Are you feeling curious?

Sour.

Super sour.

Today on Curious Crew.

I have the most delicious challenge for you today.

It's a feeding frenzy.

It's really good.

Isn't that awesome?

As we test our tastebuds, we've got a whole smorgasbord.

So work up an appetite for a serving of science and explore the sense of taste.

A little taste explosion over there.

Support for Curious Crew is provided by MSU Federal Credit Union, offering a variety of accounts for children and teens of all ages while teaching lifelong saving habits.

More information is available at MSUFCU.org Also by the Consumers Energy Foundation, dedicated to ensuring Michigan residents have access to world class educational resources by investing in nonprofits committed to education and career readiness.

More information is available at ConsumersEnergy.com/foundation and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Hi, I'm Rob Stephenson and this is Curious Crew!

Welcome to the show everybody.

We always like to start every episode with a couple of discrepant events because discrepant events stimulate Curiousity!

Yes, that's exactly right.

And I've got some fun ones for you today.

And in fact, two of you have already been helping me just a little bit.

Just a moment ago, I gave Robert what's called a little Mberry tablet and I wanted him to just suck on it, let it dissolve.

Not chew it.

Has it dissolved?

Yes.

Okay.

And Robert, what did it taste like?

It tasted sweet.

Okay.

You're going to notice, right in front of you, Robert, I've got a lemon with some cut segments as well.

How many of you like the flavor of lemons?

Some of you like lemon flavor.

Okay, Some of you do.

Okay.

And what is that flavor, Jacqueline?

What's that flavor?

Like kind of sour.

Okay, Robert, I'm so glad you like lemons because I'm actually going to ask you to taste one of the little lemon segments and then let us know, what does it taste like?

Go for it.

It tastes like lemonade.

Taste like lemonade.

Oh, that's really interesting.

Is it a sweet lemonade or a sour lemonade?

It was actually pretty sweet.

Sweet.

Interesting.

Okay.

Olivia has been helping us out as well.

In fact, I've got four little drinks in front of Olivia, and I asked her to taste each one taking a sip of water in between.

And which one is your favorite?

The blue one.

The blue one.

Okay, we're going to do this again.

But this time we're going to blindfold you.

So go ahead and put this blindfold on.

And to make it easy, I'm going to ask you to just put your hands gently on the table and.

Right.

Perfect.

Like that.

And I'm going to move the water glass to your left hand and I'm just going to give a cup to you each time and you can take a sip.

Perfect.

And I'll take that one away.

I'm going to give you another one like that.

Perfect.

I've got it.

Here's a third one and one more to check.

Okay.

Put the water glass down.

Which one is your favorite this time?

One, two, three or four.

They all tasted the same.

Okay, go ahead and take off that blindfold.

That's perplexing.

So we have sweet lemons and delicious drinks Im gonna invite three of you to do a little scientific modeling to see if you can explain these phenomena.

By the end of the show.

You can use your background, knowledge, anything that you learn along the way to revise your thinking.

Who would like to do a modeling moment today?

We'd like to try that.

Okay.

Demetrius, Aikem and Sarah Excellent.

Now, does anybody have a guess what we're going to be talking about today?

What do you think, Jacqueline?

Maybe something with flavor or taste?

The sense of taste is exactly right.

Stick around.

This episode is going to be sweet and sour.

Lets see if we can figure this out.

It was really surprising that Robert thought that the lemon was sweet.

I know lemons are really sour.

I wonder what that tablet did to his taste buds.

Yeah, I was thinking about those drinks.

Why would blindfolding someone change the results of the taste test?

The sense of taste is already present in newborn babies, and by four months they can detect sweet, sour, bitter, umami and salty.

A person's tongue is covered in tiny bumps called papillae and inside are taste buds.

The bud is like a tiny, peeled orange with an open top called a taste pore when you eat the food, mixes with saliva in your mouth and falls into those openings where special cells detect the food.

Those receptors send messages to your brain to help you identify the different tastes.

Ooh, that's sweet.

So first, let's make some sense out of our sense of taste.

And to do that, we've got a whole smorgasbord made out here.

And in fact, we are going to try to identify the five different taste or flavors that we can detect.

You've each prepared a little sampling from each one.

