The first thing a lot of us like to do in the morning is brush our teeth. There’s nothing like washing away a night’s sleep with some minty toothpaste. But what if you’re planning on eating breakfast after that? And what if you’re planning on drinking orange juice?! Toothpaste does something completely disgusting to orange juice. Most of us have unfortunately experienced the phenomena firsthand. How can orange juice, normally so sweet and delicious, taste so bitter and poisonous when preceded by tooth brushing? What is it about the combination?
The answer is actually relatively simple.
To get teeth clean toothpaste contains a sort of detergent or non-hazardous soap ingredient. This cleaning factor in toothpaste, sodium lauryl sulfate, has a sort of magical effect on your taste buds. It’s capable of inhibiting and opening different taste buds responsible for tasting different things. That is, sodium lauryl sulfate inhibits the sweet receptors on your tongue and in turn opens up those responsible for tasting bitter flavors. Because of this, after brushing you’re less capable of tasting the sweetness of orange juice and instead get a mouth full of bitter.
Toothpaste is capable of altering your taste perception. But it isn’t all bad news. Something really interesting about this phenomena is that it can also cause certain things to taste better than they normally do. One of the foods rumored to bring this on is apples. That’s right apples. The next time you’ve just finished brushing your teeth consider having an apple before you gulp down your orange juice. Your taste buds will thank you for it!
Call and schedule an appointment with Dr. D’Alfonso of Lakeway Cosmetic Dentistry today!