Why do my taste perceptions change over time?

You have probably noticed it already, but our taste perceptions change over time. You may find yourself enjoying a cigar that, the first time you tried it, left you with no particular impression, and, conversely, be surprised to no longer really be amazed by a vitola that, in the past, gave you a certain amount of pleasure. So how can these changes in taste be explained when the cigar itself remains the same?

How does our brain perceive flavors and aromas?

Every time we smoke a cigar, our sense of taste is activated. This allows us to distinguish the fundamental flavors of salty, sweet, sour, bitter, and umami. Each of these flavors corresponds to specific receptors located on our taste buds. There are thus more than twenty types of receptors dedicated to the perception of bitterness, and only one type for each of the other flavors. As soon as these receptors are activated, information is sent to the brain.

If taste were only a matter of our palate, we would therefore only be able to discern these five fundamental flavors. Yet the perception of taste is the result of a close collaboration between our taste buds and our sense of smell. It is indeed the nose that allows us to identify the different aromas. Once in the mouth, a cigar’s smoke releases volatile molecules that travel up to the nasal cavities. Every human being thus has 400 types of olfactory receptors that allow us to distinguish millions of odor molecules. The signal is then sent to the olfactory bulb, which transmits it to the brain. So it is indeed the combination of gustatory and olfactory perceptions that forms our sense of taste.

The influence of age on aroma perception

The way we perceive taste changes with age. On average, each person is born with ten thousand taste buds. These cells live for about ten days and renew themselves throughout our lives through a regeneration cycle of between 10 and 14 days. However, after the age of forty, their renewal rate declines, which directly affects our perception of taste. Likewise, the sense of smell tends to diminish with age, particularly in people over 60. These changes in smell can have very different causes, such as reduced mucus production, atrophy of the olfactory bulb, or a thinning of the epithelium.

These physiological changes will have a direct impact on the way we perceive certain aromas and flavors. The flavors that become hardest to distinguish over time are bitter and sour, which explains why many older people return to their first love: sweetness. As a cigar enthusiast, you may therefore find yourself appreciating vitolas with a richer, more indulgent profile, such as the Romeo Y Julieta Linea de Oro Dianas.

The influence of experience on the perception of aromas

While our sense of smell and taste buds play an essential role in our perception of aromas and flavors, it is ultimately our brain that decides what we like or dislike. Although Kant developed the idea that the perception of taste is a universal experience, many theorists, such as Hume and Pierre Bourdieu, believe that taste exists only in the mind of the person experiencing it. It would therefore not be inherent in things, but rather the result of our experience and habits.

This theory is now supported by science. According to Stéphanie Chambaron, a cognitive psychology researcher, once the nerve signals sent to the brain by the sensory receptors in the mouth and nose are received, the brain “compares these messages with information in memory in order to interpret them.” Over the course of our experiences, we therefore store “sensations in the form of words, images or symbols, which makes it possible to build mental representations.” Experience and memory therefore play a decisive role in our taste preferences.

As a cigar enthusiast, your tastes can thus evolve over the course of your experience. This may stem from a culinary experience that leads you to take an interest in cigars with a more herbal or spicier profile, or from a direct encounter with the discovery of cigars with a very varied aromatic profile. From this perspective, someone who has been able to explore many aromas and flavors throughout life will be more inclined to appreciate vitolas with a complex profile. Likewise, if you have always enjoyed mild cigars, it will be difficult for you to appreciate a cigar with full-bodied aromas.

Other factors that influence our perception of aromas

In addition to age and experience, other factors can alter our perception of taste. Numerous studies have also highlighted the role of sight and touch in our gustatory perception. As an aficionado, you surely know that a proper tasting always begins with a visual and tactile examination of your cigar. This step makes it possible to form an initial impression of the quality of your vitola and will have an impact on the experience that follows. This is, in fact, one of the reasons manufacturers take so much care in choosing the most beautiful wrapper leaves to dress their cigars.

Two cigars with the same blend, but presented with wrappers of slightly different colors, may thus appear different to you on the palate. Likewise, the price of your module, the expectations you may have, and the environment in which you find yourself during your tasting can influence your taste perceptions and alter the idea you had formed of a cigar.