The Bitter Truth

This article features the work of Paul Breslin, a member of the Monell Chemical Senses Center as well as a professor in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at Rutgers University. He is a geneticist and biologist whose work focuses on taste perception… The prevailing evolutionary explanation for the ability to taste bitter is that it is a warning signal for toxins – a prompt to our foraging ancestors to spit out the offending leaf or fruit immediately. But, as it turns out, bitter-tasting compounds not only add a delicious complexity to some of our favorite foods and drinks – chocolate, coffee, and beer, to name just a few – but are often quite good for us… Bitter fruits and vegetables already make up less than five percent of the average American’s daily diet. Now, as our produce becomes sweeter, bitter-tasting foods have become almost an endangered species.