Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with tasting

Why is the chef picking up my steak with his bare hands?

teg4rvn — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 11:40:17 -0800

What's an acceptable level of prodding and poking (with one's bare hands) and tasting by a chef? My wife and I recently went to a popular restaurant in a major city where they had seating at a counter overlooking their open kitchen. We thought it would be fun to have dinner and at the same time watch them prepare dishes.

What we observed, however, was the main chef presumably going over the line into ickiness. Examples:

1) Testing the doneness of pork chops by picking them up between his bare fingers and squeezing. When he wasn't doing this he was simply prodding them with his bare fingers while on the skillet.

2) Sauteing potato chunks in a pan and grabbing one with his bare hands to taste. Apparently, they need more seasoning, cuz he then threw in some spices.

3) Using the white cloth he had tucked into his apron to clean of a plated dish prior to serving (to get off stray sauce marks). Problem was he was also wiping down his work surface with the same cloth.

4) Placing a meat thermometer like device into a steak (it was extremely thin and didn't seem to have anything more than a thin handle) and then withdrawing it and placing directly up to his nostrils. After doing that he'd return the device to a bowl with multiple spoons and then he use the same device on the next steak. Frankly, I couldn't see if he was putting this thing up to his nose or in his mouth.

These are just a few of the examples. Paradoxically, being in an "open kitchen" I assumed that things like this would not be seen, but it was that paradox that led us to believe that maybe this was standard chef-ing.

This was no greasy spoon. This restaurant was featured on Iron Chef America within the past month. The owner was a contestant on the show.

Culinary folk...what did we see? a usual day at the office? or a gross violation of public health laws?

What's your favorite Sonoma winery?

mostlymartha — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 15:38:48 -0800

What extra special wineries has this Sonoma Valley regular missed? Since we live about 40 minutes away, we go wine tasting in Sonoma quite frequently. We have probably four very regular wineries and another half dozen semi-regulars. We love these places (Mayo are practically family) but have started to wonder what jewels we've been neglecting.

A partial list of places we've been more than once: Mayo, Gloria Ferrar, Roshambo, Schug, Ravenswood, St. Jean, Wellington, Eric Ross, B.R. Cohn, Cline.

Of course, there are practically a bajillion other wineries in the area. What are the best places (big or small) we've missed? We particularly value attentive, fun, and knowledgeable staff in tasting rooms. We don't particularly care about tours and hate it when we get the perfunctory in and out with a sales pitch wine country tourist experience.

Also, although we go tasting in Napa, Healdsburg, etc. as well, I'm mostly interested in Sonoma and Glen Ellen simply because that's where we go the most.

Wine Tasting Journals, tips needed, please.

ElfWord — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 09:46:10 -0800

Does anyone have any recommendations for wine tasting journals? Hey everyone, I turned 21 recently and plan to start figuring out my wine tastes, along with my girlfriend. I'd like to use some wine tasting journals to help me out with this by giving me a place to write what I've tried, where I bought it, what my impressions were, etc. I want to use two separate journals for my girlfriend and I so we can both try a wine and honestly write our first impressions without being influenced by each other's.

Does anyone have any recommendations for wine tasting journals? Either specific journals I could order online(or buy in Boston), or general tips on how I should go about organizing a wine tasting journal? I've seen a previous question on AskMe regarding wine tasting journals, but it mainly revolved around label peeling, which I'm less interested in. I'm aware of Cork'd and other wine sites, but I'd like to have a physical journal for this, and my girlfriend is more receptive to participating that way as well.

Thanks in advance for any help!

They taste like BURNING

mezzanayne — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 21:18:29 -0800

How does one taste really hot peppers? This year I planted a few different pepper plants and now they're yielding well and it's time to start cooking with them. But as I'm unfamiliar with the pepper types (I kind of played the pepper lottery at my local nursery after prime planting season), I have no idea how to cook with them.

The only information that I have about the peppers are via the little plastic flags that came in the plants and they're not very helpful (ie, "celebration pepper", "super chili", etc). All of the peppers that I've grown are too hot to eat on their own and I do not know how to temper the heat of them in order to get an idea as to their actual flavor.

My question in a nutshell would be: how does one actually "taste" a very hot pepper without temporarily rendering their taste buds useless? Is there a standard, neutral medium in which I might prepare them all in order to allow their flavor to be experienced without all of their heat?