And what I'd like you to do right now is taste your category number one item.

So go ahead and try that and we'll see what you think it tastes like.

You'll notice in this category, we've got some green tea, some arugula, some dill weed, some ginger, pure cocoa.

I've got some garlic powder over there.

Your facial expressions are priceless.

Jacqueline, what flavor is this?

Bitter.

It is bitter.

Are you all noticing that?

Yeah, it's a bitter flavor.

Now, interestingly enough, a lot of plants have compounds that produce a bitter flavor, and it's very distinctive to us, isn't it?

Kind of kind of strong.

We'll start with that one and go to something else.

Let's take a look at our second category.

And you'll notice in this one, we've got some lemons, we've got some cranberry, some cut gummies, they're coated.

You notice how strong that one was?

Some vinegar, some grapefruit.

Bilal, what is this flavor?

Sour.

It's super sour.

Now, when we taste something sour, we're actually detecting the hydrogen ions that are there and we taste it as sour or acidic.

But that's kind of important because we can also tell when food starts to spoil.

So it's helpful.

Okay, try number three.

We've got some strawberries, we've got some candies, some honey, some fruit juice here.

Aikem, what's this?

Sweet.

Oh, yes, it's so pleasant.

And of course, when we start getting that sweet, we're getting the sucrose, the sugar and the amino acids.

It's really dense.

in carbohydrates and energy.

Excellent.

Okay, how about category four?

Try this one.

Category four.

We've got some olives.

I've got some gourmet salts, some pretzels that are there.

What do you think this one is?

I think it's salty.

It is definitely salty.

That one's kind of obvious, isn't it?

And some of those gourmet salts are really, really interesting.

Okay.

Now the salt, we're detecting sodium chloride, but that's really important for your body as well.

It's going to maintain electrolytes.

It's going to maintain fluid balance.

So that's really important, too.

So we've got to start turning these over so we can see them all.

So I don't want to forget that.

So we have our bitter, sour, sweet over here.

And salty.

Now, there's one more I'd like you to try.

There's going to be some Parmesan cheese or some meat sticks here, some tomato.

What are you noticing with this one below?

It's like mouth watering.

Oh, that's a great description.

Mouth watering.

It's kind of like what we call savory.

Now, this one's really interesting.

It's called umami.

Umami is a Japanese word that means delicious taste.

And what's interesting is I'm glad you said mouthwatering because this is actually stimulating some amino acids from animal and plant proteins.

And what scientists figured out when we taste this, our bodies start producing more saliva and digestive juice to be able to digest the proteins, which is really kind of interesting.

Okay, I have one more challenge for you.

Speaking of mouthwatering, I'd like you to take that paper towel and just put it up to your tongue and get it dry as dry as you can.

Just briefly and once you feel like you have it dry, put it down and then take a taste of one more thing that's still on your plate.

I want you to see what you notice Aikem, what are you noticing?

I can't taste it as much now.

It's really strange.

Your taste is dependent upon saliva.

Because as soon as a saliva gets in there, it starts to digest it, and it transports little flavors right into your taste buds.

So when we have a dry tongue, it's really hard to taste anything at all.

But not to worry, you three have great taste.

Your taste buds can detect very specific substances when you eat sweet foods like cake.

Your tongue identifies different sugars like sucrose or glucose, or when you eat salty popcorn at the movies, it detects sodium chloride, bitter flavors can taste good or bad, but those flavorful compounds are found in plants.

If you like sour lemons, your tongue enjoys the acidic flavor like citric acid.

Does your mouth ever water while eating a perfectly cooked piece of meat or ripe tomato?

That umami taste is reacting to a substance called glutamate.

Taste buds are terrific.

So we've already identified the five flavors that we can detect.

And we know that saliva is really important in our sense of taste.

But let's see if we can make some other connections to.

First of all, you'll notice on your plate we've got some jelly beans.

And I'm going to ask you each to select one and predict for me, what do you think it's going to taste like?

Max, I'm gonna start with you.

Which one are you gonna taste?

I think Im gonna taste this white one right here.

What flavor do you think it's going to be?

I think it might be pineapple.

Pineapple.

Okay, Olivia, how about you?

I'll be tasting the blue one.

Okay.

What do you think it's gonna taste like?

