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Chocolate chip cookie with bite taken out

The Taste of Sweet: Our Complicated Love Affair with Our Favorite Treats

Age Level:
YA
Genre:
Nonfiction
Published:
2008

Why does chocolate taste so good but broccoli turns many of us off? Chen finds the answers by visiting sensory scientists who study taste buds, horticulturalists who are out to breed the perfect strawberry, and educators who are researching the link between class and obesity. Along the way she sheds new light on a familiar taste by exploring the historical sweet­scape through the banquet tables of emperors, the pie safes of American pioneers, the corporate giants that exist to fulfill our every sweet wish, and the desserts that have delighted her throughout the years.

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A YALSA committee of librarians selected these books to open doors on new worlds, exciting ideas, eccentric personalities, unfamiliar cultures, and distant time periods.