In what order do I taste these sweet wines?

eggerspretty — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 18:46:47 -0800

I am planning on tasting a bunch of dessert and port wines tomorrow with a client. What order should I taste these wines in? I have never tasted this many sweet wines together, and I am at a loss. I am trying to not look too stupid in front of my area manager, who is attending the tasting, and the buyer, who only let me taste with her after working with the lower lever managers for 2.5 yrs. Here are the wines:
Dow's 20yr Tawny
Renwood Ice Zinfandel
Ferrari Carano Eldorado Noir
Osborne LBV 2000
I realize there is probably no one who had tasted all of the wines, but I would love some insight. I know the familiar rules of dry before sweet and inexpensive before expensive, but I have no clue on what to do with these wines. Thank you in advance.

Tasty Tours

Miko — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 07:19:22 -0800

Have you ever taken a culinary walking tour? Might you be willing to share highlights and details? I'm planning to develop some tasting tours for my city and would appreciate hearing about your own food tour experiences. I'd like to learn from successful tour models like Foods of New York, Boston's North End market tours, or Chicago Food Planet, but from a tour-goer's point of view. My plan is to offer 2- to 3-hour tours of a compact downtown environment, covering the culinary history of our area and featuring small tastings from six or seven businesses that represent classic regional food traditions.

I'm pretty set on the actual foods I'm going to focus on and solid on the historic information. This is a pilot for a potential side business for me. As I'm planning now for summer, I'd like to hear about your experiences on tours like this. For instance -

-What did they charge? Was it worth it?
-How was the balance between information and entertainment? Humor and history?
-If it was fun, what contributed to that feel?
-How was it organized? Reservation or drop-in? Payment method? Did you wear a special badge to show you were a paying tourgoer?
-Did the sites you visit offer free tastings or educational tidbits, or just show their wares?
-Did the tour host give you gifties like coupons or freebies at the end of the tour?
-In general, what would make such a tour fun and worthwhile for you?
-Was there anything you disliked?

Where did my tastebuds go?

schroedinger — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 06:05:26 -0800

I want to go from goat to gourmet. Having taste buds that are happy eating MREs all day long has its advantages, but it would be nice to enjoy the finer things in life. But I can't spend all my money on high-end restaurants. How do I become a pescetarian foodie on a college budget? I was raised on an All-American diet of white pasta, grocery store brand cheese, slightly overcooked vegetables, and PB&Js. This left me with an inability to tell the difference between "bland", "good", and "fantastic." Box wine and the finest merlot are all the same to me, the sushi from a five-star restaurant and the prepackaged stuff in a dining hall fridge case are virtually indistinguishable, Ghirardelli and Hershey's are twins, and I've been known to continue eating the lentil-bean monstrosities I make long after their due date because the, um, ripeness adds tang (no, really, it does!). I think PowerBars taste good. PowerBars.

I try cooking to widen my palate, but I'm terrible at it and my tastebuds are so insensitive that I can't actually taste the difference anyway.

I've heard the way to counter this is to just buy high-quality food, but I don't have the money to shop at Whole Foods every weekend. So what to do? My lack of taste is more than just embarrassing--it contributes to unhealthy eating as I can eat large quantities of the most unimaginably processed crap without compunction. What's the solution?

Winery Tours in Niagara Region of Ontario???

vidarling — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 05:00:16 -0800

Any suggestions or recommendations for Winery tasting / tours in the Niagara region of Ontario? Logistics appreciated..... Where, when, any reservations or costs involved. Is there are some that serve snacks as well? I am just trying to plan a Sunday afternoon.

Some small unique ones or even large ones would be great!

I'm not drinking any merlot!

Julnyes — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 08:41:10 -0800

Looking for New York State Wine Tasting Suggestions After having a fantastic time at a winery in Napa Valley on vacation a few weeks ago (If you are ever there - I highly suggest the Rubicon Estate Winery) Some friends and I would like a similar experience on the East Side of the Country.

We live in New York City and are looking for wineries that have tastings. We want to make a day trip of it, so I guess the closer to the city the better.

Any wineries that you loved? Any to avoid like the plague?

We don't mind paying for tastings and we would prefer something not too crowded with a knowledgable staff.

If time of year is important - we are thinking of making our first trip in late September / Early October.

Thanks.

Several softdrinks have tasted salty to me lately.

keep it tight — Fri, 07 Jan 2005 08:10:44 -0800

I have noticed that several softdrinks have tasted salty to me lately?? Anyone experienced anything like this? Maybe my tasted buds are going through a change, but I haven't noticed any difference in food tastes...