[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

If, as you say, "Ultimately what I care about is reading something that demonstrates that the writer knows what he's talking about and that sheds some kind of useful and meaningful-to-me light on the restaurant(s) being written about...", and you don't care what sort of shenanigans went on to bring you to that point, that is certainly your prerogative, and ends the discussion.

I guess I should follow up on the "shenanigans" bit. . .

My feeling is that a good, ethical reviewer is able to mitigate any potential sources of influence to the greatest extent possible and still produce a reasonably unbiased report. In some ways, I think it's easier for a comped and non-anonymous author to do this, because he already assumes that he's getting special treatment, whereas the supposedly anonymous writer dining out on the company dime may not.

But, really, the proof is in the pudding: If a writer is unduly influenced by being comped and other "shenanigans" then this will come out in his writing, which won't reflect a fair and accurate assessment of the restaurant, and therefore won't be very high in quality. And so that's not a writer whose work I will value very highly.

I don't doubt you when you say that a free meal in Miami is a ticket to a glowing blog entry. You're certainly in a better position to know than I about Miami. And it may be true to a certain extent in New York as well. We all know that there are certain bloggers or freelancer/bloggers who always seem to give a positive review. Probably these writers are unduly influenced by being comped, not to mention any number of other things. This, to me, says that they're not very skilled at their jobs. I don't care about their work, because it is not shedding any useful and meaningful-to-me light on the restaurants those writers review. Of course, its also the case that I can say the same thing about several reimbursed writers working for newspapers in this town. So, if I consider the fact that the acceptance or non-acceptance of comps doesn't seem to have a meaningful impact on the usefulness, accuracy and overall quality of restaurant reviews in New York City (else the quality of the reimbursed-meal work would stand head and shoulders above the comped-meal work), and in further consideration of the fact that some of the best, most useful, informative and critical work around NYC of which I am aware has been turned in by writers to accept the occasional comp, what am I to conclude? Are comps ruining the craft of food reviewing? Not as far as I can tell. If all these writers were to follow Holly's model or your model, I guess we'd have three or four reimbursed restaurant reviewers in NYC turning out mostly mediocre work, and then either lots of reviews of hot dogs, pizza and cubano sandwiches or a glut of non-restaurant food writing. Meanwhile, no one would (except enthusiasts with deep pockets) be getting any experience in either dining at or writing critically about restaurants in the middlebrow and higher category.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

Good for you, Danny. But, I suspect this may be because possible for you to do this work because you are not making a living with food writing, and also I suspect this is affordable for you because most of your food writing is in "cheapeats" -- it's a lot easier to foot your own bill if you're writing about food trucks or $11 paella than if you're writing about 3-star restaurants. How much writing do you do on restaurants that cost North of $200 for a complete experience?

But, you know, maybe you've got a point there. Can a critic really be above-board in his evaluations when he's not footing the bill himself? How can we trust whether the critic really feels the restaurant experience is worth unless he pays for it out of his own pocket? Maybe Frank Bruni should be paying for all those meals, then we'd know no one can impugn his integrity when the "who paid for this" sh*t hits the fan. Of course, there may be plenty of other, perhaps more important reasons a critic's integrity can be questioned, but at least we'd know everyone's got that particular one locked away.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

I sometimes have to wonder whether reimbursed salaried food old-media writers focus on this aspect of their craft because it is one of the few remaining advantages they have over their new-media peers.

So now we finally get to the REAL heart of your argument, SK. Perhaps it is not comped meal vs. paid meal that matters to you, really; or having ethical doubts (or not) about receiving comped meals, etc.....But non-paid writer versus "salaried" writer. You seem to be saying that anyone with a computer is as reliable as anyone else with a computer. That is a completely different argument my friend.

And I don't know about NYC, but here in Miami, a free meal is a ticket to a glowing write-up in the 'new-media' (by which I assume you mean bloggers). I'm guessing that probably happens more often than you'd care to believe, even (or perhaps especially), in New York.

