Review of ‘Taste Matters: Why We Like the Foods We Do’ by John Prescott

Taste Matters: Why We Like the Foods We DoLondon: Reaktion Books; 2012208 pages, ISBN 978 1 86189 914 9In Taste Matters: Why We Like the Foods We Do, Professor John Prescott – a Sydney-based psychologist, and long-time editor of the popular food science journal Food Quality & Preference – tackles the fundamental question of why it is that we like certain foods and not others. After all, every one of us has been in the situation where something that we find delicious tastes disgusting to others around us: Japanese natto, or fermented beans, for the westerner, and rice pudding for those from Asia, being but two popular examples. One novel addition to the list of disgusting foods introduced by Prescott in his latest book is the Icelandic dish hakarl, a kind of putrefied shark. This particular fish is somewhat unusual in that it excretes ammonia through its skin. The people from Iceland prepare the shark by burying it in the ground for a couple of months until it reaches maturity. A delicious treat to the locals, apparently, but absolutely horrible to pretty much everyone else. But what exactly are the key factors that are responsible for driving our differing responses to food? And what can we do to change people’s food preferences (that is, to get young children to eat more vegetables, say)?Perhaps just as important as the question of why it is that we do not all like the same foods, however, is the related issue of why it is that we actually do share so many of our food likes/dislikes. Chocolate, for instance, appears to be universally liked. Similarly, most people find the orthonasal smell of coffee to be very pleasing (of course, the same cannot be said for this beverage’s bitter taste). As one might expect, answering the question of what factors drive our food likes and dislikes turns out to be a very complex matter. What is more, much of the relevant science has only started to emerge over the last decade or so. That said, Prescott does a great job of guiding the