People should do more thinking with their taste buds and less with what they hear. If they enjoy this truffle oil made from gasoline, why not eat it. Otherwise leave it be.
This morning I had an expensive artisan craft coffee. I've never been able to taste the difference, so I'm not going to act like it was something extraordinary. Atmosphere was nice though.
It reminds me that in the USA there are rules for what constitutes a bourbon whiskey. You can make and enjoy other types of whiskey, just don't call them Bourbon.
There's also Jack Daniel's, from what I remember they actually pass the requirements to be a Bourbon, but the company chooses not to label it that way. That's also fine!
What wouldn't be fine is a whiskey calling itself rum or vodka, because when I buy one I don't expect to get the other.
> First people should not be lied to by restaurants and the food industry, and prices should not be jacked up selling crap as premium...
I would caveat that with: First people should ALL work in the hospitality and service Industry.
You will be shocked if you think this is the most egregious thing you will find in the culinary Industry.
Honestly, after what the Industry like since COVID, I hope it collapses and people just start to eat healthier at home, in the US the Industry has been consolidated by Corpos who could get millions in PPP and didn't have to pay it back and low interest rates to win a battle of attrition against the smaller spots who relied on word to muth and higher QC/QA to justify those high prices that the public feel entitled to complain about despite not knowing the mechanics of getting a kitchen to function let alone turn a profit.
It's sad... I really thought prior to COVID we were making serious inroads in educating the American population to something that most in Asia and Europe is pretty normalized: food culture.
As a cook that has worked in and ran kitchens in both Europe and N. America the fact that most people think that what is in those atrocious bottles (truffle oil) resembles anything like a black truffle underscores what I mean.
Most people in the US freak out when they see a vein in their shrimp let alone a head, whereas when you're in Spain the best part of a tapas bar is when the numbers are thin and the patrons still drinking get the good stuff like 'gambas' and you can suck the heads after having been served countless olives, patatas bravas or various bread with stuff plates with your drinks.
Personally speaking, I don't really think black truffles are that great and I've worked with quite a lot of them over the years, it mainly benefits a lot from it's marketing more than it's actual flavour.
The perfume it gives does enhance a dish, which makes it good to garnish as a table service option, but the taste is rather unremarkable to me, at best it's like having good biodynamicly grown garlic. White truffles are far more aromatic, and just keeping them in rice is enough to brighten up a rissoto, but also suffers from the 'too Earthy' category for most people's palettes unless they are trying to impress people who gravitate towards high end ingredients or are actually coming for that as the highlight of their meals while it's in season, which is an incredibly small percentage of patrons.
But this is something that's really difficult to regulate. A good example is that wine brewed from natural yeasts that smells like horseshit. It was branded as "barnyard".
> But this is something that's really difficult to regulate. A good example is that wine brewed from natural yeasts that smells like horseshit. It was branded as "barnyard".
"Selling crap as premium" is hard to regulate. Yes, you can put laws in place to say what is allowed to be called truffles etc., but it will be hard to stop people from selling what is technically a truffle as a premium truffle. I.e., selling crap as premium.
The issue here isn't whether a wine company can creatively brand smelly wine as "barnyard". Before we even deal with the question of how do we grade products, we first have to ask whether companies should be able to simply lie to customers about whether listed ingredients are even present.
That is definitely true, I got a bit side tracked there to be honest. However, those laws already exist in the EU, so the article could probably be summarized as "truffles should be protected".
There's also the funny angle that some real "premium" stuff is actually awful crap, or at least an utterly crappy experience.
Years ago, I bought some very pungent blue cheese, must have been either from SW France or NE Spain. Definitely not a household name, and priced quite high. One of the worst eating experiences I can remember. The flavour was so strong a small crumb was enough to burn your tastebuds. Almost painful to eat, and we had to toss the thing out.
It smelled really good, though. I learned my lesson. These days I refuse to buy any unfamiliar cheese I can't sample in the shop first.
The wine industry is pretty well regulated in the EU. In my country wine was generally a hit and miss before we got into the EU. Now, almost everything bottled over 5€ is okay and also cheaper wine sold in bulk. This year we've bought some excellent white wine by the bulk directly from the producer and it was cheaper than gasoline. I mostly buy local bottled wine rather than imported table wine sold as premium. Why? Because I know most of the big producers and also some of the smaller ones.
If we go to another country with good wines, we ask the waiter and it works out better than looking at the wine menu and making assumptions. One waiter in Sicily even suggested that he chose the wine for us and we were very satisfied with his choice after we also tried to get the same wine ourselves and ordered something different.