Sorry, but that strawman's all your own. I was merely making the dichotomy between freelancers, many of whom could not work without comps -- although some publications do reimburse (albeit often stingily) -- and non-freelancers. Although, now that you mention it, there are plenty of food writers for the web (either avocationally on blogs, professionally on blogs, professionally on "web publications" or professionally for web sites associated with either print or television entities) that I think are a lot better than the usual newspaper and magazine food writers.

Ultimately what I care about is reading something that demonstrates that the writer knows what he's talking about and that sheds some kind of useful and meaningful-to-me light on the restaurant(s) being written about.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

As to just which newspapers pay or do not pay for the meals of critics, let me make a suggestion.  Build a list of the ten newspapers in the world you must trust for their editorial integrity.  I would be willing to wager that a minimum of eight of those ten newspapers reimburse their critics. Make a second list of papers that you would least rely on for editorial integrity and I would surely suggest that although their restaurant critics do not starve, they surely need another job in order to support their passion.

I'm not arguing that newspapers shouldn't reimburse their restaurant critics. I think we'd all like it if there were more of that kind of thing. I'm just not willing to say that I think that the critics who are comped are ethically compromised such that their work can't equally valuable and valid compared to the reimbursed critics.

As I've said any number of times: There are food writers of whom I am aware, food writers I know dine to non-anonymously and I know to accept occasional comps, whose work I think is better, more reliable, more informative and more ethically sound than the writing of most any reimbursed, salaried food writer of which I am aware. I'm not sure I think the value of their work would be increased in my estimation if they were to land in fully reimbursed salaried newspaper or magazine gigs, but I'd certainly be happy for them if they did.

What I am certain of is that I wouldn't think they were any more ethically pure in their new reimbursed jobs than they had been prior. It's just removing one potential source of ethical conflict among hundreds. I sometimes have to wonder whether reimbursed salaried food old-media writers focus on this aspect of their craft because it is one of the few remaining advantages they have over their new-media peers.

[What Food Tastes Like with Little Sense of Taste]

This takes me back to Mr. Horler's freshman biology class.  That's where he taught that we can only detect four distinct tastes:  sweet, salty, sour & bitter.  One region of the tongue detects sweet, another salty, et cetera.  The rest of our sense of taste is due to the olfactory glands in the nose.

I agree that what Chris is talking about is better described as a loss of flavor (not taste) largely brought about by a loss of smell. But scientists are increasingly thinking that the old "four dimensions of taste" is not accurate, and that there are myriad possible tastes. Hervé This has a small and illuminating section on this in his otherwise disappointing book, Kitchen Mysteries.

[The Fat Pack Wonders if It's Time to Slim Down]

This goes back to what I said before about BMI: It's useful on an epidemiological basis, because averaged over large populations BMI does tend to correspond to a certain lifestyle, etc. But individuals tend to be individual, and may have mitigating factors.

But there are individual differences. For example, a Lancet study showed that someone with a >30 BMI but who scores in the top 40 percentile on a stress test has better health statistics than someone with a <25 BMI who scores in the bottom 20 percentile on a stress test. However, it is also a fact that we're talking about small populations of people. On average, people with a <25 BMI have a better level of fitness than people with a >30 BMI, and if fitness levels are equal one would expect the <25 BMI population to have better statistics.

So, no BMI isn't the absolute last word. But it's hard to imagine anyone with a BMI of 40 who could be described as fit.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

My guess would be at least hundreds if not thousands of publications pay for reviewing meals.  Unless things have changed, in Philadelphia alone, the Inquirer, the Daily News, Philadelphia Magazine, the City Paper and I'm guessing the Philadelphia Weekly all pay for reviewing meals.

You're saying that you think that all these papers have a salaried restaurant reviewer and that these papers pay for the full cost of all meals eaten by the restaurant reviewer in performance of this function? All I can say is: don't be so sure. Don't be so sure that some of them aren't making the reviewer pay for his own meals out of his own pocket; or that some don't have such a small budget that the reviewer is forced to subsidize out of his own pocket.