I think blue raspberry.

Ooh, blue rasberry.

Oh, that sounds tasty.

Okay, Demetrius, I'm going to say taste this green one.

I'm going taste this green one.

Oh, and what do you think it's gonna taste like?

Mint chocolate chip.

Okay, I'm going to taste this yellow one.

I have no idea.

It's yellow.

Maybe lemon.

All right, let's try these.

Ooh, that's kind of sweet.

Did you predict right?

Mmm mmm.

Me neither.

Did you predict, Right?

I think so.

Oh, you did?

Okay.

Demetrius, Did you predict yours correctly?

Oh yeah.

Oh, how did you know with such confidence?

Well I eat these jellybeans all the time.

so if you eat them a lot you really know.

And that makes sense because we build flavor memory.

Right.

You look at something like, I remember what that tastes like.

I can't wait.

Now sometimes jelly beans can challenge us, though, sometimes you have to eat it and wait a moment while it dissolves until you can detect the flavor.

And even then, you might be surprised.

Like I was like you were.

Okay for the next investigation.

We're going to do this with our nose plugged okay.

Want you to pinch your nose.

Yep.

Got to pinch your nose Underneath here I have two slices and I'm going to ask you to move the cup so you could see these.

One of them has a blue tooth pick.

The other one has a green tooth pick.

Please grab the blue toothpick.

I would like you to eat this slice.

And when you're ready, then you can eat the green one.

What do you notice Max?

It's really hard to tell the difference between the two.

It is really hard.

Okay, let go of your nose and see if you start getting some flavors.

So what flavors were you detecting Olivia?

I was tasting more of apple.

Oh, you're correct.

One of them was apple, the other one was potato.

Really?

Thats why it tasted so bad.

that's why we did the apple second.

So it would taste a little bit better.

I know you want another jelly bean.

Go ahead, have another jelly bean.

So, of course, our sense of taste is not only influenced by our sense of sight, but it's enhanced by our sense of smell.

Have you ever eaten something when you were sick?

You might have noticed it was hard to taste your food.

Although taste is detected from your taste buds.

Identifying flavor combines taste with the aroma you smell as you chew some release chemicals travel to your taste buds while others travel into your nasal passages.

Then both your nose and tongue send messages to your brain that get interpreted as flavor.

This is also why when you smell something cooking, you can almost taste it.

Yum STEM Challege.

so have you been having fun investigating our sense of taste?

Yeah.

I'm so glad.

I have the most delicious STEM challenge for you today.

In fact, you're going to be making a five taste ketchup recipe using the ingredients in front of you.

I know that some tables have actually even spiced it up and enhanced some of the flavors.

So, chefs, are you ready to start your recipes?

Yeah.

All right, Go for it.

Have fun.

I say we should go round table.

I do the vinegar and you do corn syrup.

And you do that.

Yeah.

And after we pour in our powders.

All righty, three, two, one.

This investigation is very fun because all of the different tables are combining together to make their own forms of ketchup.

I'm going to start off with the corn syrup.

Oh wow!

the ingredients that Dr.

Rob has is using are tomato paste, water, vinegar, corn syrup, garlic powder, onion powder, salt and sugar.

It's a lot of sugar.

Yeah.

Oh, I can smell the vinegar.

Each of the tables were enhancing different flavors for the ketchup.

Our table decided to enhance the salt and the onion powder.

and think it tastes great with the salt.

We chose salt and onion powder because we wanted it a little more bitter and we wanted the salt to give it a little more kick.

Whys it stuck to the bottom.

The flavors that we enhanced in our ketchup were salt, sugar, onion powder and garlic powder.

It's a lot of garlic powder.

The consistency of the ketchup was changing throughout mixing all the ingredients together.

It's like a chunky consistency.

It was like from a very thick paste to like a watery paste.

And after mixing it for a while, it ended up turning out like an actual ketchup.

I think it's definitely like really smooth.

Some advice that I would give to other kids who want to make ketchup is to really experiment with all the ingredients that you have at your house.

You don't have to use everything that we use and you can experiment with a bunch of different ingredients.

Okay, this is looking really, really good.

You're probably wondering what's the next step?

So we are going to put this on the stove, bring it to a boil, and then we have to reduce the heat for about 20 minutes and then let it cool put in the refrigerator.

