hidden in a bite of steak or a dollop of olive oil - just as umami is hidden in a bite of anchovy. Fat, as everyone experiences it, is what's called a triglyceride, because it is made up of three fatty acids. The combination of the three - which are different in size and therefore different in flavour - gives fat the mouth feel and creaminess we associate with it.
The kind Mattes is talking about is actually only one of those three fatty acids: the longest. It's the one that stimulates the flavour profile that is unique to fat.
As with primary colours, a primary taste can only be recognised as such if it doesn't share characteristics with other primary tastes. The fact that people can so easily recognise fat as a unique sensation in this context is evidence that it is a primary taste, especially since it already meets all of the other qualifications.
The impact of Mattes research could extend well beyond the reach of his lab. They might very well end up affecting what is on your plate, and, more specifically, how it tastes.
"Understanding this could have huge implications for the food industry," said Mattes. "It could make a lot of food taste a lot better."
The Washington Post
Source: Good Food, Roberto A. Ferdman, July 30th 2015
Originally published as: Scientists discover new taste that could make food more delicious