Food writers don't have to review restaurants to get started.  One could suggest that the reading public would be better served if aspiring critics wrote about other aspects of food and restaurants - growers, chef's, dishwashers, a day in the life of a kitchen and such where no dollar outlay is required.  Might even make them better, more knowledgeable and more well rounded critics.

Okay. And how much of this kind of work is there to go around, realistically? Even the lowest end of freelance piecework in food writing involves scrounging up assignments to crank out 100 word blurbs on restaurants or bars for things like Time Out's web site -- a form of "reviewing" in other words, which would presumably not be allowed. Not to mention, how is the aspiring restaurant reviewer going to get any reasonable depth and breadth of experience that might make him a good reviewer, especially at the higher end, considering that I assume you would also frown upon comps for this person?

Of course, a person who worked away at this stuff as long, hard and successfully as it would take to accumulate the experience and reputation that might lead to one of the "company dime" salaried food writing jobs would, by that time, be a restaurant and food industry industry insider in that city, known to everyone in the business and with lots of relationships. This, in turn, would set off hundreds of "anonymity" and "professional/personal relationship" ethical alarms among the food writing police. Surely you wouldn't approve of that guy who wrote about the apprentice's first day in Ducasse's kitchen writing the review of Ducasse's restaurant. This kind of guy would get special treatment everywhere he went, and certainly couldn't be trusted to write an objective review of a restaurant where the chef gave him that great quote about sous vide, and the guy supplying the tomatoes appeared on that article he wrote about microgreens, and the head waiter is the one he trailed at a different restaurant for a week for that "front of the house" article last year, and, oh yea, the dishwasher is the one who hooked him up with that dude who delivers the best weed in town right to his door. So, in effect, you're suggesting that the aspiring writer guy work his ass off writing about growers, chefs, restaurateurs, dishwashers, reservationists, waiters, a day in the life of a kitchen and so on in one city (or perhaps lives nomadically for however long) in the hope that he'll get on someone's radar, whereupon he would then have to move to another city where he doesn't have any potentially ethically-conflicting relationships and is "anonymous" so he can take a job as that town's restaurant reviewer.

Well, no wonder there aren't many food writers who pass the ethical and quality test!

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

Here's a theoretical question: Suppose the New York Times and all the other newspapers and magazines in the NYC area declared: We're not paying for the meals we review any more. From now on, the industry standard is going to be that our reviewers are comped and make reservations under their own name. Our expectations is that our writers will not be given inordinate special treatment, and our writers will be on the lookout for such treatment and adjust their reviews accordingly.

Does anyone suppose that there would be a drastic lowering of the quality of NYC restaurant reviews?

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

Danny, the point that I am making is that there are myriad influences and ethical dilemmas that a writer may face. To focus on comps as though accepting a comp somehow breaks a writer's ethical cherry seems silly to me. And, as a performing artist, I have to say that all of my colleagues laugh and laugh and laugh when they hear that foodies and food writers believe that accepting a comp unduly influences a writer to go easy on the restaurant. Comping is standard in the theater -- so much so that some larger companies actually hold back a certain number of prime seats every night and have a person standing at the entrance, ready to hand those comps to any writer or music-world notable who might just happen by without a ticket. And yet, bad reviews happen all the time. Really bad ones, sometimes. Do some reviewers always give positive reviews because they want to keep on getting invited? Sure. But plenty don't. And the number isn't any greater than those who, for example, always give a great review to the hunky baritone who is often staged shirtless. Theatrical companies know that it's a risk -- they might get a great review/they might get panned. But it's a risk they know they have to take, because they want a review. So they comp the critics anyway. And everyone understands that the critic is not beholden to the company for the comp.

So, what I am suggesting is that it's silly to focus on comping as the Great Satan of restaurant criticism and reviewing. If the writing isn't generally very good, comps are pretty low on the list. And, frankly, if food writers were more skilled and and more ethical to begin with, comps wouldn't be a problem. And, again I toss down the gauntlet that no one has been brave enough to pick up: Taken as a group, the salaried "company dime" food writers aren't very good; and one can find a larger number of comped freelance food writers who are better than the salaried "company dime" food writer. This seems like a strong indication to me that it's not comps and the notion of "anonymity" that we should be worried about. I'd trade comps and notional anonymity for experience, knowledge, enthusiasm, a critical eye and something to say any day of the week. I would also suggest that, if some food writers write glowing reviews based on receiving a comp or attending a press preview, it's more a question of experience and skill than it is ethics.

