Why is acid so important in balancing taste? Our bodies do not crave it like sugar, and we are not nutritionally inclided to include it like fat or salt. Is there anything to it besides just improving taste?

Question

My only guess is that it helps with digestion. Do feel welcome to correct me 🙂

In: 4

Answer 1

There are actually lots of essentials acids, they are called fatty acids. Fattys acids are an necessary component of cellular structures, and important to all living organisms. This is likely part of the puzzle, as for this any other reasons organisms tend to have more acidic components than basic components. This is because bases are actually more damaging to organic tissue than acids are (when comparing the same relative concentrations. A strong enough acid can certainly do plenty of damage too).

As far as why acids make things taste better, I believe it’s because the affect the acids have on the molecules we are tasting (it almost certainly has very little to do with digestion). Thare are two layers to this effect: ionizing molecules to increase how strongly they bond to taste receptors, and adding more ions to the solution which increases the number of times those taste molecules bump into taste receptors. This is the same reason why salt makes food taste good, by increasing the number of collisions between taste receptors and flavor molecules!