A year ago I knew nothing about cooking. I couldn't make rice, and didn't know how to cook a chicken breast. I've made progress. I can make most relatively simple dished from a recipe. I have several dishes that I'm comfortable cooking without without consulting a recipe. Now I'm working on distilling what I've learned into a set of cooking principles that will let me move into more creative cooking.
Humans have five kinds of taste receptors. All perceived flavors are generated from some combination of these.
Salty The taste perception of salts, especially sodium chloride.
Sour Sourness is the taste that detects acidity.
Sweet Sensation produced by sugars and some proteins.
Bitter Perceived by some as unpleasant, sharp, or disagreeable. Possibly an evolutionary defence against poisoning. Common foods include:
Savoury Also called umami, the savory taste receptors were only recently confirmed by science. Umami taste is intensified when combined with salty tastes. This is why tomatoes taste better with salt. Savory taste is caused by compounds such as glutamate, and found in protein-rich foods like the following:
Fat Research indicates that certain mamals have distinct taste receptors for fat. It has not been conclusively shown that humans are able to taste fat as a disctinct flavor.
Temperature The actual hot or cold of food. Some foods are percieved to taste bettery hot or cold.
Coolnes Also called fresh or minty. Experienced with foods like spearmint, menthol, ethanol, or camphor.
Spiciness Burning sensation caused by substances such as capsaicin or ethanol. The main foods which provide this sensation are black pepper and chili peppers
Astringency Caused by foods like tea or unripe fruit containing tannins that constrict organic tissue. Unripe persimmons.
Add sweet if the flavor is too sour, salt if the flavor is too bland, sour if the flavor is too salty or sweet on top of sweet if the flavor is too spicy.
| Sweet | Sour |
| Sweet | Salty |
| Salty | Sour |