ETA: If, as you suggest, sportwriters are on the whole more experienced and knowledgeable in their field than food writers (something with which I would agree), how do you suggest that food writers gain this experience and knowledge if not with comps? Should newspapers have "young food writing talent development" programs, where they pay for meals on behalf of food-writing trainees? Right, that'll happen. Or will food writers have to be drawn from the ranks of the wealthy, who could afford to educate themselves? Former restaurateurs or restaurant workers are out, of course, because they would have to many biases and connections for you. So who?

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

So, here's a question: How many restaurant reviewing jobs are out there where the employer pays for all of the writers meals? Let's just make a ballpark guess for the entire United States. 25 jobs? Maybe? I happen to know, by the way, that certain NYC papers do not pay for the writers' meals. So don't assume that every regular newspaper restaurant writer is eating out on the company dime.

So, absent of comps, how are we going to get new food writers -- especially writers who have any familiarity with, and basis to write critically about the more exalted (and expensive) styles of cuisine? I guess the prospective writer has to be rich and pay for all these things out of his own pocket? Work his way up from writing about Ray's Pizza to Alain Ducasse somehow? Has that ever happened? Or, is it more likely that newspapers will do what the NY Times has done in recent years, and bring over a writer from some other discipline as their new restaurant critic? Because, you know, that's really been great for the quality of food writing in this town.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

Let's examine this. . .

"Opera Premiere".  Only happens once.

Dinner at a restaurant only happens once.

'Cats' was not reviewed over the course of its run, with several performances over several months being examined, but during previews or at its premiere.

Most restaurants are never reviewed by the same critic more than once, and most of the time based on only one or two visits. You are also not correct that theatrical shows or opera productions are never re-reviewed. For example, it is fairly commonplace for a newspaper to run a second review of an operatic production if there is a noteworthy change in the cast that would be of special interest (just like re-reviewing a restaurant after an especially noteworthy change of chef). It is also somewhat common to re-visit long-running musical theater shows after several years have gone by. Keep in mind that the "menu" (songs, staging, costumes, many of the same performers, etc.) at Cats never changed, so there was actually less need for a revisit compared to a restaurant's evolution after a year or more.

Each baseball game, etc., is  a separate event.  And reporters are not there to 'review' the game, but to report on the results, probably more than 99% of the time.  They also must do interviews in the clubhouse with players and team officials.  Access is essential.

Each meal is a separate event as well, although that's not most of my point here. My point is that a sports writer who enjoys special access to players and team officials (and the attendant career benefits) has a strong influence to not write anything negative about that team and those players. Why? Because if he does, he may find that special access cut off or given to a competing writer. This is especially true of beat writers who cover a single team or a single city's teams. If that team and its players cut you off, it's not like you can write about the team down the block. You might have to leave town and start over. In contrast, a food writer can always go on to the next restaurant down the block if he burns himself with one. It seems obvious that these are much more compelling reasons for the sports writer to be influenced to go easy on a team or a player than receiving a comp from a restaurant might influence a food writer to go easy on a restaurant. And yet, as I have pointed out, sports writers do hard-hitting and critical stories on teams and players all the time.

So, here we have the evidence that sports writers, who have much more powerful reasons to compromise their ethics in favor of a team or certain players, seem nevertheless to be able to make ethically uncompromised critical comments about these same teams and players. Indeed, this is the norm in the field. And yet, you and others are arguing that food writers, based on the comp of a single meal at a single restaurant, would be unable to do the same. What conclusion are we to draw here? That food writers aren't as good, or are somehow morally and ethically weaker than sports writers?

Who are these people who get comped meals and then write about them?  The so-called blogosphere is littered with them.  These are people we know, and understand that their critical judgement may, in fact, be swayed by the royal treatment.  Just like in any other critical profession.  Does it happen every single time?  Probably not.  But does it happen every now and then?  Of course.  To say otherwise would be ludicrous-just as in any other critical realm.

