Is a great tasting orange (or any fruit) as nutrient filled as one that doesn't taste so good?

That depends upon so many other considerations than taste.

goji berries are amazing, but you can only get them dryed most places and they taste like cardboard. Don’t pay 14 dollars for them like I did! It’s not worth it!

I’m pretty sure there is no real correlation between nutrition and taste, when comparing two of the same fruit. And if there was, it would probably be negligible. But I have no science to back that up, and would love to see some :)

I think so. Look at store bought tomatoes vs. home grown. Store bought tomatoes taste like crap because they are hybrids that have been shipped from long distances, out of season, and pumped full of water. They have way less nutritional value. The older the veggie or fruit is the less good it is for you.

@dynmicudo, I’m pretty sure there is no real correlation between nutrition and taste, when comparing two of the same fruit. Too bad that only works for fruit. It seems all the tasty things (i.e. chocolate) are much worse for me than the non-tasty things.

@omfgTALIjustIMDu – that’s because we’re programmed that way! During human evolution, humans were hunters/gatherers. Food was scarce and took lots of effort (read, energy) to hunt or gather. Our bodies are programmed such that if we encountered foods with lots of energy (read, calories and fat – chocolate, pizza, milkshakes), to EAT and eat these foods so that our bodies could store some energy for use later in the form of fat (which doubles as insulation). Sadly, our intellect progressed way faster than our bodies could evolve, so here we are, with huge brains and huge intellect potential, but still in a primitive body.

I find knowing this helps with life. Such as, when your stomach growls, that’s your body asking you “Hey! Are you going to put food in me, or am I gonna have to start burning this fat to get energy?”. When you’re trying to lose weight, it’s good to know this, it lets you take a different perspective on it. Now I don’t associate grumbling stomachs with having to have a snack – I associate it with having a cup of water while knowing my body is working hard!

I do believe there is a correlation between taste and nutrition in the larger sense, i.e., ripe fruits are tastier than unripe ones, and also are more nutritious. It’s why we evloved to think ripe ones are yummy.

However, when you can take two equal-looking carrots and find that they have different nutritional profiles because they grew in different soils, that’s when the connection between taste and nutrients breaks down.