NPR

Why Taste Buds Dull As We Age

You're born with roughly 9,000 taste buds, and they're very good at regenerating — which is why you can recover the ability to taste just days after burning your tongue. But that changes as we age.
You're born with roughly 9,000 taste buds, and they're very good at regenerating — which is why you can recover the ability to taste just days after burning your tongue. But that changes as we age.

Sometimes people develop strange eating habits as they age. For example, Amy Hunt, a stay-at-home mom in Austin, Texas, says her grandfather cultivated some unusual taste preferences in his 80s.

"I remember teasing him because he literally put ketchup or Tabasco sauce on everything," says Hunt. "When we would tease him, he would shrug his shoulders and just say

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