You say this as though the quality of food writing coming from "company dime" salaried writers is categorically better than the quality of food writing coming from comped freelance writers. I disagree. There is good and bad to be found in both groups. As I said before, there are any number of comped freelance food writers whose writing and judgement I value over that of most any "company dime" salaried writers. So I think you're off-base to suggest that it's comps that are reducing the value of food writing. If so, what is the explanation for the overall poor state of the writing we are getting from "company dime" salaried writers?

Of course, there are comped freelance writers who may be swayed by "royal treatment," which you seem to equate with comping (I would suggest that salaried "company dime" writers are much more likely to receive special treatment than any comped freelancer -- and candid reports from restaurateurs tend to support my suggestion). But my larger point is that a critical writer or reviewer has any number of potential outside influences that may sway his writing in one direction or the other. A skilled ethical writer tries to account for these potential influences and mitigate them to the greatest extent possible; a less skilled or ethical writer may be less willing or able to do so. What I don't see is that comping necessarily equates an unmitigatable influence and ethical conflict that stands head and shoulders above all other potential influences and ethical conflicts. For every writer who is unable or unwilling to consciously consider and mitigate the potential influence and ethical conflict inherent in accepting a comp, there are any number of writers who are unable or unwilling to consider and mitigate the potential influence and ethical conflict inherent in the fact that they want to screw the head waiter, or admire the restaurateur, or want a certain kind of restaurant to succeed, or don't like pasta, or feel that the chef/restaurateur has "dissed" the town's restaurant culture, or were likely recognized by the restaurant staff, or were in a bad mood that day, or were reviewing the restaurant of a major advertiser, or didn't really understand a particular style or restaurant/cuisine, etc.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

Interesting, Holly.

What I get is that you're making the case that accepting comps hurts (or can hurt) the writer's reputation among his peers in the media and the restaurant community -- but not that accepting comps necessarily compromises the ethical integrity of the reviews or creates a situation in which the reviewer is necessarily unduly biased in making his critical comments?

[CLE: The Velvet Tango Room]

Yea, those mugs kick ass. I wonder where they got them.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

So it seems, unfortunately, that in the end, this argument always comes down to a battle between those who take comps and defend it, and those who don't, and defend that.

For the record, I don't write, nor have I ever written reviews of anything.

The argument that sports, or opera or theater writers take comps, is irrelevant to restaurant criticism.  These writers must cover an event, usually an unduplicatable one.  Meals can be duplicated.

Really? That seems a little naive about these businesses. I'm not talking about the one Bruce performance out in the Meadowlands. These are all ongoing businesses. Tell that to the Metropolitan Opera and its dozen or so performances of La bohème every season (the premiere of which is reviewed every year in the NY Times). Tell that to the producers of Cats, which ran for over 6,000 performances and more than 20 years on Broadway -- that's longer than most restaurants, and the "menu" never changed! Tell that the producers of any Broadway show, all of which are designed to run 8 performances a week so long as they can continue filling the house. Tell that to the Atlanta Falcons in the wake of the Michael Vick dogfighting controversy, or the New York Knicks in the wake of yet another forgettable season. Also, consider that by and large, the restaurant critic is reviewing between one and three "performances" or "games" by the restaurant.

The argument, by the way, is not that the situations are directly parallel. But rather that writers in these other fields have equally, if not more powerful reasons to be influenced -- and yet they seem to do pretty well. You think that a single comped meal at a restaurant is going to influence a food writer to go easy on a restaurant more than a season's worth of free seats to the local opera, invitations to the star-filled special events, arranged interviews with international stars appearing in company productions, etc. is going to influence a music critic to go easy on the new production of Rigoletto? Really? You're going to go with that?

And yet, somehow, negative opera reviews happen all the time. What does this mean? Does it mean that professional live opera reviewers are just better and more ethical as a whole than their counterparts in the food world? Are some music critics influenced by these things? Sure, of course they are. Some food writers who dine out on the company dime may be influenced by the fact that they want to screw the good-looking celebrity chef. What's that got to do with the price of tea? There are good, ethical writers who try to do the best they can, and there are bad, unethical writers who don't.