I have the perfect thing to taste test it with.

So we have our ketchup ready.

And I know you all used the same ingredients, but some of you enhanced some of your recipes as well.

But before I ask about that, I'm curious what ingredients cause the sweet and salty flavors.

Robert.

The sweet would be the sugar and the corn syrup and the salty would be the salt.

That's exactly right.

And Max, what about the sour flavor?

Where's that come from?

The south flavor comes from the vinegar.

Okay, great.

And what about the garlic powder?

What does that do?

That makes the flavor bitter?

Bitter?

Excellent.

And Bilal, where does the umami come from?

Umami comes from our onion powder and our tomatoes.

Excellent.

And tomatoes, the more ripe they are, the better.

And onion powder is a great ingredient because it gets savory, but it can offer a little sweet as well, which is interesting.

Now, I'm curious.

You each enhanced yours.

How did you change your recipe, Robert?

What did you add more of?

Garlic powder and salt.

Okay.

So going for a little more bitter, A little more salty.

How about over here?

Max?

Your team did what?

We added onion powder, sugar, salt and garlic powder.

That's a lot.

A little taste explosion over there.

Okay, great.

And Bilal.

How about your team?

We added more onion powder, and more salt.

Great.

So I think we're ready to taste it.

And on what?

Better to taste ketchup then, with French fries?

Go ahead, taste them.

I love your feedback.

What do you think?

What do you think?

Mmm.

It's really good.

Isn't that awesome?

It's tastes really good.

Super tasty five taste ketchup.

You've got them all.

Try making your own five taste ketchup and you can enhance the flavor with additional ingredients that you like.

On average, adults have between 2000 an 10000 taste buds that are mostly on the tongue in the papillae, but also on the roof of your mouth.

And even in your throat.

The buds are very small, measuring about 1/30 of a millimeter in diameter and 1/60 of a millimeter long.

Most of the tongue buds are on the sides and tip of the tongue in the fungiform and further back on the tongue in the foliate.

But far fewer on the back in the circumvallate.

That sure is a lot of taste buds, so I am sure you're all grateful for your sense of taste because it makes it possible to taste some pretty wonderful things, right?

Amazingly, though, your sense of taste is pretty complex and we can even detect intensities.

You're going to help me out with something I call sweet detection.

But first, I made a cup of tea for both of you.

Would you like some tea?

Feel free to sip along while Robert works on this sweet detection.

So, Robert, what I have here, five glasses.

I'm going to ask you to taste each one and then put them in order from sweetest to least sweet.

You understand?

All right, Go for it.

Satisfied?

Yes.

Okay.

How's that tea?

Bitter.

Interesting.

Okay.

Now, I don't know if you guys noticed this, but you did that pretty quickly.

I'm curious.

How did you know how to set this up?

You were obviously paying attention to sweetness.

Were you noticing something else, too?

The color.

Because this one's the darkest.

So I thought this was the sweetest.

So I just took a quick sip.

That was actually quite astute.

Let me tell you why.

That cup number three that you identified as being the sweetest is all apple juice, the whole thing.

The second one that you identified in the our sweetness row is actually 75% Apple juice, 25% water.

This one is half juice, half water.

This one only has 25% juice and 75% water.

And this one is clearly water.

Get it?

Clearly water.

Well done with your sweet detection.

Now, bitter tea.

I'd like you to try something for me.

You each have a little candy there.

Okay.

Sariah predict for me.

What do you think that candy is going to taste like?

Like candy.

Like candy.

Nice and sweet candy.

Okay, go ahead and taste that.

Eshaan, you as well.

See what you notice Whoa.

Eshaan.

What are you noticing there?

It tastes really bitter.

You're expecting something sweet and it's coming out bitter.

Now, that's really unusual.

This tea is a special kind of tea called Gymnema Tea.

And it comes from Southern India.

It it's actually some leaves from a vine called Gymnema Sylvestre.

Now, the interesting thing is when we drink this tea, it temporarily inhibits or stops our taste buds from tasting sweet.

So things taste bitter.

Surprise.

This is a really interesting investigation and actually gives new meaning to the term bitter sweet.

As we get older, the total number of our taste buds goes down, so you might discover you start enjoying different foods.

