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THERE IS NO ACCOUNTING FOR TASTE

Recipe Introduction


Anytime that one cooks or tries a new recipe they stand the chance that the end results will not taste quite right or different than before. Believe it! This is NOT your imagination nor a bad recipe (although it might be the latter). It is simply a matter of your taste and the enzimes in your mouth that effect that taste.





List of Ingredients









Instructions



1. There are three things that directly effect everyone's sense of taste. . . The taste buds on your tongue, the chemistry of your saliva, and your olfactory senses (sense of smell). In the long run it is the saliva that is probably the most important.
   
   
2. Through inheritance your saliva will have its own unique chemistry, the most important of which are its quantity and types of enzymes. These mix with the food you eat as it crosses your tongue and determines exactly how you distinguish the taste of that food. This chemistry changes slightly from hour to hour and can be greatly effected by your present physical condition, medicines you are taking, food temperature, and even your mental state.
   
   
3. As an example: Do you like fried calve's liver, perhaps smoothered in onions? Well, I don't! To me it has a terribly bitter, nauseating taste that makes my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth. Still, some of my offspring and aquantances love it. Thats a difference in our enzymes at work.
   
   
4. On the other hand, I love the taste of mango and papaya (with a little fresh lime juice) and my wife definitely does not. Again an enzyme type of thing. The list goes on for both of us.
   
   
5. We have experienced times when we have cooked a dish and one of us will find it too salty. too peppery or too bland. While the other one of us thinks it tastes just the opposite. And, a week latter either both love the same recipe's taste or think it tastes just the opposite of what it did the last time. These changes in taste are usually caused by temporary physical conditions or medications.
   
   
6. This enzyme factor is not to be confused with taste overload. This is the type of taste change that happens when you first eat or drink something that has an extremely strong flavor that effects the taste of the next thing you eat. Having a dish of ice cream will cause the glass of lemonade you wash it down with to taste exceptionally sour.
   
   
7. By the way, that physical condition changing of enzymes also applies to just aging. As we get older our bodies may not make as much, or lowered actvity, enzymes. Also, our tastebuds may tend to deteriorate in sensitivity. These factors might require an increase in flavorings and spices to compensate and regain the taste of our favorite recipies.
   
   
8. Speaking of taste buds, it should be noted that they can be damaged or destroyed over the course of time. If your life style or ethnic background has you eating excessively hot, cold or spicey foods, you may never detect the hint of marjoram in a spaghetti sauce. One of our best Korean friends, who we have cooked for several times told us that, after a lifetime of "tears-to-the-eyes" kimchee, Western food tastes like cardboard to him. We feel sorry for his loss of taste, but know where he is coming from.
   
   
9. And finally, having a nasal infection can sometimes effect how you conceive the taste of food. The more arromatic the recipe, the more effect your sense of smell will have on its taste.
   
   
10. Are you a wine connoissieur or know one. Well, remind them that, because of all of the above, what may they think is a full bodied wine with a distinctive woody taste, subtle overtones of rose and vanilla, and just a hint of anise, may taste like skunk flavored licorice to the next person.
    
    






Final Comments


So, how you perceive the way one of our recipies taste depends greatly on your own oral/nasal conditions and your heredity. Changing the quantities of spices, herbs and condiments called for may better appeal to your "matter" of taste.