Have you ever eaten a magic fruit?

If you were reading a fantasy story set in a magic land, you probably wouldn’t be surprised to read about a fruit that can make sour things taste sweet. But the surprising thing is that such a fruit actually does exist! It’s called the miracle fruit.

The miracle fruit grows in West Africa, looks a bit like a cranberry-coloured almond, and tastes pretty bland itself, but the real magic happens when you eat it. Once you eat the berries, anything sour or bitter you eat for up to half an hour afterward tastes sweet! Lemons taste like candy, and burning hot sauce tastes a bit like honey.

It’s not actually magic – it’s chemistry! The berries contain a chemical that binds to taste receptors on the tongue and fool them into thinking that one thing actually tastes like another. As the chemical wears off the tongue, normal tastes return.

It can be fun to try – many people have “miracle fruit parties” where they try many foods after eating miracle fruit – but it also has an important use in medicine.

Cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy often have trouble eating because the treatments make all foods taste metallic and bitter. They begin to lose weight, which can harm their bodies and put them at greater risk from the cancer. But after eating miracle fruit, some patients are able to eat again. If this fruit can actually help cancer patients get better, it will really have earned its name!