Aromas

Scents or odors are the first thing we perceive when approaching food or drink to our mouths. The olfactory sense (sense of smell) permits us to perceive these scents through the nose, as well as mouth aromas, which are retronasally sensed through the canal that connects the nose to the mouth. The perceptions produced by retronasal smell and taste, constitute what we call the flavor of a food or drink.

Aromas are produced by chemical molecules that interact with the receptors in our olfactory system. It is difficult to correctly identify individual aromas, not because our receptors don’t work properly, but because our sense of smell is not trained. In fact, you cannot recognize a smell if you have not sensed it before and if you have not given it a name. This suggests that our olfactory memory can improve notably with training.