Seeing, Smelling, or Tasting

For my last post I wanted to talk about tasting because just like everybody I love eating.  However, the more I read the more I realize that tasting is not just the flavor of the food itself, but also the sight of the food and the smell of it.  The sight of food has for a long time told us what was good and what was not.  Fruits and vegetables are always closely inspected for any dark colors or bruises because they are considered bad once these things start to happen to them.  In the article linked below, I read of an experiment that wine experts described a food colored white wine with red characteristics because of the fact that it was red alone with no regard to the actual flavor of the wine.  Smell also influences taste.  Have you ever heard the saying, "Hold your nose, you won't taste it." Well this is kind of true.  You will be able to detect flavors, bitter or sweet, but you won't be able to describe the taste saying, "that tasted like a strawberry." This relates to the cells at the end of the nasal passage, which then relay information to the brain through olfactory referral.  Little did I know when I thought I was just tasting foods I was seeing them and smelling them as well and my brain put all these sensations together to form the "taste" of the food.

Link: http://deutsch.ucsd.edu/pdf/frontiers.pdf