Does anyone consider themselves a "super-taster"?

[Tab]

I became interested in this about 10 years ago or so. Within my family there are those of us who love to cook, and those of us who love to eat (and some are both).

I think I do well in cooking, because I can visualize the flavors, and taste the different parts individually. Although that might help my cooking, it actually has a reverse effect in my eating. I'm a particularly picky eater, and a lot of food I can't even go near. The "super-taster" thing comes into play for various foods - broccoli is a great example. Broccoli is too intense for me, too bitter. However my mother, wife, and son love it. I can't eat it. I can cook it, but only because others tell me I've cooked it properly.

Don't get me started on canned tuna fish, mashed potatoes, creamed corn, brussel sprouts, etc. Some of this is psychological, dating back to bad elementary school food in the 60s, but much is that I just can't stomach the taste or smell.

So, it's a benefit to my cooking, but a drawback to my eating.

Anyone else notice such a thing?

[Kali]

1. I am not sure...

but I seem to have a way more sensitive nose and taste than others that I eat with regularly. I am also picky about things, especially textures.

[Tab]

2. I am super-picky about textures too

Some of the foods I mentioned are more texture than taste (except the bitters - those really turn me off). But I notice that although I like myself a bar of milk chocolate, I can't stand a cup of hot chocolate (the creamy textures, etc.) or even chocolate ice cream, yet they're somehow intertwined, because the same texture of, say, an orange creamsicle I'd suck down in a second.

[2theleft]

5. Food texture and smells are big with me, too.

ESPECIALLY textures. Anything squishy/squiggly/spongey makes me gag...like the texture of oysters or marshmellows. In addition, if the texture is "off" - i.e., in spaghetti sauce, I hate chunks. In my world, sauce is smooth. I can eat chucky sauce, but am not happy about it...but if you have chunks and they are the even in the slightest bit firm, it is not good for me. Just can't enjoy it. I hate being like that and really try to ignore, but I just can't.

[NRaleighLiberal]

3. It's an easy test - I am not a super taster according to the saccharin version

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/PersonalBest/story?id=2740603

I am not a super taster, but a real foodie - was a chemist, have a very analytical mind/approach. I love nuances - which is why I roast my own coffee, taste lots of different dark chocolates, wines and beers.

You mention the intense broccoli thing - that is more an interesting genetics phenomenon

http://www.livescience.com/39578-why-some-hate-broccoli.html

The cole family (cauli, broc, etc) taste very sweet to me, so neither of my parents passed down the gene for bitter taste receptor (thankfully!).

But there are some flavors and aromas I do NOT like - vinegar (acetic acid), cilantro (soapy water), for example.

[Tab]

4. Interesting...

My ex-wife (or maybe my current wife?) also like broccoli but hated Cilantro. I'm the opposite - love cilantro (reasonably applied), hate any broccoli.

There's got to be money in this here somewhere..... hmmm....

[SheilaT]

8. Yes, yes the cilantro tastes like soap problem.

Very few things can put me into a rage faster than someone assuring me, "It's okay, there's only a little cilantro in this dish."

Fine, then. I'll only sprinkle a few soap chips on your food. Does that sound okay?

Anyway, I tend to consider myself a super taster, but I was in a conversation recently with someone about this, and she asked me about some specific thing, and because of the way I reported tasting it, she assured me I wasn't a super taster. Can't recall what it was.

So I'm probably not one, but I can tell you that since I've been making my own cookies, cakes, and brownies from scratch for a very long time, I can't abide the ones made from mixes. They have a distinct chemical flavor to me that's quite unpleasant. Was really distressing is that most bakeries do not bake from scratch any more, but use commercial mixes also. Earlier today at the grocery store I watched a woman select a cake mix, then a can of frosting, and then a tube of decorator frosting. It was all I could do not to tell her she could make the cake from scratch just as fast as from the mix, but I restrained, as it would have been unpardonably rude of me to do so.

[NRaleighLiberal]

9. yes, it is easy to spot a box mix cake a mile away! not only flavor, but texture!

sounds like we would have a great time cooking together and sampling our wares!

[SheilaT]

20. Yes. I love to bake, and now that I'm no longer working

I can't bake very much as I live alone. I think I need more friends.

[Tab]

11. My ex (or is it my current wife?)

I don't recall. I think my ex. Anyway, it was cilantro-tastes-like-soap. I'd have to eat a lot of cilantro to get that effect. Not sure if that undermines my argument or not. I like it, but some people really hate it.

[SheilaT]

19. For me, even to walk by a large display of cilantro

in the produce department smells like soap to me. Yesterday at Sprout's it was especially pronounced.

