Fatty food triggers taste buds

Something in the taste, not the smell, of fat lures us to rich foods, says a Purdue University scientist.

Wearing nose plugs, human subjects given a taste, but not a whiff, of cream cheese and crackers showed an immediate rise in their blood fat levels, while those given a sniff but not a taste did not.

"Taste, and not the smell, is what the body is responding to," said Richard Mattes, a professor of foods and nutrition, in the journal Physiology & Behaviour.

Fat has been thought of as a tasteless "flavour carrier" that could deliver tasty compounds derived from other parts of food, and as a component that provided texture.

But if Dr Mattes' fat findings hold up, science may have to include it in the list of five flavours human palates can detect: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and "umami", which is evoked by monosodium glutamate.

Our physiological response to the taste of fat may explain another mystery: why don't fat-free foods taste as good?

Dr Mattes: "I wonder if the less-than-perfect performance of current fat replacers may be due to a lack of understanding of all mechanisms for fat perception."

- REUTERS

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