3 Factors that Lead to Great Tasting Food

After a trip to Wisconsin, David's mom asked him why the food here tastes better than that of Texas, where she currently resides. Not one to miss an opportunity to give of what he has learned, he shared the following:

Hi Mom,

Why does food taste better in Wisconsin?  Good question!  Aside from the thought that everything tastes better while on vacation :), it is quite possible that the food you've been eating in Wisconsin is tastier than what you've been eating in Texas.  Here are some thoughts on food taste.

Focusing on fruits / vegetables specifically, I think taste is mostly influenced by 3 factors: 

1. weather conditions (temp, sun rain)

2. soil conditions

3. how it gets from plant to mouth

Weather conditions: 

• some fruits/ vegetables taste better in warm temperatures (i.e. strawberries, tomatoes & peppers are sweeter), some taste better chilled (i.e carrots, broccoli, lettuce are sweeter in cold temps). I'm not sure of many that prefer very hot temperatures like Texas has (though I admit ignorance here as I don't have experience gardening in tropical climates).  The problem is that Texas also freezes so many tropical fruits can't successfully be grown in the field.

• Wisconsin has warm enough summers to make those warm-loving plants taste great (but not too hot to hurt the plants), and Wisconsin also has an extended chilly season that many other plants like as well.

• Sunlight drives photosynthesis (which is the source of a plants sugar / energy), thus more photosynthesis in Wisconsin during the summers (compared to more southerly latitudes) should improve plant taste.  So more sunlight in the summer with better growing conditions (warm temps vs very hot) would improve taste.

• The right amount of rain is important as well.  Too much rain and fruit often split and their flavors are diluted, too little rain and growth can be stunted.  Madison and Houston both receive adequate rain (35 in/yr vs 50 in/yr), so taste may be improved by having a bit less (35 in/yr) like we do near Madison.

Soil conditions: 

• are the plant roots in soil that is alive with microorganisms (e.g. microbes, living organisms too small to be seen with the naked eye), or are the roots growing in sterile dirt?

• plants have more non-plant cells (microbes) living inside of them than they do actual plant cells (humans also have more microbes inside of us than human cells).  Healthy soil is the home of billions of microbes per teaspoon.  These microbes in plants travel throughout the plants interior delivering to the plant nutrients from the soil, and then the microbes exit the plant again through the plant roots to find other minerals that the plant needs.  While in the soil, the microbes also feed off of the plants root exudates (which include sugars, organic acids and amino acids).  Then these microbes return to the plant and repeats the process of delivering nutrients to the plant, which in turn will provide food for the microbes too!

• Healthy soil can thus provide copious nutrients to plants, which in turn makes the plants tastier (and healthier) to eat.  Large amounts of chemical fertilizers oxidize soil microbes and thus slow or their interaction with plants, thus limiting the health of the soil and the taste potential of the plant. 

How the food gets from plant to mouth:

• Fruits / vegetables start losing phytonutrients (polyphenols / flavonoids, carotenoids) right after harvest.  Phytonutrients provide superb health benefits (to include having anti-oxidant and inflammatory, disease prevention, cardiovascular support, brain health and more).  The sooner a ripe fruit or vegetable is eaten after harvest the tastier (and healthier) it is.

• Many fresh vegetables taste significantly better when picked at their peak ripeness and when at their ideal temperature.  Fruits and vegetables that need to be shipped are normally picked prior to this peak point so that they don't spoil while enroute.  Store bought tomatoes are a classic example of this sad story.  They are picked while green, shipped in controlled atmosphere shipping containers (displacing oxygen gas with nitrogen gas to slow the ripening / spoilage process), and then shipped long distances before reaching their destination and continued to be stored and eventually allowed to ripen back in normal air.  Eating such a tomato is almost always disappointing, as most people are aware :)

So in summary, to find the best tasting food, I recommend eating food that was:

1. grown in healthy soil

2. picked at it's peak

3. harvested recently (which often means eating from a local source)

Next time you're in Wisconsin, we can make that happen again! :)

Love you!

David 

Come see us at the New Glarus Farmers Market!

Fridays 3 pm - 5:30 pm

Hometown Pharmacy parking lot

1101 Wi HWY 69

New Glarus, WI 53574