Reading time: 2 minutes – Spotted on The Verge
If you could have a superpower, what would it be? Fly? Time travel? Or enjoy broccoli and Brussels sprouts without any seasoning? In the latter case, good news, we should put a little fantasy in your healthiest dishes, by electrifying your tongue with a Japanese gadget presented by the American online media The Verge.
The company Kirin has put on sale in Japan a model of electric spoon which promises its users to enhance the taste of food and therefore consume less salty and healthier products. This spoon, named “Electric Salt Spoon”is initially offered in 200 copies, but Kirin announces that the shelves should be restocked after the month of June.
The plastic and metal spoon was designed in collaboration with Homei Miyashita, professor at Meiji University located in Tokyo. The device emits a weak electric field which concentrates sodium ion molecules on the tongue, in order to increase the perception of the salinity of the food. The researchers estimate that this electrical stimulation increases this perception of salt by 50%.
Kirin had already focused a few years ago on electrostimulating dishes to enhance the taste of food. In 2022, the Japanese brand announced that it was working with the same Homei Miyashita to offer electrified chopsticks in a press release showing us guinea pigs who seemed to be enjoying themselves, despite an electric wire connected to their cutlery. In 2023, this innovation had also received an Ig-Nobel prize, the famous parody version which rewards the craziest scientific research.
Towards taste TV
The creators of this little torture utensil intend to convince people of the virtues of this process to reduce salt consumption within the population, particularly in Japan, where an average adult consumes around 10 grams of salt per day, specifies Reuters, i.e. double the amount recommended by the World Health Organization.
Dr. Homei Miyashita has been working on these questions for many years and has the ambition to convert taste information into electrical impulses. Beyond changing or reinforcing a taste sensation, its objective is to digitize and transmit this type of information, as we already know how to do for a sound or an image. We could therefore ultimately produce digital content that we could “taste”, which would open up an exciting new media field.
This project in any case demonstrates Kirin’s desire to position itself in the well-being and health niche, after having contributed very largely to the development of the beer sector in Japan. A strategy confirmed by the group’s recent acquisitions in the fields of biochemistry and food supplements.
Thanks to this new kind of spoon, we will perhaps soon stop being jealous of babies who, on the verge of their dietary diversification and after a whole life of feeding on milk, experience a real taste orgasm by tasting for first time a very dull carrot-turnip puree. Rediscovering the taste for simple things by electrocuting your tongue is an attractive project.
