We like to eat. Food makes us feel good. We probably obsess about eating as often as or more than we think about sex.

I read the other day that when we were young, we all had around 9,000 taste buds. And each taste bud contained a number of specialized taste receptor cells for sensing sweet, salty, sour, umami and bitter flavors.

Unfortunately, the number of taste buds decreases as we age. Each remaining taste bud also begins to shrink. So sensitivity to the five tastes often declines markedly after age 60.

According to a recent University of Chicago study, tens of millions of Americans suffer age-related losses of taste. If you find yourself putting more salt in your soup and more sugar on your cereal than you used to, your taste buds probably are degenerating.

For many people, the loss is permanent. If that’s the case for you, what can you do to make eating more pleasant?

·      Eat with other people as much as possible. Sadly, we Americans rarely eat together anymore. In fact, I recently read that the average American eats one in every five meals in her car, one in four of us eats at least one fast food meal every single day and the majority of American families eat a single meal together fewer than five days a week. As I suggested in my last blog, eating with others can act as a unifier, a way to create communitas.

·      Experiment with different flavors. You may be able to taste some types of food, seasonings and spices better than others. You may find that you now love certain flavors you never liked when you were young. My husband Ed used to hate spicy foods like Indian or Thai cuisine. Now they are his favorites. You might surprise yourself!

Is your sense of taste diminishing? What are you doing to continue to make eating a pleasurable experience?