This one time I noticed that everything I was eating that day was tasting very bitter.
It started with breakfast. My cereal with fruit and yoghurt on top was tasting bitter. At lunchtime, my sandwhiches tasted bitter. That night, my dinner tasted bitter (even though it was chicken cooked the way I always cook it). I had a few lollies and chocolate too and even they tasted bitter!
Something was very wrong.
What had happened to my sense of taste?
Did I have a tumor that was pressing on the the parietal lobe in my brain (the part that controls taste and smell)?
I didn’t know what was wrong with me. My wife was eating the same foods as me and she said they didn’t taste bitter to her.
The next day, the same thing happened.
This was terrible. I like my food (especially chocolate), and this phenomenon was depressing. Was that it for my life? Was this permanent?
I didn’t know what to do.
I turned to Google (why visit a doctor when Google can help me diagnose my problem faster than a doctor can?). I searched for “why does all food taste bitter to me?” and found lots of people asking the same question.
Many of these discussions talked about “Pine Mouth”. I had never heard of this before.
Pine Mouth is where a small proportion of Pine Nuts from China can cause a bitter, metallic taste in your mouth 2 days after eating them, and the sensation can last up to 2 weeks.
Wikipedia: Pine Mouth from Pine Nuts
And then it hit me. I had eaten a hand full of left-over pine nuts 2 days ago!!
It’s not something I’ve done before, but at the time I had thought nothing of it.
Unfortunately there is no treatment so I had to put up with the strong bitter taste for a week. In the second week the sensation gradually disappeared.
It was such a horrible experience, I now avoid Pine Nuts at all costs.
If you are reading this because all food tastes bitter to you and you don’t know why, now you know you are not alone. I’m sorry there is no treatment, but in about a week you’ll start feeling better.