A few days ago I noticed that my taste was disturbed: no matter what I eat or drink I feel the bitter taste in my mouth. This bitter, metallic taste appears within seconds of chewing and it affects everything I eat even sweets! Initially I thought I was having a very serious health problem until I came across this short article “Taste disturbances after pine nut ingestion” from “European Journal of Emergency Medicine”.  A few days prior to my unusual symptoms, I had eaten a whole 200 g bag of pine nuts from “Whole Foods”!

The article hypothesizes that certain triglycerides, formed by unsaturated fatty acids, may attribute to the bitter taste; however, the role of these triglycerides remains a mystery. The good news is I should be able to taste food normally within a week or so.

I’ve eaten pine nuts in large quantities in the past but never experienced any taste problems, so perhaps it depends on the nuts’ origin.

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