When you were a youngster, did you ever sneak a sip of your parent’s coffee, cringe, and think “how can something that smells so good, taste like a blend of rusty nails and human desperation.” Well, science has an answer to that.
It takes 631 chemicals to combine to form the complex and heavenly aroma of coffee. However, 300 of those 631 chemicals are wiped out by saliva, causing the flavor of the coffee to change before it is swallowed.
Additionally, researchers claim that the act of swallowing a drink sends a burst of aroma back up the nose from inside the nose, activating a “second sense of smell” in the brain that is less receptive of the flavor, causing a completely different sensation. In contrast, come cheeses smell like death but taste delicious because the whiff seems more pleasant when passing out of our nose, than in.