Among the food writers (both online and in print) upon whose work I rely, I'd say that those who dine (supposedly) anonymously and on the company dime are, as a whole, pretty low on my list.

Rogov makes the point that criticism has its basis in philosophy.  Unfortunately, when it comes to restaurants these days, there are simply too many cheerleaders, many of whom get invited to comped events (and some who do not, of course), and not enough philosophers.

Perhaps. But perhaps I just don't think that the guy writing about the merits of the linguini con vongole they're serving at Luigi's, however philosophically informed, is turning out stuff in the same league with Immanuel Kant (or Stendhal, who did the odd bit of criticism).

Mea culpas over, I object to comped meals, especially meals to be reviewed.  It is not that they necessarily influence the writer.  Steven would never sell his integrity for the cost of a meal.  Nor would I.  There are critics that would.  Philadelphia had a couple of legendary freeloaders.  Neither was respected by their colleagues or the restaurants that comped them. 

That is my objection to comps.  Restaurants and publicists think they can influence one's opinion by giving a reviewer free food - that waving a free meal will get the critic to dine at a place that would otherwise remain unvisited. 

I don't think any restaurant ever respects a critic it has comped in return for a review.  I think critics who don't accept comps and the publications that have no-comp policies - and these are usually a city's major critics and publications - have disdain for critics who expect and accept comps.

So, if I get this right: Your objection to food writers accepting comped meals is not that you think the fact of the comp would necessarily influence the writers' opinions (any more than other things might), but because you don't think it looks good?

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

The basis of criticism is philosophy, for if were not there would be no moral imperative for the critic.

I don't really believe that there is a principle originating inside the critic and compelling him to critique the work of others. I'm happy that there are critics like you out there, but I'd bet almost anything that you are among an infinitesimally small number of restaurant critics who think about their craft this way.

[Comped Meals - The Question of Ethics]

Agreed also that in many fields, comps are a norm.  There is one huge difference between restaurant and wine criticism and any other form.  Whatever form most comps take - theatre, baseball, the opera, the cinema, literary - the subject under observation and criticism is dealt with on a primarily intellectual level that perhaps with a certain overtone of emotion.  In food and wine criticism, however, the objects we are criticizing become physically part of our bodies and are therefore dealt with both at the intellectual and the purely physical level.  I would propose along with Claude Levi-Strauss that we relate differently to those things that become "part of us" and those things which remain "outside of us"

This seems to be getting pretty heavily into the realm of philosophy, if you're saying that the primary thing that makes comping matter so much more in restaurant reviewing than all these other fields is that you digest the food and make it "part of you."

Many forms of criticism (certainly criticism of any performing art) involve applying analysis to various physical sensations. In the case of the opera reviewer, the primary sensations are aural and visual (although there are certainly other components, such as the physical sensation of certan powerful tones, etc.) In the case of the food critic, the primary sensations are taste, smell and those associated with digestion. Either way, I don't understand how the fact of digestion tips the balance one way or the other (unless the writer is relying upon the restaurant comps for physical subsistence he otherwise couldn't afford).

[St. Germain]

Hmm.  I wonder about that.  Could you provide a bit more information?  Certainly things such as color, temperature and viscosity affect perceived sweetness.  I wonder whether, and to what extent substances in things like mint or other herbal flavors increase the perceived sweetness of something, rather than generally being associated with sweetness in our minds.

Stevia, is the easiest example, with extracts of that herb having up to 300 times greater perceived sweetness than sugar.

As far as perceived sweetness in normal culinary herbs, licorice (Glycyrrhiza glabra) is one of the sweetest. I find articles which claim it is perceived as up to 50 times as sweet as sugar.

Right. So, these are chemicals that are actual sweeteners contained within the plant.

Stevia is an interesting example, but seems to be unique in having that amount of sweetening power in the unprocessed plant.

