3 Most Important Elements of a Plate...

[Gavin Jones]

So we make a distinction between 'flavour' what we taste in the food, and 'taste' a property of the structure of the foodstuff. Still this doesn't help us as there is no clear relationship between the 'taste' and the 'flavour'?

As I understand it the 'taste' is some sort of distribution to which we apply our 'flavour' operator i.e. eat the food - to generate our experience of the taste. Some of us claim our flavour operator is a small perturbation of the identity.

There is a long way to go before this (which I understand the Plotnickitistic assertion to be) is remotely plausible.

[Adam Balic]

Oraklet - it's a science, it's a craft. Doesn't matter which opinion you have, in terms of the central question.

[oraklet]

no, adam, 'cause this is the scientific way of seeing it:

So we make a distinction between 'flavour' what we taste in the food, and 'taste' a property of the structure of the foodstuff. Still this doesn't help us as there is no clear relationship between the 'taste' and the 'flavour'?

As I understand it the 'taste' is some sort of distribution to which we apply our 'flavour' operator i.e. eat the food - to generate our experience of the taste. Some of us claim our flavour operator is a small perturbation of the identity.

There is a long way to go before this (which I understand the Plotnickitistic assertion to be) is remotely plausible.

and that is trying to be overly precise on matters that are not important to the central issue of a craft: doing your job well, whichever way you do it, whether you're aware of all the steps you take or it's become second nature to you.

[Steve Plotnicki]

Still this doesn't help us as there is no clear relationship between the 'taste' and the 'flavour'?

Yes but you get right to the foundation of the Plotnicki theory here which is, it doesn't matter because a preponderance of informed opinions govern what the right flavor is. Let's say you were a farmer growing heirloom tomatoes. You planted a few different clones, and as the tomatoes ripened, you did some testing on them. Acidity level, residual sugar, etc. How would you know which one will be the favorite among goumet diners? That's right, you can't tell. I mean you could guess, but that's no guarantee. And this is exactly why it is a craft and not a science.

The tricking part of the modern dining experience is really a matter of exploting the poor way our plates are trained. They give you a lollipop and you know it tastes familiar, but you can't get your arms around what it is. But once they tell you it is red pepper, you recognize the taste right away.

All they have done is change the visual cues. And over time you would train yourself to not rely on the visual cues as a way of correcting the situation.

[Adam Balic]

no, adam, 'cause this is the scientific way of seeing it:

So we make a distinction between 'flavour' what we taste in the food, and 'taste' a property of the structure of the foodstuff. Still this doesn't help us as there is no clear relationship between the 'taste' and the 'flavour'?

As I understand it the 'taste' is some sort of distribution to which we apply our 'flavour' operator i.e. eat the food - to generate our experience of the taste. Some of us claim our flavour operator is a small perturbation of the identity.

There is a long way to go before this (which I understand the Plotnickitistic assertion to be) is remotely plausible.

and that is trying to be overly precise on matters that are not important to the central issue of a craft: doing your job well, whichever way you do it, whether you're aware of all the steps you take or it's become second nature to you.

Oraklet - you are just getting caught up in the details. The question is simply, can external influences influence taste/flavour of food. If we keep it at your no-science-for-me level then there is no need to Gavinify it, assume flavour and taste to mean in practical terms (this was after all about the 'dining experience').

I personally would be very interested to see if certain colours made food taste more salty or sweet etc, but this to "precise" for this thread.

Stepping back from whole pile of steaming rhetoric that this thread is, and looking at the question: "Can presentation of food effect taste? I think that a large percentage of people either scientists, sailors, tinkers, priests or crafts-people would say "yes".

Everything else is debateable but not this.

[Adam Balic]

The tricking part of the modern dining experience is really a matter of exploting the poor way our plates are trained. They give you a lollipop and you know it tastes familiar, but you can't get your arms around what it is. But once they tell you it is red pepper, you recognize the taste right away.

All they have done is change the visual cues. And over time you would train yourself to not rely on the visual cues as a way of correcting the situation.

Yes Steve, most people participating in the "Dining experience" are going to train themselves not to be "tricked" by presentation. However, the lollipop thing is a nice example of how you have been wrong all along, Tah!

[Gavin Jones]

it doesn't matter because a preponderance of informed opinions govern what the right flavor is.

And that would be French.

[Steve Plotnicki]

Oraklet - you are just getting caught up in the details. The question is simply, can external influences influence taste/flavour of food.

Adam - You keep leaving out the important bit.

"The question is, in the context of the dining experience, simply, can external influences influence taste/flavour of food."

Once you interpose that, all they can do is change the visual clues. And while in the lollipop example I couldn't figure it out at first because the visual clues had changed, it didn't make the red pepper taste any different. All that changed was how quickly I could tell it was red pepper. That's because I have learned how to pick up the taste of red pepper by rote. But if when I was child, my mother fed me salad ingredients blidnfolded, and then together in a salad, I would have done it on the first lick. So this very biog point the scientists are making, doesn't say much about humans and their acuity. But it says a lot about the flawed ways we have trained our palates.

