To: <skkewing@yahoo.com>, "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Grapple, kids and artificial flavour
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 2009 20:56:44 -0500
Sarah asked,
What school age kid doesn't eat oranges?
Zinc deficiency reduces the sensitivity to sweetness and makes food not
taste right. Processed foods tend to be low in zinc yet require zinc to be
digested. Growing requires lots of zinc, kids need it more than adults. So
zinc deficient kids probably can't detect the flavors that make an orange or
an apple appealing to a normal human. High amounts of sugar, salt and MSG
get through to the deficient taste buds.
Then there is texture and the creepiness factor. If you have never
eaten anything with the texture of an orange, with it's membranes and
individual sacks of juice, it would seem pretty weird. My experience has
been with people I took out to our garden and handed tomatoes and lettuce
leaves to. They stood there helplessly, unable to put them into their
mouths without the ritual running of water over them. I said don't worry,
there's no spray on them, but I mean, these veggies, they were OUTDOORS,
y'know, with bugs and dirt and all that. I think that the average city
person would find it very creepy to think of putting something directly from
the outdoors into their mouths. I realise you had grocery foods indoors,
but back to the fact that these are obviously living plant-like objects with
form and texture, not extruded mixes of flour, sugar and oil (like dogfood
kibbles). Donna