Stress Management

Concept of The Six Tastes

To westerners, a balanced diet requires the understanding of the different food groups, nutrient values of the food and an understanding of the daily requirements of the food items to get a balanced diet. If a person consistently eats an unbalanced diet, his health will suffer from the deficiency of the nutrients to be obtained from the food or from the excess of the nutrients he is taking. (For example, a diet which is high in saturated fat and red meat is known to cause hardening and blockage of the arteries ultimately resulting in heart disease.) In the absence of such sophisticated knowledge as we know on the nutrition content or requirements and due to the fact that most of the people who lived at the time Ayurveda was written may not be able to understand a complicated nutritional requirement, the creators of Ayurveda have developed a very simple dietary program. This is called the six tastes. According to this system, all the important nutrients that we need for life, such as fats, proteins, carbohydrates, minerals, vitamins, etc. are contained in a meal that consist of all six tastes.

The six tastes are sweet, sour, salty, bitter, pungent, and astringent. The food items that belong to each of these tastes is given in the table.

Any meal that contains food items from all these six tastes will be a balanced meal. It has all the nutrients for the proper functioning of the body and will balance all the doshas. This is a very simple system and easy to practice and follow.

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The Senses

How Can We Use the Information on The Six Tastes To Improve Our Health

How The Six Tastes Affect The Doshas

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