When life gives you lemons…

Take some Miracle Fruit extract (known as Miraculin) and viola… the lemons will taste sweet! At least that’s what Adam Peltz (Chicago Editor of Menu Pages) reports on Menu Pages Boston.This story was so bizzare and interesting that I had to investiage for myself. According to Wikipedia, this West African berry has been proven to alter the taste of sour (but not bitter) foods and juices. When you consume the extrat of this berry and hold it in your mouth for several minutes (prior to eating), any sour foods you eat (for up to 2 hours after) will taste sweet!

In fact, Wikipedia also reports that back in the 1970’s, “…An attempt was made to commercialize the ability of the fruit to turn non-sweet foods into sweet foods without a calorific penalty, but ended in failure in controversial circumstances with accusations that the project was sabotaged and the research burgled by “big Sugar” industry to prevent loss of business caused by a drop in the need for sugar [1]. The FDA has always denied that pressure was put on it by the sugar industry, but refused to release any files on the subject.[2]…”

Hmmm… interesting. I’m a bit tempted… though it doesn’t come cheap at 10 grams for 14 pounds, plus shipping. One gram equals one serving and I’m not even sure there are that many sour foods I need to improve the taste of. However, if this is safe, can you imagine what it would do for the baby food market!

Miracle UK also references a few articles on the stuff if you want to find out a bit more:

The Guardian
BBC
The Wall Street Journal (FYI – I thought up the title of this post BEFORE I saw this entry!)

Adam and his friends took the extract for test drive — and had positive results. You can purchase the extrat from Miracle UK. The FDA has not approved the extract for US consumption so it is not available for purchase state side.