91–100 of 155 posts
Of course I don't live in Japan, or for that matter where I have access to that sort of steady flowing clean water. But still...
After many years of peak wasabi use (i.e. highest saturation possible) at Japanese restaurants in the US, I had a chance to eat sushi while on a trip to Shanghai. I don't know if Chinese wasabi is more real or not, but quickly learned it had at least 10x more sinus-cleaning power than US wasabi. That was also the first place where I had 'not possible to be any fresher' sushi - orders were placed at the fish tanks on…
So is most truffle oil. Canned reindeer meat in the Nordic countries can be up to 40% pork. Budget-brand soy sauce might actually be "soy sauce powder" mixed with water, as opposed to something straightforwardly brewed. If you travel the developing world, you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it. Lots and lots of disappointments out there in the food world. I find reading labels careful…
> you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it
In the western world, most people seem to want little to no cacao but sugar instead.
So is most truffle oil. Canned reindeer meat in the Nordic countries can be up to 40% pork. Budget-brand soy sauce might actually be "soy sauce powder" mixed with water, as opposed to something straightforwardly brewed. If you travel the developing world, you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it. Lots and lots of disappointments out there in the food world. I find reading labels careful…
The store brand soy sauce here has 12% soy sauce and 7.1% soy sauce powder. I've been wondering if this is actually 12% soy sauce as the product is quite cheap. > you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it In the western world, most people seem to want little to no cacao but sugar instead.
Nah really just the US has the giant value bags of Hershey's product with almost no cacao solids. The commonwealth western nations are still sweet but have higher minimums.
Don't believe me? A good benchmark is kitkat bars. Try the regular from US, Canada, England, and Japan. Only the US one tastes overwhelmingly of sugar and not chocolate. Japan's chocolate is far less sweet but they don't seem to emphasize solids as much as UK does.
In high-end Japanese restaurants, you can often get real wasabi (it'll be listed at the bottom of the menu). My experience with it has been that it's usually coarser, more watery, and less pungent than the "standard" wasabi. I do not prefer it; whatever combination of horseradish and mustard restaurants default to is, I think, the better product. If I was eating wasabi on its own and trying to, I don't know, apprecia…
Live in Tokyo and couldn't agree more. I've been to Mt. Mitake a few times, where wasabi makes up a nice portion of the economy. Towards the top of the mountain, you can literally smell the wasabi in the air. It's kind of the locals' gimmick as well to put wasabi in everything -- pretty sure I saw wasabi ice-cream. The fresh "real" stuff is quite earthy, and frankly, I find unpleasant in any significant quantity. I b…
And you didn't eat it?!
So is most truffle oil. Canned reindeer meat in the Nordic countries can be up to 40% pork. Budget-brand soy sauce might actually be "soy sauce powder" mixed with water, as opposed to something straightforwardly brewed. If you travel the developing world, you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it. Lots and lots of disappointments out there in the food world. I find reading labels careful…
I few years ago I was was reading the back of a can of New York style hotdogs and realised the main ingredient was chicken. By a substantial margin too. Ever since then I’ve been sceptical about the contents of products I buy.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The store brand soy sauce here has 12% soy sauce and 7.1% soy sauce powder. I've been wondering if this is actually 12% soy sauce as the product is quite cheap. > you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it In the western world, most people seem to want little to no cacao but sugar instead.
>In the western world Nah really just the US has the giant value bags of Hershey's product with almost no cacao solids. The commonwealth western nations are still sweet but have higher minimums. Don't believe me? A good benchmark is kitkat bars. Try the regular from US, Canada, England, and Japan. Only the US one tastes overwhelmingly of sugar and not chocolate. Japan's chocolate is far less sweet but they don't seem…
Given that sugar is addictive and most producers seem to have the attitude that the more sugar you sneak into the product, the cheaper it is and the more it sells, maybe Nestle (Kitkat's producer, right?) tests for regional tolerance and puts in the maximum amount of sugar, where the person still doesn't feel an overwhelming sugar shock when tasting? Just speculation, but it's a possibility I'd investigate if I were an evil food industry mogul.
So is most truffle oil. Canned reindeer meat in the Nordic countries can be up to 40% pork. Budget-brand soy sauce might actually be "soy sauce powder" mixed with water, as opposed to something straightforwardly brewed. If you travel the developing world, you may find that what is sold as chocolate actually has no cacao in it. Lots and lots of disappointments out there in the food world. I find reading labels careful…
On the other hand the frozen sliced reindeer meat is 100% reindeer. The canned stuff is meatballs, which is difficult to make from reindeer or moose -- the meat contains no fat whatsoever. Thus the pork mix.
As for wasabi, what my wife says (she's Japanese) is that wasabi isn't there for its own flavor - its only job is to enhance the flavor of the food it is served with (she talks a lot about tasting the nuances, which is what Japanese food is about - it's not about taste explosions like in so many other cultures). So if you use so much wasabi ('fake' or not) that it only functions to open up your sinuses you're doing it wrong. Same with soy sauce and the like - it's not something you add just to make whatever you're eating taste like soy sauce. And she's horrified when she sees people around here (we're not in Japan) dip vegetable tempura into soy sauce. It destroyes the taste. You're supposed to only add a little salt, the same as a little salt enhances the flavor of eggs. (Add too much though and you only taste salt).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
All because everyone wants champagne taste on a beer budget. It reminds me of a Frank Lloyd Wright quote when someone asked for a $5k house and he says “Are you sure you want a $5,000 house? Most people want a $10,000 house for $5,000.” They could just pitch these as cheaper substitutions and it wouldn’t be so annoying.
You could say the same thing about vanilla, for which Cooks Illustrated was infamously not able to triangle-test a meaningful preference between artificial and real in a baked goods panel (IIRC, the Milk Bar cookbook went a step further and specified recipes that only worked with artificial vanilla). Sometimes, the artificial ("beer-grade") version is a legit advance. A big problem with truffle oil is that it's too e…
It's a well known fact of cooking, natural vanilla denatures above a rather low temperature (around 50°C or so, if I recall correctly) but artificial vanilla doesn't.
So if you're using vanilla in... crème anglaise (apparently that's the English name for it?) you should use artificial vanilla or pay much attention to adding the vanilla only after it has cooled down enough, but if you're doing ice cream then natural vanilla is a good choice.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I few years ago I was was reading the back of a can of New York style hotdogs and realised the main ingredient was chicken. By a substantial margin too. Ever since then I’ve been sceptical about the contents of products I buy.
Are you in Europe? I notice the things they call "hot dogs" there are almost always canned, which is exceedingly odd coming from an American perspective, where the concept of a canned hot dog basically does not exist.