Ou r sense of taste makes our lives more flavorful, so there are things we can do to preserve it.

Try not to eat or drink things that are too hot or too cold and be sure to floss and brush your teeth.

But not to worry.

If you do hurt some taste buds, they will fully heal in about ten days.

In fact, your taste buds regenerate constantly.

Thanks to our sense of taste, we can enjoy many different foods and cuisines.

Bon appetit.

Are you curious about careers in science?

Hi, I'm Olivia.

And today I'm here with Jade Heslip.

Jade, can you tell me where we are and what you do?

I'm the R&D technical manager here at Jiffy Mixes at Chelsea Milling Company in Chelsea, Michigan.

What happens here at the Jiffy Plant while we make all sorts of food products, we do both retail and food service under the Jiffy name.

We're best known for our corn muffins, but we also make all sorts of products.

Do you want to be my taste tester today?

Yes, I've been waiting.

I like to say we eat for work, not for fun.

But that's part of the job here.

Understanding how things taste.

Research and development is a really unique role where we are problem solvers.

Every day I'm doing some sort of calculation or we might be going out and thinking about physics and packaging.

I love the troubleshooting, and one of the benefits of being in the food industry is you can taste everything you're working on.

I had a great mix of food science and fun at Jiffy with Jade Heslip.

Explore your possibilities.

And now back to Curious Crew.

So we know that Robert couldn't detect the sour taste of the lemon.

I wonder if his taste buds were clogged, like the Mberry stuck to his tongue and covered the pores.

Maybe no new flavors can get it.

That makes sense.

I was thinking about the investigation with the jelly beans and how appearances can influence how we think something will taste.

And Olivia chose a favorite drink because she could still see it.

Right.

So maybe it was the color of the drink that influenced the decision, not the taste.

Exactly.

I wonder if all of the colored drinks are the same thing but with food coloring added.

So have you had fun investigating sense of taste today?

Yeah.

I'm so glad it's now time to return to our discrepant events and I hope they didn't leave a bad taste in your mouth.

But what have we figured out about the sweet lemons?

Demetrius We think that when the Mberry dissolves the molecules cling to the taste receptors.

Right.

So the sour taste of the lemon is covered by the sweet taste of the Mberry Oh, that was a great explanation.

That's exactly what's happening here.

The Mberry is really interesting It's made from a berry called the Miraculous berry or Miraculous Fruit, and it grows in West Africa.

And it really does change the way things taste.

As Robert discovered firsthand right?

Now, you might be wondering, how long does this last?

Well, it's just 10 minutes to just over an hour that your taste buds are affected.

And we could have done lots of different foods.

We could have done a grapefruit, a lime, strawberry, pineapple, even a pickle.

That would have been fun.

Now, what have we figured out about these delicious drinks Aikem?

We think that Olivia wasn't distracted by the color the second time and paid more attention to the similar taste.

We think that's the same juice in each cup.

You caught me.

You're totally right.

I have apple juice in each cup.

And then I added food coloring to several of them.

And in fact, Olivia even identified it correctly afterwards.

She said it's apple juice.

She was right.

Now, most people, when we look at colors, we are influenced by the color and we decide, Oh, I like that one because we might like a certain color, but once we're blindfolded, we really have to pay attention to the taste.

And then Olivia was able to detect, Oh no, this is exactly the same drink.

I don't have a favorite.

They're all the same.

So as we've discovered, numerous senses are involved in our tasting experiences.

Good job, crew.

So, remember, my friends, stay curious and keep experimenting.

Get your curiosity guide and see more programs at wkar.org.

Support for Curious Crew is provided by MSU Federal Credit Union offering a variety of accounts for children and teens of all ages while teaching lifelong saving habits.

More information is available at MSUFCU.org also by the Consumers Energy Foundation, dedicated to ensuring Michigan residents have access to world class educational resources by investing in nonprofits committed to education and career readiness.

More information is available at ConsumersEnergy.com/foundation and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

So it looks like we need to make some sense out of our sense of taste.

Get it.

What do you notice Max?

eating jelly beans for science.

Talk about a sweet gig.

Take your jelly bean.

Take the jelly beans.

Oh, investigation number two, take one.

That was perfection.