Notes on Flavour and Taste

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Flavour and Taste

We all eat and drink several times a day but few of us really take the time to fully enjoy the experience, but with a little bit of effort we can all begin to notice more and enjoy more of the flavours, tastes and textures that we experience from our food. The most dramatic way to demonstrate this is to start by learning how much impact on our perception of food is from our olfactory glands in the nose. Take a small piece of some very tasty food, fresh garlic, strong cheese, fresh coriander or whatever you have, hold your nose, put the food on your tongue, roll it around your mouth and chew a little. All you can detect are the base tastes allowed to the tongue and these are sweet, sour, salt, bitter and savoury (umami) let go of your nose and the difference really strikes you as the full flavour you had expected suddenly hits you. This is a great experiment to try with kids and helps them appreciate food a little more.

Now you will have a strong understanding of the difference between "taste" and "aroma", I tend to use the word flavour when I mean aroma but I think that the true use of the word "flavour" is to reflect taste, aroma, texture and sensation when eating or drinking.

Taste is the 5 bases, these most strongly affect our appreciation of a dish. The most aromatic dish in the world without 1 or 2 of the base tastes will be completely bland, try eating some ground coriander seeds on their own. Add some aroma to the taste base and you effectively enhance the experience by several magnitudes. The texture of the food will also add or detract to the experience, a nice crispy coating followed by a melt in the mouth middle is a great experience. By contrast I was once having a business dinner in Japan, a small dish of what looked like cold noodles was served, as I bit in expecting a soft mush I was horrified to get a hard chewy crunch, what I then had to finish ( to save face ) was some sort of bland unidentified animal product, later they told me it was Jellyfish tentacles. The point is that the texture and expectation of texture are significant. Finally I use the word sensation to round out the whole "Flavour" meaning and possibly the best two examples I can give are Chilli and Cheese. Chilli burn is neither taste, aroma nor texture it is just a sensation in the mouth, it has two major effects, first the release of endorphins makes us feel high, second the tongue is set on edge and taste receptors become more active (if you have never managed to handle the burn then this may not be obvious to you). Cheese can also sets the mouth on edge including the roof of the mouth.

If you can learn to identify the tastes, aromas, textures and sensations of the food you are eating you will usually enjoy it all the more. It will certainly help you recreate a favourite restaurant dish at home. Makes notes as you eat the dish, what aromatics do you detect, what tastes etc. Do the same when you have recreated your interpretation of the dish, this will help you identify what the differences are.

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