Smell that Taste (61 Brilliant Biology Experiments)

You will need:

1. 3 plates
2. Water & cookies/bland crackers
3. Peppermint oil
4. Fruits cut in bite-size pieces (strawberry, pear, tomato, kiwi, banana, watermelon, apple, etc.)
5. Toothpick
6. Blindfold
7. Pen and paper

Have fun figuring out whether your sense of
smell and taste are actually linked.

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Deseed and peel all the fruits.
2. Pierce a toothpick in each piece of fruit. Divide the assorted fruits onto 3 plates. Divide the assorted fruits onto 3 plates.
3. Only on Plate 1, dab edible peppermint oil onto every fruit piece.
4. Blindfold a volunteer and offer him a piece of fruit from Plate 1.
5. Ask him to identify the fruit he just ate. Repeat this experiment with all your friends in the same manner.
6. Record each right or wrong answer.
7. After completing round 1 with Plate 1, give your friends water and crackers.
8. For round 2, blindfold them again and pinch their noses shut before offering them fruits from Plate 2.
9. Ask them to identify the fruits. Note down the correct and wrong answers.
10. For the final round, blindfold the volunteers and offer them fruit pieces from Plate 3, asking them to identify the pieces of fruit.

RESULT

You will notice that while most people will guess the correct fruits in round 3, they will not be able to guess the correct fruits from rounds 1 and 2. A lot of what we taste in food is actually related to what we smell before we eat the food.