Tasty Audiobook By John McQuaid cover art

Tasty

The Art and Science of What We Eat

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Tasty

By: John McQuaid
Narrated by: Tom Perkins
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Taste has long been considered the most basic of the five senses because its principal mission is a simple one: to discern food from everything else. Taste is a whole-body experience, and breakthroughs in genetics and microbiology are casting light not just on the experience of french fries and foie gras but the mysterious interplay of body and brain.

Tasty explains the scientific research taking place on multiple fronts: how genes shape our tastes, how the mind assembles flavors from the five senses and signals from the body's metabolic systems, why something disgusts one person and delights another, and what today's obsessions with extreme tastes tell us about the brain.

Brilliantly synthesizing science, ancient myth, philosophy, and literature, Tasty offers a delicious smorgasbord of where taste originated and where it's going - and why it changes by the day.

©2015 John McQuaid (P)2015 Tantor Agricultural & Food Sciences Biological Sciences Psychology Psychology & Mental Health Science Food Science

Critic reviews

"McQuaid is an enthusiastic writer undisturbed by dead ends, and he provides an entertaining exploration of 'the mystery at the heart of flavor,' which 'has never truly been cracked." ( Kirkus)
"Narrator Tom Perkins's delectable performance highlights the multiple aspects of taste.... Navigating the dynamic text with credible accents and well-timed inflections, Perkins brings out the elusive and surprising qualities of taste and how they relate to the range of human emotion." ( AudioFile)
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It is crazy the many intricate details we do not realize go on in even something as simple sounding as taste. This book was fascinating and definitely a very nerdy and interesting read!

Fascinating!

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This audiobook covers the basic flavors as well as the art of tastemaking. There's a lot more going on in the food industry than the average person knows, and this book explains in detail what happens to deliver the tasty stuff we know and love to us.

The Science of Flavors, or Why I Love Hot Sauce

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The narration sounded kind of boring at first but the performance picked up as the book got more interesting. Overall, an interesting read that looks at the food we eat as what defines as as humans. This it had a thought-provoking quality to it by the end of the book. I think some parts were too detailed and lost the listener's interest. I'm more interested in the neuroscience aspects of taste so that kept my attention quite strongly. Whether you're a foodie, a scientist, anthropologist, engineer or whathaveyou I think most people would find it interesting and will get something out of it so I recommend the purchase.

A good solid 4 stars

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