[DawgHouse]

6. I think I'm good at picking out seasonings and parts of prepared dishes,

but I think that's because of experience in the kitchen.

I don't know if that makes me a super taster. My husband, on the other hand, is definitely a super taster and he's very hard to cook for because even the slightest seasonings seem to overwhelm his taste buds.

Fresh cilantro in VERY limited amounts is fine with me but too much and it tastes like soap. It seems to lose it's soapy taste if it's cooked in a dish, though.

[AlbertCat]

7. Sure!

I have super taste in all things!

[Tab]

12. If you could only get that in velvet.

Or is it?

[AlbertCat]

17. But it IS, Blanche, it is velvet!

Seriously... I did a google for "velvet Elvis"... so many choices!

[Tab]

25. More surprised

you found a velvet of Bob Ross painting Elvis. That just blows my mind on so many levels.

[pinto]

10. Not super, but definitely a taster. I like to eat a meal...one...bite...at...a...time.

Not surprisingly, I'm usually the last at a table. Almost always ask for a to go set up or, at home, have left overs on hand for a snack.

[TexasBushwhacker]

13. I'm very sensitive to bitter tastes

Cilantro is not good to me, and I'm from Texas. Beer? Ack!!! I remember drinking some my freshman year in college. I screwed up my face and my roomate saud "Ypu have to develop a taste for it." All I could think was why would I want to develop a taste for something that's gross? So no beer for me. I like spicy food, as long as bitter isn' t in the mix.

[Tab]

14. Odd, that's the same way I am with coffee.

Although, I don't recall anyone ever saying I had to "develop" a "taste" for beer - it came naturally. Coffee, on the other hand, always seemed horrid (viewpoint of 1960s+) and I was always told I had to "learn to like it", which seemed silly to me. I hated it, and was damned if I was going to pay to "like" it or submerge my taste feelings to "like it".

Of course, history books in this matter will mention coffee. Betchu anything they don't mention my opposition

[TexasBushwhacker]

15. I love coffee - with cream and sugar! n/t

[AlbertCat]

18. I'm very sensitive to bitter tastes

I hear a pinch of salt will help that.

Apparently salt goes into all your taste receptors on your tongue...enhancing some and blocking some.

This is why one puts salt on grapefruit as well as some sweetener.



On "Good Eats" once they did a grapefruit burlee. You cut the sections free for a 1/2 a grapefruit like you'd do for breakfast, then cover the top with sugar and torch it like a cream burlee, melting and caramelizing the sugar. Before it cools you sprinkle some decorative salt.... like pink salt... on top... and let it cool. Then you eat the thing... while dancing naked in the back yard. OK seriously, I haven't done this but it sounds good.

[TexasBushwhacker]

22. Salt makes sense

Think of all the salted chocolates available now, generally dark chocolates. Very dark chocolate is healthy, but the darker it is, the more bitter. Maybe a little salt is the key to making it more palatable.

[Tab]

26. I originally thought that was weird (salt on grapefruit)

but we put salt on lots of other things, including citrus (thinking lime margaritas here). Haven't tried it on yellow, white, or pink citrus yet, but I imagine it would be good.

[Phentex]

16. Not sure about taste but my sense of smell is always in overdrive...

and so the two seem to be related. I can smell cilantro in anything and I get the soap taste with just the tiniest amount. I am pretty good at smelling seasonings in anything but as others have said, maybe that's due to experience. I am very sensitive to anything on the verge of spoiling or burning. I get mineral tastes more than others it seems and I can tell the difference between many artificial sweeteners. I can't stand the smell of many processed foods because like an aftertaste, I get the aftersmell. I will leave an office where someone has made microwave popcorn because of that disgusting chemical smell it leaves.

I despised the smell of broccoli growing up. I only learned to eat it in my twenties when my sister made it with a cheese sauce which may have tempered the smell for me. Now, I love it.

[SheilaT]

21. I just want to reiterate that awful chemical smell

that so many processed foods have. So many people eat nothing but that stuff that they don't really notice. Microwave popcorn is really the worst, and I can do regular popcorn on the stove top faster than it can be microwaved.

[Laura PourMeADrink]

27. Makes me think of jarred spaghetti

Sauce..even $8 Raos..I can still pick out the processed taste. Wonder what that is?

[TexasBushwhacker]

23. I had a dorm mate who lost her sense of smell

after a bad sinus infection. We learned pretty quick to let her salt her own little bag of popcorn, not the big bowl the rest of us shared. Salt and lots of it, was about all she could taste.

[GreatGazoo]

24. My friend is a super taster against all odds: male + smoker

Great at picking out every ingredient in a sauce but picky if things aren't just right.

He is very handy when I am trying to duplicate something from a restaurant (with no recipe).