Why do some things taste nice and some things nasty? 

According to Trinity Professor Luke O’Neill, it’s all to do with evolution and how our bodies tell us that something is good or harmful to eat.

In short, our body needs certain foodstuffs and our sense of taste reflects that.

“We need sweet stuffs,” Professor O’Neill told The Pat Kenny Show.

“Glucose and sugars are in our diet, for example, hence we like that sensation.”

Human beings have five tastes; sweet, sour, bitter, salty and umami.

Umami comes from Japanese and essentially means 'savoriness'.

Professor O’Neill described it as an “important one” for the body.

“It picks up amino acids - glutamate and aspartate are being sensed by umami,” he said.

“They’re in proteins and we’re driven to eat protein in our diets.

“So, a big reason is that this stuff is needed nutritionally.”

A child eating vegetables sitting in white high chair.

Perhaps most importantly, your sense of taste can tell you when something really should not be eaten.

“The sour and bitter one, that’s inclined to be in food that’s gone off,” he said.

“Of course, we have an aversion to that because it might be infected with bacteria.

“So, in other words, ‘avoid that because it doesn’t taste nice’.

“So, sourness or bitterness is probably tied into food that’s gone off - or indeed poison.

“We evolved very elaborate ways of sensing this stuff.”

'You can actually acclimatise them'

Despite this, you can teach your body to ignore its initial reaction to food and enjoy certain foodstuffs.

“You can actually acclimatise yourself to liking things and coriander is an example,” Professor O’Neill said.

“Even if you don’t like it initially, you can build up a sort of desensitisation to it.

“Children… [who] don’t like broccoli, you can actually acclimatise them to it bit by bit.

“If you want to fight that battle with them - there’s ways to overcome these aversions.”

A person’s sense of taste is heavily linked to their sense of smell and roughly 80-90% of taste comes down their first sniff of something.

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Main image: Prof Luke O’Neill in the Newstalk studio. Image: Newstalk