Taste vs Flavor: What’s the Difference? - Basic English Grammar

hi everybody my name is Alisha today I'm going to talk about the difference

between taste and flavor two commonly confused words let's get started okay

the first one I want to talk about in this lesson is the word flavor flavor we

use flavor as both a noun and a verb let's first look at how to use flavor as

a noun the definition of flavor as a noun is the blend of taste and smell

sensations caused by something in the mouth so this is a key point a blend of

taste and smell together in the mouth so for example we could say this has a nice

flavor so here we see flavor at the end where this is the item in the mouth this

food item perhaps has a nice flavor or I don't like fruity flavors so again the

blend of something in the mouth produces a fruity flavor in this case I don't

like that so we can use this as a noun that's one however second we can use it

as a verb as well so as a verb we can say to give or add flavor to something

is the definition so this is key giving something or adding something so in

other words a flavor that was not there a taste that was not there before is

added or is given to something else so in some example sentences I flavored the

drink with lemon here we see it in past tense I flavored the drink with lemon

meaning I added lemon to the drink to create a new flavor to create a new

taste we can also use it in this sentence we flavored the cake with

berries so by adding berries it changes the taste or it changes the flavor of

the cake by adding some ingredient in this case berries so I've used the past

tense here flavored is the past the tense so these are the two ways

primarily we can use the word flavor as a noun and as a verb okay but let's talk

about the verb taste or the noun taste as well so

taste as a noun it has a couple of different meanings first we can say that

taste is can be understood some people might argue there are five tastes but

for now let's look at these four a sweet sour salty or bitter quality of

something some people might say mummy is the fifth taste you can decide that but

a quality of something one of these as understood with the sense of taste as

understood by using essentially your mouth your tastebuds to understand these

qualities of something so for example this has a really salty taste so here we

see salty comes before the noun taste here so we're describing specifically

using one of these words the quality of something that's in the mouth of food or

drink another example the taste is bitter at first but sweet at the end so

again a specific word to describe the quality of something we use taste the

taste of something is bitter or the taste is salty so we're talking about

the quality a specific quality as understood using these kind of rough

categories here so the second definition of the word taste as a noun though is as

a small amount of food or drink a small like food or drink item so if you just

want to try a piece of something you can describe that as a taste of something so

for example can I have a taste of your Drake just a taste of it means just to

take something into the mouth and test the flavor as we'll see you later

we uh we can also use it in a sentence like this I just want a taste of that

sauce so meaning just a small amount of a food or drink item so these are the

two ways that we can use taste as a noun as a verb however we can use it to mean

one to understand the taste of something by taking it into the mouth so taking

something into the mouth to understand the flavor or we can use taste in that

way to understand the flavor to understand the taste for example I want

to taste your cake here I want to taste it

used as a verb in this sentence so I want to in other words understand the

flavor of your cake by taking it into my mouth this is the meaning here the

second general meaning I have is to have a specific flavor so this is where many

people run into some issues I think this sentence that I have here prepared is

this tastes good this tastes good when you want to talk about a specific flavor

you're enjoying something or you're not enjoying something that you're eating or

drinking you should use taste tastes in this way in this example this tastes

good it tasted bad for example we don't use flavors so much we don't say for

example that had a bad flavor about it you can say that and it will be

understood it'll be easy to understand actually but if you want to sound more

natural I recommend using this form of taste this tastes good this tastes bad

so this means having a specific flavor having some flavor some combination of

smells and tastes together and then you can describe that with a good or bad or

great so when you want to talk about a food I would recommend using this form

this tastes good or this tastes bad I want to mention though a couple of other

items a couple of other meanings that I sort of hinted out with the noun

description up here we can also use the verb taste to mean one to eat or drink

in small quantities of something so like I tasted every item on the menu sounds

like I only had a small piece of each item on the menu so it doesn't sound

like I ate one portion of everything from the menu but to taste something

sounds like just a small piece of something so we can use it to mean to

eat or drink in small quantities that's one second as I hinted at before as well

it can mean to test the flavor of something so for example you might have

heard of wine tasting so wine tasting is testing the flavor of wine or maybe like

beer tasting or some other kind of tasting where participants just try a

small piece of something to understand the flavor to try to test the flavor so

there are these other kind of common meanings as well of the verb to

taste but in general when you want to explain your opinion of a flavor your

opinion of a food you should use an expression like this this tastes good

this tastes bad your cake tasted really good for example of course you can drop

the expression all together you can drop taste like this is good or this is bad

that's fine but just please keep in mind taste is something that refers to your

understanding of the flavor flavor it refers sort of just to the blend of

things so we tend to use flavor more to maybe describe a the quality of a food

or a drink by that I mean the ice cream is lemon flavored for example or this is

a grape flavored soda for example we tend to use it in that way when we want

to express our opinions we'll use taste more often at least this

is how I use it and this is perhaps how it's used more in American English so

please maybe consider that if you want to just describe the name or a just

simple description of something flavor might be a better choice if you want to

talk about your opinion try using taste this tastes good this

tastes bad so I hope that that's helpful for you if you have any questions or

comments about how to use these two words feel free to let us know though if

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as well thanks very much for watching this episode and I will see you again

soon bye bye