The role of the taste of umami

Our sense of taste plays a number of important roles. On the most basic level; taste makes the task of eating pleasurable, but there are more practical reasons behind it. By dividing tastes into those that we find pleasant and those that we do not, our body is telling us which kinds of food we should eat for survival, and which we should avoid. For example, human beings require energy in the form of sugars and carbohydrates, and for this reason we are predisposed to find sweet tasting foods pleasant.