I wonder whether other herbs could add enough non-sugar sweeteners to a liqueur to affect the actual sweetness of a liqueur when one considers the amount of sugar already in there. For example, the sweet chemical in licorice is glycyrrhizin. And, while glycyrrhizin may be 30 to 50 times sweeter than sucrose, the highest concentration is in the bark and is only 4% (and it hydrolyses to a non-sweet form).

With respect to St. Germain, since elderflower doesn't appear to have any non-sugar sweetening chemicals like the glycyrrhizin in licorice or the glycosides in stevia that could cause an increase in actual sweetness, the question would be whether or not there is some chemical in elderflower that causes an increase in perceived sweetness. I have my doubts about that, however.

[St. Germain]

Hmm. I wonder about that. Could you provide a bit more information? Certainly things such as color, temperature and viscosity affect perceived sweetness. I wonder whether, and to what extent substances in things like mint or other herbal flavors increase the perceived sweetness of something, rather than generally being associated with sweetness in our minds.

[Muddling, Muddlers, and Muddled Drinks]

Right. I'm with you. All of these "muddling substitutions" with respect to fresh herbs (we also muddle citrus and other fruits) strike me as either unacceptably inferior to actual muddling, considerably more trouble than actual muddling, or most often, both. Making a mint syrup, for example, seems both more trouble and produces an inferior result compared to simply muddling the mint.

[Muddling, Muddlers, and Muddled Drinks]

It used to be the case that all the mint drinks I made were either not shaken or sufficiently strongly flavored to mitigate any bad effects of hard shaking (the Juniperotivo comes to mind). As a result, it was my practice to shake hard with big ice and double-strain through a fine strainer. At some point, I started making some more subtly flavored shaken mint cocktails, and quickly learned what can result from overworking the mint: bitter, brackish flavors and an off-brown colored drink. Most drinks with overworked mint need extra sweetness, richness, tartness or flavor to compensate. The Juniperotivo has all four in spades, but usually the main compensation is sweetness -- hence, the super-sweet Julep.

These days, if the cocktail calls for mint shaken with the ice, I'm more likely to give the mint a few taps with a muddler and roll the drink with cracked ice between two large metal mixing tins. Maybe one day I'll be able to toss it in an arc from one tin to the other old-school style.

Ada, a few thoughts:

First, you can use practically anything for muddling. I've seen video of someone making good use of the wooden handle of a potato masher. Also, if you like making cocktails, why not pick up a muddler? They can be had quite inexpensively.

Second, and with all due respect to your bartending son, non-cocktailian bartenders take all kinds of shortcuts all the time. Just because the people at his bar are shaking the heck out of their Mojitos doesn't mean it's a good idea. I would argue that it's not a good idea, and actually don't quite understand why they would be shaking a Mojito anyway. What it is, most likely, is easier and faster than gently muddling and building the drink in the glass. That's all good and well if you're working in a place that does tons of volume and where people the customers aren't expecting the pinacle of refined mixology, but there's no reason you shouldn't do better at home.

HungryChris: IMO mint syrup tastes not right. Definitely no substitute for fresh mint, and it degrades too rapidly to be practical. I don't want a cocktail made with week-old mint syrup.

(Edited to fix typos)

[The Fat Pack Wonders if It's Time to Slim Down]

There was an interesting study that was published over the summer, which I believe has some relevance to various forks in this discussion. More or less, what the study showed is that weight gain (specifically, obesity) is influenced by social ties. To put it in layman's terms, this says that if you hang around with people who are overweight, you are more likely to become overweight yourself. By extension, one might suggest that if you hang around with a bunch of people who engage in or glorify behaviors that lead one to become overweight, you are more likely to engage in these behaviors and become overweight yourself.

Here is the abstract:

Christakis NA, Fowler JH. The spread of obesity in a large social network over 32 years. N Engl J Med 2007;357:370-379

Background The prevalence of obesity has increased substantially over the past 30 years. We performed a quantitative analysis of the nature and extent of the person-to-person spread of obesity as a possible factor contributing to the obesity epidemic.

