Tastes

We talked about the five senses again on Monday and actually did a taste test with the kids. We do this about every year, and the funny thing is, every child is delighted to taste the most egregious stuff to do the test, and at the table, they are as shy as sheep.

We put salt, sugar, cocoa, lemon juice and baking powder into 2 ounce cups and had the children poke their finger into the substance and tell us if the taste was salty, sweet, bitter or sour or nothing like the baking powder. Most of the children knew the vocabulary words. A few had trouble with the word bitter, but we explained it.

Our theory is that children who eat anything don't have a regard for the precise taste, and those children who eat nothing know the sense very well. This theory evolved with my grandchildren who are the pickiest creatures in the universe - I'm sure because they don't even eat much candy. They eat perhaps three kinds of candy. Let me tell you - they are a joy to feed. Both Bill and Jack were eager to take the test, and both of them knew each taste without hesitation. I was really surprised, and began to look at our other kids and realized that the pickiest eaters were the ones most knowledgeable about tastes. Interesting. Here are some of the other results:

Our vegetarian who eats no fruit, no vegetables, no noodles, no meat except chicken nuggets at fast food restaurants, no eggs, no bread, and no dairy could only recognize the sugar. Tells you something about his general diet.

My grandson, Bill, got them all on the first try, so did Alyssa.

Our youngest food champion, Zoey, could only identify salty.

Brady, who's a good eater too could only identify salty as well.

Kamden, who eats anything, could only identify sour.

Austin, Luke, Kanin, Alex, Isaac, Javeon who all struggle with new things and whose diets are single minded -- old and trusted why experiment, each knew tastes.

Most of the kids could identify about half the tastes and that's what we expected. The children who bucked the theory were Bryce, who's an eating machine and Skylar and Alexis who are especially good eaters. All children knew all the tastes. Dax,who is a poor eater knew them all too. Mara, on the other hand is picky and didn't know a single taste. Zoe, knew all the tastes and eats nothing.

Now, regarding tastes - yesterday I made myself an omelet with goat cheese. I sat down with the kids and they all asked, "Miss Judy, what are you eating?" I said "I'm eating an omelet - that's an egg and milk with goat cheese." Half the kids tried the omelet (should have made 2) and they all liked it even the picky eaters! It must have to do with the adult plate.

Now today, we are having cradles with ground sausage, eggs and cheese, and although they love this, they would not like to eat goat cheese in theirs if I made them that way - for them - but they loved the taste yesterday.

Yesterday, our vegetarian wanted more applesauce. I told him he could have the applesauce if he ate his corn. He balked. He finally ate the corn and loved it. He had never eaten corn on the cob before. I keep telling these kids to try things, and sometimes it works. Kids are funny.