How to Train Your Palate

For both adults and children alike, learning to like new foods can be a challenge. This is especially true of foods like vegetables that tend to have a more bitter flavor. Children are naturally predisposed towards sweet foods - mother's milk is sweet tasting and this preference is inborn - but this can be overcome in both children and adults. Training your palate to not only accept but enjoy different flavors takes time and exposure.

Instructions

• 1

  Select a food that you generally dislike or are unfamiliar with. Start by taking the time to smell the food in its uncooked form. The sense of smell is strongly connected to the sense of taste, so getting used to the smell of the food is a first step towards enjoying the taste.

• 2

  Try the food first on its own. If it is a fruit or vegetable, you can eat it raw in most cases. For foods that are particularly bitter, such as greens, cooking may increase the bitterness. Eating them raw allows you to slowly adapt to the taste. Avoid dips, dressings or seasoning at first, as these will mask the flavor and deny your taste buds the chance to adapt. For foods that must be cooked, cook them without seasoning.

• 3

  Make the food a part of a weekly meal. Look up recipes online that use the food and choose one to cook every week. Vary the ways in which you cook the food in question and note how the flavor changes. Make a note of how you best enjoyed the food in question.

• 4

  Keep the food in regular rotation once you have grown accustomed to the taste, to ensure it remains a part of your palate. Once you have adapted to one food, try another.