Writes: Javier Martínez Aguirre - Professor of Organic Chemistry
There is no doubt that the industrialization of agriculture and livestock in the middle of the last century it was a great revolution. Some foods that were difficult for people to acquire became affordable. It changed the diet and nutrition of families in an important way. Ultimately, it improved the quality of life of people.
All of these changes prioritized production. In addition, they were looking for the uniformity in the product, which has undoubtedly had an effect on its quality. These two concepts led to varieties and breeds based on price, disease resistance and the drought.
As well as in the Product image in the market forgetting. In many cases, the flavor original food was affected. This is one of the essential themes, getting to diminish or disappear.
But really, what is taste?
Well, the flavor is the sensation that food or substances produce. Which are made up of chemical compounds that 80% are perceived by smell and 20% by tongue and palate. This is one of the reasons why when we have colds we lose part of the taste of the flavor.
In the language we find more than 10.000 taste buds. They are made up of cells that send electrical stimuli to our brain. Although the latest studies contradict each other, it is true that in most cases every part of the tongue is more sensitive to one flavor or another.
The five main flavors
Sweet: is one of the five basic food flavors that provide sugars. It is detected mainly on the tip of the tongue. It is present in foods with carbohydrates and fruits. It's about a pleasant taste.
Salty: This well-known flavor in our culture is what gives us the common salt. It is a flavor that is appreciated on the sides of the front of the tongue, reminding of metallic flavors.
Acid: sometimes it is identified as sour. It is appreciated by the taste buds on the sides of the back of the tongue. It is provided by Citrus, tartaric acids in the grapes and the malic acid on apples.
Bitter: it is detected in the taste buds on the back. They are usually unpleasant flavors if they are very pronounced. We meet them in the coffee, In the beer (for the hops) and in the tonic (for quinine).
umami: a flavor identified in Japan at the beginning of the last century. In Japanese it means tasty. We find it in some seaweed, soy sauce, Iberian ham, anchovies, etc. It is characterized by causing a certain salivation and stimulating the palate and throat.
Other flavors and their study with tomatoes
Although these are the five main flavors we discovered that there are some more like the hot spicy, refreshing, astringent or fatty.
For the food chemical industry, its study is very important, especially for processed foods. It is also for researchers in agriculture and livestock who seek to recover the flavors requested.
A well-known case is the flavor recovery in tomatoes. In this sense, studies have been carried out that identify volatile compounds as responsible. These in the hybridization of varieties have been lost.
They were and are responsible for the flavor that we perceive in the smell and that are vital for its perception. This fact is expected to happen in the same way in multitude of fruits.
Hopefully these studies and the recovery of these varieties, with a high flavor, will lead us to recover flavors. They are part of our taste heritage that we long for so much.
