Your Taste Buds Ambassadors to Nature

[Music]

i’d like to invite you

to think about your favorite food

now this can be a single item

or it can be a whole meal

try to remember the last time you had it

i don’t want you to think about the

environment or the people you’re with

but the food that you are experiencing

now take that bite

what are you tasting

are you getting something sweet

maybe salty

maybe there’s a savory meatiness to it

perhaps there’s even a little hint of

bitter

nothing offensive maybe a spice or an

herb

maybe

it has a citrus garnish

and you squeeze it on your food and

you’ve got this pop of sour

are your salivary glands going

our taste buds

are there

for your pleasure

but they also have purpose

you see i believe that even healthy food

should be out of this world delicious

and yet we find ourselves in a place

where

our sense of taste has kind of lost its

reverence

if you think about it

those taste buds are the only thing that

you were born with

to be able to detect nutrition

so

your sense of taste matters

so much more

than we’re giving it reverence for

now i just walked you through a

flavorful experience and in that

experience

you got to think about the five flavors

we get to experience on our taste buds

salty sweet

sour

bitter and umami

now you’re gonna laugh when i tell you

what my favorite food is

it’s meatloaf

my mom makes the best meatloaf in the

world

and growing up in new jersey

my dad and i were the gardeners

and to this day i still garden

and i’m so lucky because i have really

been able to embrace the food industry

in a lot of different ways

so i’ve worked in restaurants

and i’ve done food manufacturing

and this fascination with food and

flavor

ultimately took me to a culinary school

and it wasn’t just a cooking

school this school is focused on local

and organic

food

and we as students

got to get our hands in the dirt

and link arms with farmers that really

care about their land and their soil

and the food that they’re growing and

raising for that matter

and it was here in culinary school that

i learned

about the five flavors

salty sweet sour bitter and umami i’m

gonna keep saying it

so i not only learned how to make food

taste good

but i also learned that these flavors

have benefits and they have purpose

we live in a world today

where

our taste buds are not really given

enough reverence

our children are growing up thinking

that blue

is a flavor

and we have been conditioned to think

that only sweet and salty things taste

good

but then we get in our heads and we say

well sweet is calories

and salt

is heart it’s concerning for your heart

so all of a sudden we don’t trust our

sense of taste anymore

but the thing is

that there’s an important correlation

here

between flavor and nutrients

and in nature

flavor and nutrients create the perfect

package

the sad thing about not giving reverence

to our sense of taste

is that not only doing ourselves a

disservice

we’re also

allowing kind of confusing combinations

of flavor

so for instance

chocolate flavored protein

do you know that protein has its own

flavor

it’s called umami

and it is delicious

it is that meaty savory anxious flavor

that we get

yes when we eat meat but also when we

eat seeds or nuts

and even kale that higher protein green

has an umami flavor

so these flavors

have purpose

and when we embrace these flavors

in this way

we can learn to trust them more

so for instance in nature let’s think

about an apple

if you think of an apple you’re going to

think of it as sweet

but is it just sweet

when you take that bite

you’re getting sweet

you’re getting sour

you might even be getting a little

saltiness

but it’s wrapped in a bitter package

and that bitter package that protects

the apple

from pests and disease with its

antioxidants and polyphenols

is going to provide the same benefit for

you

so in nature

sweet doesn’t come alone

sweet is always packaged with other

flavors

so

it’s really

powerful if you think about it

you can make choices around flavor

without the guilt

when it comes from nature

so i’m really lucky in that in my

pursuit

of understanding our taste buds better

i get to interview really amazing

experts

i get to talk to chefs and nutritionists

and farmers

regenerative farmers

agronomists and the exciting thing is

that they’re doing the right things with

flavor they are growing flavor into food

instead of manufacturing it and adding

it later

in one usda report that was shared with

me by rod tyler of garden socks did a

comparison report of nutrients of

strawberries grown conventionally versus

strawberries grown

in garden socks which are filled with

just compost

biology rich compost

and they were measuring nutrient density

but the reality is it translates to

flavor really easily

so for instance

it showed higher levels of sucrose

glucose and fructose

you can probably guess that that’s going

to bring you sweetness

but it’s also energy

right

it also showed higher levels of malic

acid and citric acid and these show up

as sour

on our taste buds

and here’s the thing

that you’re going to love

is the antioxidants

were higher

and antioxidants

are bitter

i know you don’t really love that

usually when we think of bitter it’s

offensive and it’s not something that we

feel like we enjoy

but don’t be bitter about

bitter because bitter is where the magic

is

all the medicinal healing properties of

food

show up in bitter flavors

so antioxidants terpenes polyphenols

these are all things that we can embrace

as a bitter flavor

and the best part of it is

we can kind of bring mary poppins into

the picture here when we and if you

think about it a little bit of sweetness

can help the medicine go down

in a world

where

we’re on the precipice of environmental

collapse

think about how empowering it is to use

your own taste buds as an ally for these

regenerative farmers

and imagine

this is cool technology that’s showing

up

there’s devices that you will be able to

take into the grocery store

measured nutrient density

of let’s say a leaf of spinach in the

grocery store

take that device to the farmers market

do a little comparison

look at the nutrient density

take them home

and taste them

all of a sudden

your taste buds are not so superficial

after all

so here we are

often confused about how we can make

changes in the environment

doesn’t it feel completely empowering

that your taste buds

and you

demanding more flavor be grown and

raised into your food

can make a difference

flavor is a

remedy flavor is a remedy for boring

food

flavor is a remedy for your health

flavor is remedy for the planet

what is it that you want to eat and

taste in your food

[Applause]