On Wed, 21 Mar 2012, Nick Maclaren wrote:

Can I safely eat the foliage grown by carrots?? I'm getting interested
in eating assorted young greens. And radishes, and turnips.......
(thoughts of rhubarb leaves has made me ask).

Carrot tops are nice cook or raw. They were often used when I was
young. It's a bit of a mystery to me why people don't eat more.

You are probably a non-taster. Bitterness can be tasted by less
than half of the UK population, apparently, though it seems to be
more common among the people I know. The others taste it in the
same way as sourness. If you regard lemon juice as more bitter
than grapefruit juice, or can counteractness bitterness with sugar,
you are a non-taster.

Many, many people describe something as bitter when it is, in reality,
sour. Apples, for instance. There *are* bitter apples, for instance most
cider apples, but when someone is trying to explain to me that something
is bitter and I think it is sour, is it because the other person is
unable to tell the difference? That's something that I hadn't heard
before.

And what do we mean by sour? Sour milk is not the same as a sour apple
...... or is it?

Confused!! I know what *I* mean but does anyone else?

David

--
David Rance
writing from Le Mesnil Villement, Calvados, France