A NEW book aims to encourage us to flex our taste buds.

The book called The Food Lover’s Handbook by Mark Price, reveals the foodie flavours you should try before you die. If that all sounds a bit ominous, don’t worry. Price, who has more than 20 years’ experience in the industry - most recently as MD of Waitrose, has penned the guide to the origins of 40 of the most popular foods, along with advice and recipes for cooking them, plus suggestions for more exotic ingredients you should sample before you shuffle off – kala

namak salt anyone?

Here are our favourites from Price’s prized list...

1. Iberico de Bellota jamon. The ever-trendy cured meat from free-range black Iberian pigs which have feasted on acorns (bellota) in Spain and Portugal. Price writes: “The wafer-thin slices of the ruby-red wonder have been described as one of the greatest food items in the world.”

2. Jersey Royal potatoes. There’s something deliciously nutty and creamy about a bowl of freshly cooked Jersey Royals - and you should be able to find them in your local supermarket when they’re in season, too.

3. Craster kippers. A breakfast staple at your staycation B&B no doubt, kippers hold a certain smelly place in the nation’s hearts. These ones, says Price, are smoked in the traditional way at L Robson & Sons in Craster, Northumberland, whose smokehouses are more than 140 years old.

4. Tonka beans. They may sound like something dreamed up by Willy Wonka, but these small black beans produced in Venezuela and Nigeria are very real and, according to Price, smell of “almond, vanilla, caramel and clove”, while they taste like cocoa.

5. Purbeck Ice Cream. Hurrah for the Dorset delight! Using fresh milk and thick double cream, this award-winning ice cream boasts Cracking Choc and Dorset Marmalade as new flavours for 2016.

6. Beurre d’Isigny. You don’t have to hop across the Channel to indulge in Price’s pick of the butters - this creamy French beauty’s available at Waitrose for £1.89.

7. Forbidden rice or black rice.Legend has it, says Price, that only emperors in ancient China were allowed to eat this rice due to its rarity.

8. Silver tip jasmine tea. The leaf buds are plucked at the point of unfurling, says Price and, carefully dried in the mountain sun and then scented at a jasmine farm.

9. San Nicasio potato crisps. From Andalusia in Spain, are “cooked in 100% extra virgin olive oil and flavoured with Himalayan pink salt”.