[Adam Balic]

Oraklet - you are just getting caught up in the details. The question is simply, can external influences influence taste/flavour of food.

Adam - You keep leaving out the important bit.

"The question is, in the context of the dining experience, simply, can external influences influence taste/flavour of food."

Once you interpose that, all they can do is change the visual clues. And while in the lollipop example I couldn't figure it out at first because the visual clues had changed, it didn't make the red pepper taste any different. All that changed was how quickly I could tell it was red pepper. That's because I have learned how to pick up the taste of red pepper by rote. But if when I was child, my mother fed me salad ingredients blidnfolded, and then together in a salad, I would have done it on the first lick. So this very biog point the scientists are making, doesn't say much about humans and their acuity. But it says a lot about the flawed ways we have trained our palates.

Steve - I see this as spliting hairs. The visual clues changed they 'flavour' didn't, but it didn't 'taste' like red pepper.

Within the dining experience the presentation altered you perception of the dish. End of story.

You can talk until you are blue in the face, about being trained to recognise the deception, but the above still remains the same.

So to go right back to the being of this thread, presentation is an important componant of the dining experience (maybe not the most important), otherwise restaurants would be serving your food on dryed cowpats and you would turn to Fatguy and say "Excellent dining experience old boy, what? That flavours are capitol, tip-top.".

[oraklet]

do you really mean that the taste of pepper in the lollipop has changed because we don't immediately recognize it? would mona lisa be a different painting if it wasn't lighted?

i can't believe this is happening. it's a good thing that in a moment i'll be leaving for the sweedish wilderness, with no computers or internet, 'cause this makes me slightly dizzy.

have a nice easter!

edited for mona lisa example

Edited April 11, 2003 by oraklet (log)

[Steve Plotnicki]

Steve - I see this as spliting hairs. The visual clues changed they 'flavour' didn't, but it didn't 'taste' like red pepper.

No it didn't change the flavor at all. That's the whole point. All that changed was how rapidly I could recognize what the flavor was. I didn't think it was a radish instead of a red pepper. The taste was always familiar. And when the red pepper was revealed, it was obvious.

You are not drawing the distinction between cogniscence, and a true change in perception. That's the point we have been trying to make. A change in apprearance does not alter the qualities of the food, or our cognitive ability in the long term. Yes, people might be confused at first, ala the wine experts in Yvonne's example. But eventually, they would have overcome it.

When ChefG serves his pushed foie gras with pear puree, it's a dead ringer for chestnut cream. But, it still tastes like liver. Not at first, because the visual and textural clues lead you down a different road. But eventually, buried in the pile somewhere is the taste of the liver which was always there to begin with. Good tasters would figure it out eventually, even blindfolded.

[Adam Balic]

do you really mean that the taste of pepper in the lollipop has changed because we don't immediately recognize it?

i can't believe this is happening. it's a good thing that in a moment i'll be leaving for the sweedish wilderness, with no computers or internet, 'cause this makes me slightly dizzy.

have a nice easter!

Odds bodkins, how difficult does this have to be:

It was red pepper 'flavour', but Plotnicki only being an Ubertaster wannabe, didn't recognise it upon 'tasting' it. One presumes that Steve has tasted red peppers many times (maybe even as chile sauce which is sweet and red pepper tasting), but he didn't recognise it this time, until he 'knew' what it was.

Two explanations: Steve is a cretin of the first water or it didn't taste like red pepper to him, although he knows what red pepper tastes like, due to mis-read visual clues.

[oraklet]

hehe, here we go again:

balic, what plotz missed was the feeling and sound of eating red pepper. the taste was there, but not the texture, so it was not immediately recognizable. with a chili dish, everybody knows there may be red pepper in it. makes it a bit easier.

if you so wish we can say that's part of presentation, though i doubt that was what was meant by "presentation" in the first place. "preparation", perhaps? still, i think you'll agree that you have been forced to point to rather extreme examples to prove that even super gourmets may be fallible - and neither plotz nor i ever said they weren't. we just said that a professional is trained to shut out most exterior stimuli and concentrate on the taste(/texture). unlike ordinary diners, whose enjoyment of a meal will be more of a homogeneous mixture of environment, presentation, expectations and taste. we further said that this shows that presentation does not change the taste but it sure changes most people's focus .

it would have be an interesting experiment to serve the lollipops to a number of great chefs like gray kunz or alice waters, asking them what it contained. personally i don't think they would have been "fooled". do you?

[Stone]

I'm not sure where this came up, but I was speaking with a food person recently (she helps develop new products for restaurants, etc.). She said that market research has confirmed that people will rate better "looking" food as tasting better. One simple example she gave was coffee. People were asked to rate two cups of the same coffee -- the only difference was that one had a few drops of flavorless caramel color added to make it darker. Almost everyone rated the darker coffee as tasting better -- richer, more robust, blah blah blah. But if the lights were off, the two cups would have tasted exactly the same.