How Your Nose Helps you Taste!
Did you know that 80% of what you taste is actually from your sense of smell? Your tongue can only detect a few basic tastes, but your nose helps turn those into millions of flavours! Here’s how:
1️⃣ The Tongue’s Job
👅 Most agree that your tongue can taste sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and umami (a savoury taste). But that’s it! (However, some scientists now think there may be more basic tastes, including starchy, metallic and menthol.
2️⃣ The Nose’s Superpower
👃 When you eat, tiny scent molecules travel up the back of your throat to your nose. This is called "retronasal olfaction"—a fancy way of saying your nose smells food from the inside!
3️⃣ Working Together
🔬 Your brain combines the tastes from your tongue with the smells from your nose. That’s how you recognize the difference between a strawberry and a raspberry or chocolate and coffee! Scientists estimate the average person can distinguish 1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion) different smells.
4️⃣ Try This!
🤔 Want to test how important your nose is? Try eating a jellybean while pinching your nose. It will taste mostly sweet, but you won’t know the flavour until you let go of your nose!
Pretty cool, right? Your nose is a flavour detective that makes food exciting! 🍎🥕🍞
Taste + Smell = Flavour.
Sources:
📖 Monell Chemical Senses Center – How Smell and Taste Work Together
🔬 National Institutes of Health (NIH) – The Science of Taste and Smell
🧠 Harvard University – How the Brain Perceives Flavor