Methods We evaluated a densely interconnected social network of 12,067 people assessed repeatedly from 1971 to 2003 as part of the Framingham Heart Study. The body-mass index was available for all subjects. We used longitudinal statistical models to examine whether weight gain in one person was associated with weight gain in his or her friends, siblings, spouse, and neighbors.

Results Discernible clusters of obese persons (body-mass index [the weight in kilograms divided by the square of the height in meters], 30) were present in the network at all time points, and the clusters extended to three degrees of separation. These clusters did not appear to be solely attributable to the selective formation of social ties among obese persons. A person's chances of becoming obese increased by 57% (95% confidence interval [CI], 6 to 123) if he or she had a friend who became obese in a given interval. Among pairs of adult siblings, if one sibling became obese, the chance that the other would become obese increased by 40% (95% CI, 21 to 60). If one spouse became obese, the likelihood that the other spouse would become obese increased by 37% (95% CI, 7 to 73). These effects were not seen among neighbors in the immediate geographic location. Persons of the same sex had relatively greater influence on each other than those of the opposite sex. The spread of smoking cessation did not account for the spread of obesity in the network.

Conclusions Network phenomena appear to be relevant to the biologic and behavioral trait of obesity, and obesity appears to spread through social ties. These findings have implications for clinical and public health interventions.

[Orgeat]

Pacific Organic almond milk contains: Organic Almond Base (Filtered Water, Organic Almonds), Organic Rice Starch, Sea Salt, Organic Vanilla, Natural Flavor, Carrageenan, Riboflavin (B2), Vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D2. Could work great though. Only one way to find out!

For what it's worth, personally I don't think that simply shaking up a 1:1 simple syrup with POM makes a particularly good grenadine (my process is right around as much trouble as making orgeat from scratch, and I think results in a far superior grenadine). But making pomegranate juice from fresh pomegranate is considerably more difficult and time consuming than making almond milk, so I think using POM is a reasonable compromise. If it were easy to juice pomegranates and the difference were notable, I'd do that over using POM.

[Orgeat]

Worth a try, I suppose. But I have to wonder whether it would be nearly as good/concentrated/silky as making it yourself -- which is already very little trouble. Also, I assume that premade almond milk normally has additives and is pasteurized.

[Orgeat]

I suppose one should point out that orgeat can be made fairly inexpensively. The Art of Drink formula most of us seem to be basing our methods around results in something like a liter of orgeat! This is a lot of orgeat unless you are a professional bartender or a major tiki fanatic. I would suggest that a decent amount for a home user would be something like this:

Ingredients

150 grams blanched almonds [or other nut]

1 blanched apricot kernel (optional)

250 ml water

200 grams table sugar

30 ml brandy

1-5 drops of orange flower water or rose flower water to taste (optional)

Process

1. Soak solids in ample water for 30 minutes
   
2. Discard water and grind nuts in food processor to a medium-fine paste. Add water to processor towards the end
   
3. Let mixture steep 1-2 hours
   
4. Place a thin tea towel or several layers of cheese into a strainer and pour mixture through cloth, reserving liquid. Twist and squeeze solids in cloth to extract maximum liquid.
   
5. (Optional) Return solids to liquids for an additional hour and repeat straining and squeezing.
   
6. (Optional) Repeat one additional time.
   
7. Add strained nut milk to saucepan with sugar and heat, stirring constantly, until sugar is disolved. Optionally, dissolve sugar in some percentage of the strained nut milk and then combine after the heated mixture has cooled sufficiently.
   
8. Once sweetened nut milk has cooled sufficiently, add optional orange flower water, rose flower water or other flavoring; add brandy for stabilization and bottle.
   
9. Keep under refrigeration
   

This makes a much more managable amount of orgeat, and if you decide to skip one or two of the extra squeezing steps, the whole thing could be ready to go in around an hour and a half.

[Orgeat]

I just did the same thing I do to get the excess moisture out of blanched greens I'm going to saute: I put a thin tea-towel into a strainer, dumped the nut and nut-milk into the tea towel, then gathered up the ends and twisted while squeezing out the rest of the liquid. No need for a special bag.