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The six Tastes
Appears in
Published 2017
It’s not just the Qualities of the food we eat that matter, but also the Tastes. There are six defining Tastes (known as Rasas) in Ayurveda: sweet, astringent, sour, salty, pungent and bitter. In Western cuisine, only five of these Tastes are recognised. The sixth one, which may seem unfamiliar, is ‘astringent’, which is more of a sensation of dryness than a flavour. Think of the tannins in tea, the taste of broccoli or the feeling of a green banana or orange or lemon pith on your tongue.
There’s much more to the Tastes than flavour. Just as for the Doshas, each Taste is composed of two of the five Elements, and therefore each Taste corresponds to one or more Doshas. Any Taste eaten in excess will aggravate its relative Dosha, and in the same vein, opposing Tastes can help to pacify each Dosha. As all the Elements have specific Qualities too (for example, Air is mobile, cool, light, dry, rough) knowing the Elements of the six Tastes makes it easy to understand their influence on our mental and physical state. See the Star of Ayurveda to find out which Qualities and Tastes pertain to each Dosha, and then note which Qualities and Tastes are opposites.