Garlic is one powerful little bulbous plant. In fiction, it keeps vampires at bay. In reality, it turns your feet turn into taste connoisseurs and actually prompts them to taste its pungent flavor. Yes, you read that right: You can actually taste garlic with your feet. And it’s all due to a special molecule the popular plant contains called Allicin.
How Your Feet Can “Taste” Garlic
According to an American Chemical Society installment of Weird Food Tricks, your feet are able to taste garlic due to how its chemical makeup reacts with your skin. As you may recall from science class, your skin has both watery and oily layers. Normally, water and oil don’t mix, which makes your skin pretty good at protecting you from foreign molecules. However, garlic is chock full of Allicin, a molecule that contains both oil and water and therefore allows it to permeate the skin — after which, it travels through your blood and ends up in both your nose and mouth.
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On average, it takes about 30 minutes to an hour for your feet to “taste” garlic. In that amount of time, you’ll start to taste garlic in your mouth and smell it with your nose — even if the garlic came nowhere near your face.
Still skeptical? Check out the video below for an in depth explanation of how your feet are able to taste garlic.
Can Your Feet Taste Other Things, Like Lotion?
There’s no need to worry about tasting everything that comes near your feet. Luckily things like shoes, foot lotion and stinky socks don’t contain Allicin, meaning there’s no way they can penetrate your foot skin and give you an unexpected lunch.