Do you think of lemons as being bitter, or sour? I know the two options are not mutually exclusive, but I’ve always thought of them as being obviously sour, with any bitterness being overpowered by sourness. Based on comments from a few others, their first thought seems to be “bitter”. If anything, I think the secondary characteristic of lemons (after sour) is sweetness - they do contain plenty of sugar. The only bitter part might be the skin, but we don’t call oranges “bitter”.
Are these few people who say lemons are bitter mental, or is that the first thing that comes to mind when you think of the taste of lemons?
Coming soon: Is this colour yellow or green? You decide!
Sour. When I passed out miracle berry tablets at home and at work – for SCIENCE! – lemons were one of the things we tried. Miraculin makes sour things taste sweet; lemons under its influence were very citrusy, not bitter at all.
Some of the other things we tried – coffee, in particular – had their sour notes turned to cloying sweetness and still some bitter notes. Coffee not good. Sour Patch Kids and other sour candies were liked by the kids (at home), panned by the adults (at work and home).
Nb. One brave/foolish soul took a swig of distilled white vinegar, reporting it tasted sweet-and-bitter on the tongue… and then spewed it everywhere when it hit the back of his throat where the miracle berry tablets hadn’t reached.
Definitely sour and not at all bitter. Anyone who calls lemons bitter doesn’t know what the word actually means, and thinks it just generically means “tastes bad”.
I’d say the rind has a hint of bitter to it. Don’t notice any sour myself. As for the lemon itself, mostly sour. I can’t definitely rule out there being a touch of bitter in the juice, but the overwhelming flavor is sour. This is as opposed to something like yellow grapefruit, which, to me, is equal parts bitter and sour.
I used to quiz 9th graders on this. I’d ask if lemons were bitter or sour- all the black kids and some of the white ones would say bitter. Same for vinegar. A few kids would be surprised at the bitter-choosing ones.
I’d describe the proper taste for bitter thus: Think of eating a pecan. Now think of biting into a piece of the shell that sometimes sticks between the halves of the pecan- that’s bitter!
I think Lawrence Durrell would have been in the “bitter” camp; what with his memoir of his time in Cyprus in the 1950s, Bitter Lemons. Mind you, he came out with some distinctly weird stuff …
Lemon juice is definitely sour. But I’ve definitely had lemons whose flesh was more bitter than sour.
I’ve also encountered the weird phenomenon of something being so intensely sour that it actually tastes bitter. Adding sweet to it makes it taste sour again, though.
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