A Deconstructed Dinner on the Brain
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Not many place settings include a nose clip for each dinner guest. But olfactory deprivation — the inability to smell — is at the core of “How and Why Things Taste the Way They Do,” a special dinner, taking place next week, that is designed to showcase why particular foods taste and smell the way they do.
A Columbia professor of neurobiology, Stuart Firestein, and a Cornell professor of biochemistry, Terry Acree, have used food and drink demonstrations as part of their classroom lectures for years. They’re hosting the dinner at PicNic Market & Café next Monday in an effort to formalize the fun their students have had in learning about how the brain perceives flavor. The professors will give a short presentation during cocktails, and plan to walk around and chat with guests about what they’re tasting and why during the multi-course dinner.
The sense of smell is vital to the ability to taste. One of the courses will pair a fruity sauvignon blanc with a salad that includes bell peppers. “We’ll show how aroma chemistry works: You adapt to hints of bell pepper in the wine by eating bell peppers,” Mr. Acree said during a recent meeting to plan the menu. “So the next sip of wine will release completely new odors, like passion fruit, even though you think you’re going to smell bell peppers.”
Texture is a big aspect of flavor, too. According to Mr. Firestein, a person’s palate equates the creaminess of a food with the distribution of the sizes of the particles composing it. They plan to serve two versions of the same parsnip soup: PicNic’s chef, Jean-Luc Kieffer, will emulsify one version and leave the other chunky. Most guests will erroneously think the chef added cream to the emulsified version, Mr. Firestein said.
One of the most significant developments in Western food science has been the acceptance of umami — Japanese for “good flavor” — as a fifth flavor (scientists traditionally believed sweetness, sourness, saltiness, and bitterness were the only flavors the palate could detect). The professors urged Chef Kieffer to choose a cut of steak or a pork chop to demonstrate the sort of meaty flavor associated with umami.
jakasie@nysun.com
February 25, 7 p.m., PicNic Market & Café, 2665 Broadway, between 101st and 102nd streets, 212-222-8222, $95.