Also, Moldova used to export crappy sweet wine before their agricultural products were banned in Russia. Now it exports mainly into the EU and they have some good quality wines if you skip the ones made from hybrid grape varieties, which I wonder why I've even found on the EU market. Must be the new 2021 regulation allowing hybrid varieties in wines with protected denominations of origin. Apart from the usual varieties, they also produce wines with a Georgian variety called Saperavi, which I like quite a lot and also a local older variety called Rara Neagra which is popular but I don't like because it's acidic, however it can be sucessfully used in blends where one needs more acidity.
That is due to a species of yeast called Brettanomyces, usually shortened to brett. Judicious use of brett can impart smoky or leathery characteristics - lumped together politely as "barnyard" or "horse blanket" notes in beer or wine.
> If they enjoy this truffle oil made from gasoline, why not eat it
The article does say that, but makes the (valid) point that it's not okay to sell it pretending that it's "the real stuff" with a corresponding price tag.
What I'm curious about is that the author seems to suggest these artificial flavouring are unhealthy ("causing long-term damage to [...] your stomach and palate") but doesn't say why.
They analyze the real thing for what makes it smell or taste like it does. Then they take one or a few major molecules that make up the taste and that are easy to derive cheaply from something else and use it for flavoring stuff. The real thing probably had a hundred different things make up its smell and taste.
Bonus points if it can be derived from something that allows them to label it as "natural". Lots of natural flavor is produced by molds/funghi actually that have been modified to produce the molecules needed. Example: https://cen.acs.org/food/food-science/Edible-fungus-yields-n...
Case in point I just recently read here on HN I believe that banana flavored stuff still tastes like the old bananas that we can no longer buy because that variety is no longer possible to grow. The molecules they extracted from that aren't in the bananas variety we can currently buy.
Anecdote: we did this in our high school chemistry class w/ pineapple flavour, i.e. we created artificial pineapple flavouring right there in class. It was very strong and not as complex as a real pineapple, but identifiable.
> like the old bananas that we can no longer buy because that variety is no longer possible to grow.
that would be the Gros Michel. It is a common misconception that it no longer exists, but you can you actually still buy it (and grow it), you will find many results in google. It's just been replaced in the mass market.
It’s on my list to try one day, and see if it’s as good as the hype.
It’s one of my life’s entertaining side-missions to try as many types as possible, ever since I found out that “the (cavendish) banana” is not the end of the story.
I’ve ticked off Cavendish (of course), dwarf cavendish, lady finger, apple banana, Pisang Awak, red Dacca, Fe’i and various plantains so far. Many more to go!
TLDR: it was made economically unsustainable to grow because of something called Panama Disease, which Gros Michel is susceptible to, where modern bananas are not
The chemical used for artificial vanilla is found in real vanilla, but the artificial and real vanilla are rather different from each other. I can roll with either, but if I'm paying real vanilla prices for vanillin, I've been ripped off.
If you ask for a glass of water and a waiter gives you a glass of urine, do you smile and drink it because urine also has H2O in it and therefore has the same chemical found in water?
Truffle oil is kinda like that artificial grape flavor. It's clearly not the real thing if you've tasted both. But if you're honest, that fake grape in a Fanta or whatever is tasty in its own way.
Similarly there's a burger joint near me that does truffle oil fries with the synthetic flavor. They aren't priced like it's some luxury thing either, they're just the standard fries at the price you'd expect. They're tasty. I don't see the point of being all huffy about it.
Yeah artificial banana is actually pretty good. I do like bananas and the synthetic stuff is nothing like the real thing.
I do like to think that sim-flavors will eventually get their own seat at the taste at the table but there is still correlation between interest in the prototype taste and the sims.
However I do like organic raspberry for example, synth raspberry is meh.
It think the difference lies in valuing the process or the result.
Personally I think like you, if the product tastes good and the atmosphere is fine for the advertised price I'm 100% satisfied.
If the restaurant manages to achieve that with cheaper ingredients (while maintaining hygiene and not outright lying) I consider that a good business practice.
But what is constitutes outright lying? Some would assume that the word "truffles" on its own means the genuine article. Others would say they are telling the truth if they state that it is not the real thing in the small print. It wouldn't surprise me if someone tried to trademark Real Truffles for their substitute. All would claim that they are telling the truth, never mind deny they are not outright lying. Technically, they are correct.
Deception is not a good business practice, even in the slightest. It is the sign of someone who is solely interested in short term gain, rather than establishing a lasting institution.
Exactly. I like artificial truffle flavor and use it sometimes in my cooking. No way would I pay for truffles. There's no gas-like aroma and I don't know what the author is going on about in that regard. I've had a meal with real truffle once and I must say that the artificial flavor does a pretty good job.
