Size, weight, shape and colour all have an effect on flavour

Our perception of how food tastes is influenced by cutlery, research suggests. Size, weight, shape and colour all have an effect on flavour, says a University of Oxford team. Cheese tastes saltier when eaten from a knife rather than a fork; while white spoons make yoghurt taste better, experiments show (BBC News Article, 26 June 2013).
An article about the research was published in the journal ‘Flavour’. One of the conclusions in the article is that what might be particularly effective in terms of reducing people’s unhealthy eating habits would be to make unhealthy food difficult to find (not grouped together with like products) and to have unintuitive packaging so that blue no longer signals a salty snack. Another study had already shown that blue packaging is often associated with salty snack products, at least in the UK. Keeping people on their toes, and unable to fulfill expectations, might make them slow down their consumption so that they might eat less or make better food choices in the market.