Miracle fruit is a plant which makes other things
taste different. It natively comes from West Africa, where it was chewed before
meals for centuries. Europeans became aware of this plant in 1725 thanks to a French explorer Chevalier des Marchais The fruit itself has a mild tang
(similar to cranberry) and a low sugar content.
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Miracle fruit berries
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f0/MiracleBerry.jpg
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So how does it work?
Miracle fruit contains a protein called miraculin which makes sour products
taste sweet. Normally taste buds on your tongue translate chemical molecules
into electrical signals. Each bud contains taste cells which detect flavours by
binding themselves with molecules from your meal. When you eat miracle berry it
binds its protein with your detectors preventing sweeteners from further
bindings. Under neutral conditions miraculin blocs those receptors, but when
you eat sour things, the environment in a mouth causes miraculin to change its
molecular shape and reactivate the sweet receptors.
How strong is it?
Miraculin binds about 100 million times more intensely than sugar and about
a million times more strongly than aspartame. That’s why drinking juice
resembles drinking condensed syrup.
If you want to try the magic of miracle fruit you can buy tablets or powder
of freeze-dried berry. It’s easily available in many online stores. Fresh
fruits are hard to find because of a short shelf life and the fact that miraculin loses its properties when it’s heated.
Below you can find a video miracle berry taste test video:
Sources:
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/thoughtomics/shapeshifting-protein-makes-sour-taste-sweet/
Comments
For me it is rather for usage as food trick than for typical everyday use. I guess it is not too cheap and not easy available.
Recently I found new fruits as well, I was surprised when I found mango stone fruit as well as price... 30 euro per kilogram.
It is very interesting and intriguing. Although it looks like a inconspicuous fruit.
I want to try it. Do you know does it have any nutritional values? If it is a “miracle fruit” it may has other good properties.
Personally, I enjoy trying new types of food and various cuisines from all around the world, but in this case I don't really feel like trying it, especially when it influences the taste in a negative way. It is difficult for me to imagine that the taste of a product which I consume on the daily basis, would change completely. In my opinion the interesting part is that you can find such thing created by nature.
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/carbohydrates/added-sugar-in-the-diet/
i have to try this magic fruit.
Does any one knows how they called here in Poland?
I think it will be a great idea to give some of this magical fruit to children Before taking sharp medicines so they will not feels the medical taste. :D
Definitely i am going to try it out this week.
Probably there are still many undiscovered kinds of plants and animals by me and and even by scientists. Maybe I will try to eat it when I have the opportunity.
I was skeptical about the name "miraculin", it sounds like a special potion from a video game, but I researched it and it really is called that.
It would be really weird to feel the taste different to what we expected. Some time ago I have read a research on a group of people that were given jellies with different tastes and colors. When the jelly was pink and they expected raspberry flavour but it surprised them with a lemon taste, they were more likely to say that they didn't like the flavour, but if color matched taste, everything was better.
Thanks for your article, you refreshed my curiosity and I think I will try it soon!
The effect is maintained for up to 2 hours - in this time we can experiment with different products and see how they taste in the sweeter version. However, if we drink or eat something warm, our taste buds return to normal.
Due to the low stability of miracle fruit we can not buy it in Poland. We can only obtain the tablets containing powdered fruit and in this way to check for yourself. But what is the point of doing that? I don’t see it as reasonable.