During October I travelled to two different countries and four different cities; therefore, I had ample opportunities to expand my food taboo line and to work on not eating “with my eyes.” To start off, I travelled to London. Out of all my time abroad, London was able to make me feel the most at home. Being able to understand the language and to be able to speak to others confidently and comfortably was an amazing feeling that I haven’t had in a while. It was lunchtime, I was starving, and I felt like trying something new. I had fish and chips for the first time in my life at The Laughing Halibut, which was recommended by some locals. The sign on the restaurant said it was the Best Traditional Fish and Chips and I would have to agree, the fish and chips were spectacular. I didn’t know what to get so I just ordered the traditional plate of fish and chips and I can tell you that it was the most food I have seen on one plate in all of the time I have been abroad. I could hardly see the plate in contrast to the plates that I see in France.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/47536577@N00/5169514276
My next adventure took me to Milan, Italy. Now that I was in Italy I could not wait to try some “true” pasta. I was so excited the first time when we went to dinner that I just ordered the bolognaise pasta in light of the fact that I knew that it was a safe option. I was too hungry to try something new and taking the chance of not liking it. It was at that point I made the decision that the next time I went to a nice restaurant that I would step out of my comfort zone and order something I normally would not have.
http://t-ka.net/cuisine/plats_complets/spaghetti_a_la_bolognaise
Two days later I was in Florence, Italy sitting at the lunch table face to face with a menu knowing that I had to choose something that exceeded my food taboo line. I ended up ordering seafood pasta. A majority of the seafood options are outside of my taboo line; however, I made the decision to give it a try. When I asked the waiter what the seafood was, I was told that it would be shrimp, which, as a matter of fact, is one of the few seafood options that I actually do like. When the pasta was brought out to me I was in complete shock; the pasta was full of mussels and clams. I was extremely hesitant to try it but I knew that I had to go into it with an open mind and to give it a chance. My firs bite was a cautious one. I scooped up a lot of pasta and a single clam and surprisingly I did not think it was too bad. The hardest part about eating this dish was that I could not get over how it looked. Just seeing all of the clams and mussels in my pasta was enough to make me uneasy about even giving it a try but I am glad that I did. Results from a late 1970’s study found that, “when we find food more appealing, not only do we enjoy it more we also absorb more nutrients from it” (Shaw). I actually began to enjoy my meal about half way through the dish. I believe this is partly due to the fact that I removed the tainted image that I had formed in my mind about what I thought it would taste like rather than what it actually ended up tasting like.
Terry E. Acree found that the appearance of food and drinks can make people “see” flavors before that actually taste anything. “Now we are beginning to understand that flavor depends on parts of the brain that involve taste, odor, touch and vision. The sum total of these signals, plus our emotions and past experiences, result in perception of flavors, and determine whether we like or dislike specific foods.” Visualization of food may be important to some people when faced with eating something that does not look appearing; however, the eyes are not dominant when it comes to the perception of food. Acree offers two different explanations to why people may still try something even though it does not look appetizing. The first explanation is, “if a person has strong, positive feelings associated with these foods, that pleasant past experience can trump the yucky- looking visual on the plate.” The second explanation that Acree posits “is that people have a strong desire for new experiences and that input from the brain and nose may override the eyes in these situations.”
In addition to the way food looks, color also plays a factor in the perception of food. According to Amy Castle, “our eyes have been conditioned to see certain foods in a particular way and while some colors stimulate the taste buds, others are capable of killing the appetite.” The human brain is programmed to choose foods that offer the most nutrients to the body and each individual’s subconscious knows this. This is why people will pause and look at different food items before choosing which one they want because they are trying to find the item that is the most visually appealing. French researchers conducted an experiment to test how color affects taste by dying white wine with red food coloring. They then proceeded to ask a group of wine experts to describe the taste. “The connoisseurs described the wine using typical red wine descriptors rather than terms they would use to evaluate white wine, suggesting that the color played a significant role in the way they perceived the drink” (Small).
The sense of smell is another factor that plays an important role in taste. When people are eating and they put food into their mouth it hits the taste buds on the tongue but the food also activates sensory cells that are located side- by- side with the taste buds. In the light of this fact “we perceive the act of touch as tasting because the contact “captures” the flavor sensation” (Small). For example, if an individual were to plug their nose while eating they would not be able to distinguish the taste of the food; however, once they unplugged their nose they would automatically be able to recognize the flavor. This is due to the fact that they can now smell the food and that information is relayed to the mouth from the nasal passage in a process called olfactory referral. According to Dana Small, a neuroscientist at the John B. Pierce Laboratory in New Haven, Conn., and the Yale School of Medicine, “to our brains, “taste” is actually the fusion of a food’s taste, smell and touch into a single sensation.”
It is interesting to realize how many of our senses play a role in how we taste different foods. I always thought that taste was black and white and the information we gathered was solely due to the taste buds on our tongue. I now know that flavor is the combination of all of our senses and in order to decide whether we truly enjoy the taste of a food or not each one of our five senses must be functionally cohesively.
Work Cited
Castle, A. (2012, September 12). Does The Way We See Food Affect Its Taste? Retrieved December 11, 2015, from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/Menuism/does-the-way-we-see-food-affect-taste_b_1872204.html
Shaw, G. (2010, December 19). We Eat With Our Eyes First. Retrieved December 11, 2015, from http://glennashaw.com/2010/12/we-eat-with-our-eyes-first/
Small, D. (2008, April 2). How does the way food looks or its smell influence taste? Retrieved December 11, 2015, from http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/experts-how-does-sight-smell-affect-taste/
Spaghetti à la bolognaise. (n.d.). Retrieved December 11, 2015, from http://t-ka.net/cuisine/plats_complets/spaghetti_a_la_bolognaise
The Laughing Halibut. (n.d.). Retrieved December 11, 2015, from https://www.flickr.com/photos/47536577@N00/5169514276