Scientists unlock the secrets of a sixth basic flavor
Scientists unlock the secrets of a sixth basic flavor
Japanese scientist Kikunae Ikeda first proposed umami as a basic taste—in addition to sweet, sour, salty and bitter—in the early 1900s. About eight decades later, the scientific community officially agreed with him.
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What am I missing here? Because it sounds like they're saying they've discovered a new thing that registers to us as sour, not actually a new flavor?
Annoyingly, the article never said what it tasted like.
Like liquorice, the really intense one (salmiak). i don't think English has a word for it, since it was not recognized as a flavor before.
The thing is, I know the flavor but wouldn't know how to describe it to someone who doesn't. Asian (Korean and Chinese, to be precise) friends told me it tasted like medicine to them, because apparently it's a common flavor in traditional medicine for them?
Edited for typos.
Nope, the anise/liquorice flavour mostly comes from anisole being detected by scent receptors in the nose/mouth, not by taste receptors. The 6th taste that the article is discussing is triggered by ammonium chloride and would probably best be described as an ammonium taste - kinda like how savoury taste mostly comes from the activation of nucleotide and glutamate taste receptors.
Anise?
Is it perhaps ginseng flavour? That I find really strong, it also kind of smells like penicillium
No, the paper says it shares a receptor with sour, not that it tastes like sour.
Just as "orange" and "purple" have receptors in common but are not perceived as the same.