Restaurants being dishonest are maybe problem for honest ones next-door, but if the customer is happy I see no harm done.
Truffle fries don't contain truffles. French fries don't come from france. I don't think the restaurant is to blame for our language. You want every restaurant to start calling them immitation truffle fries?
Yeah. I deliberately buy imitation truffle oil made from mixing whatever-pentane into cheap refined olive oil with full knowledge that it's fake. I also buy fake saffron, fake maple syrup, and fake vanilla essence.
With all these foods the real thing is better, but the substitute is also fine.
I don't know if aunt jemima and similar brands of syrup count as "fake Maple syrup". It doesn't say maple syrup on the bottle anymore. They usually say "maple-flavored syrup" at worst, or just "syrup". It's not maple syrup, but it's not labeled as maple syrup and not advertised as maple syrup.
Imitation vanilla is labeled imitation vanilla. Not a secret that it's not made from actual vanilla.
I'm surprised honey hasn't come up here more. The majority of honey in the US contains very little actual honey, but the ingredients list just says "pure filtered honey". If you've ever had real honey, it's night and day. If you want a cheaper honey substitute, that's fine. If a company is labeling a cheaper honey substitute as "pure filtered honey", that's not fine.
I get honey from jars at the grocery store and, every once in awhile, from a local farm who supplies my local butcher shop (because I'm lazy, at the butcher, and realize I'm out of honey). The local farm honey is definitely real honey (the butcher shop people have been to the farm). Apart from the floral quality of the farm honey, I've never noticed a difference from the orange or blossom honey I get at the supermarket. I don't think most supermarket honey is fake. Maybe the bear honey is?
If it says honey on the jar and there is no ingredients list or the ingredients list says it’s honey, then it is honey (unless the producer is just absolutely breaking the label laws).
That said, you should be able to _easily_ distinguish different varieties of honey or even different sources of honey by tasting it. If you can’t then it’s likely a big commodity blend.
Go do a blind from a producer that lists the hive locations for the honey. It’s probably the product that has the most obvious “terroir” effect that I know of. I can tell the difference between honey from hives that are less than 2 miles apart (Woodlawn vs Englewood in Chicago).
A lot of honey is imported from places where it has been mixed with other sugars or adulterated in other ways. The bottlers either don't know or don't care because the price is lower and the profit margin is higher.
The labeling laws are being broken by a number of big producers. The adulterated honey is generally safe, but is not pure honey.
Fake saffron is the only thing I’ll disagree with here. It’s nothing like the real thing, and since most of the coloring in fake saffron comes from turmeric anyway, might as well use turmeric (and maybe something floral like rose water) as a substitute when you don’t want to splurge for the real thing.
Sadly, I've met people that actually enjoy fake maple syrup more than the real stuff. To the point of actually disliking real maple syrup because "it doesn't taste like the thing" that they'd been eating since childhood.
Great point. It still makes me sad because I've unscientifically concluded that maple flavored corn syrup is unequivocally much worse for your health, on the basis that I want to justify still eating maple syrup and choose to believe that it's actually not the worst thing I could be eating, so it's ok to have it. This same unfounded belief has helped me curb my sweet tooth, as I no longer order pancakes or french toast, anytime I eat out, working at a fancier restaurant showed me that they all mostly use the exact same several gallon jugs of maple flavored syrup.
That's not the point. The point is that calling it truffle oil is intentionally deceptive. Call the fake truffle oil something else, then see how many people still want to buy it.
I love coffee, and most of the time I go to specialty coffee shops just because they know the basics of making coffee: not heat up the milk more than necessary, and the coffee beans shouldn't be burned too much (which is necessary for the worst part of the coffee beans).
Sadly most of the coffee shops don't even try to achieve these two things.
That doesn't work, it's called fraud and can be dangerous in some cases... For example, restaurants do that a lot with fish too and sometimes they serve you an alternative that is much more likely to contain heavy metals.
Even in grocery stores you can't be sure what kind of fish you buy.
It’s nice to be able to attribute noticeable differences to a reason so you can learn. Maybe you don’t notice much difference with coffee (I’m with you there as long as it’s well extracted), but if you’ve been to a nice restaurant and notice the Caesar salad tastes better than at Olive Garden despite having the same ingredients listed on the menu, it’s helpful to understand that the kitchen sources the ingredients daily from a local farm.
This morning I had an expensive artisan craft coffee. I've never been able to taste the difference, so I'm not going to act like it was something extraordinary. Atmosphere was nice though.