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The Dorito Effect

nytimes.com

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Re: The Dorito Effect

#51

Post by L_Rahman »

rayiner wrote: post #3

In Bangladesh, we had scrawny little chickens that you'd buy live at the market. When we moved to the U.S. I couldn't eat chicken for 6-9 months because it just tasted so bland and flavorless.

You just brought back memories of getting home from school and slamming a plate of "deshi murgi bhuna" and rice.

I always found it interesting that the scrawny and flavorful chickens co-existed with the bland and plump ones. Haven't been back in a few years, so I wonder if this is still the case or if the "farm murgi" has taken over domestic consumption.

Re: The Dorito Effect

#52

Post by L_Rahman »

m_mueller wrote: post #40
comrade1 wrote: post #13

I had to spend a good amount of mental effort trying to explain to my German teacher, in German, why American pork tastes so bad (or, rather, has no flavor). When I said, 'Schwein, das andere weisse Fleisch, wie poulet' (I'm in Switzerland), she figured it out immediately and was as disturbed as anyone should be.

Wait, is pork really considered white meat in the US? I've never seen white pork, but then again I think I never consciously ate pork in the US - all I know is that ham is absolutely terrible for my taste - but I think I've never had good ham outside German/Italian/Spanish- speaking countries. I'm Swiss btw.

Yes. The typical pork chop in the United States contains so little fat that it is closer to a chicken breast than a fatty cut of beef.

Re: The Dorito Effect

#53

Post by arturnt »

rsync wrote: post #49
wdewind wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly I greatly prefer corn fed beef to grass fed regardless of economics. Grass fed is nice once in a while, but I think the best is grass fed, corn finished. It gives the meat a much fattier taste, and I've found also gives you a much nicer maillard crust.

Where and how are you eating that you are able to sample and differentiate: - corn fed - grass fed - grass fed, corn finished - other permutations ? Genuinely interested ... I mean, I know where I can go to get either corn or grass fed, but I wouldn't assume that other variables are controlled for. And then the grass fed, corn finished ... no idea who I would submit that request to ...

They sell these varieties all at Whole Foods. Usually Grass Fes and Corn Fed at the butcher section and Grass Fed Corn Finished pre-packed on the side.

Re: The Dorito Effect

#54

Post by YZF »

nether wrote: post #42
rayiner wrote: post #3

In Bangladesh, we had scrawny little chickens that you'd buy live at the market. When we moved to the U.S. I couldn't eat chicken for 6-9 months because it just tasted so bland and flavorless.

Back home in South Carolina, we had apple trees in our front yard. Never used any pesticides or anything, just let them grow. Anyway, they were about half the size of grocery apples, almost completely covered in insect bites, and tasted like ass. Incredibly sour, strangely dry, and very little sweetness. So thank god for pesticides and Fuji apples.

I live in BC, Canada, and here you can find apples, a large variety of berries, pears, plumbs... All growing in random open areas and all delicious and relatively pest free without any pesticides. Even though a lot of those aren't native they seem to do pretty well. Perhaps the fact they're not grown commercially in this area helps... I grew up in Israel where pests were definitely more of a problem but you could still grow many different fruits without using pesticides and I used to pick many fruit off trees for eating... (Mangoes, oranges, and many more). Some of those "large" grocery apples have no taste and a floury texture though we do get some local apples in season here that are good...

Monocultures is a big problem. If you have a good mix you're less likely to have serious issues. It can still happen but less likely. You also need to take care of your trees, prune them, water them etc. if you want to get good fruit... Just let them grow doesn't always work...

Re: The Dorito Effect

#55

Post by igonvalue »

> According to a gruesome statistic from a 2013 article in Poultry Science, if humans grew as quickly as the Chicken of Today, “a three-kilogram (6.6-pound) newborn baby would weigh 300 kilograms (660 pounds) after two months.”

How is this an appropriate comparison? A quick google search attests that birds grow faster than mammals, and that humans grow especially slowly; I'm sure you could conjure up a similarly "gruesome" statistic with any wild bird.

Re: The Dorito Effect

#56

Post by m_mueller »

L_Rahman wrote: post #52
m_mueller wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, is pork really considered white meat in the US? I've never seen white pork, but then again I think I never consciously ate pork in the US - all I know is that ham is absolutely terrible for my taste - but I think I've never had good ham outside German/Italian/Spanish- speaking countries. I'm Swiss btw.

Yes. The typical pork chop in the United States contains so little fat that it is closer to a chicken breast than a fatty cut of beef.

Ok, so the fat determines the way people think about it, but the meat's color is still red, right? If it were white I'd make a big circle around it since I'd assume it's spoiled.

Re: The Dorito Effect

#57

Post by carlob »

m_mueller wrote: post #40
comrade1 wrote: post #13

I had to spend a good amount of mental effort trying to explain to my German teacher, in German, why American pork tastes so bad (or, rather, has no flavor). When I said, 'Schwein, das andere weisse Fleisch, wie poulet' (I'm in Switzerland), she figured it out immediately and was as disturbed as anyone should be.

Wait, is pork really considered white meat in the US? I've never seen white pork, but then again I think I never consciously ate pork in the US - all I know is that ham is absolutely terrible for my taste - but I think I've never had good ham outside German/Italian/Spanish- speaking countries. I'm Swiss btw.

I don't know about the US, but I've always thought that, just like chicken pork has both white and red meat. You can sometimes see it when you slice a pork loin [1].

[1] http://www.donaldrussell.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/i...

Re: The Dorito Effect

#58

Post by marbiru »

dantheman wrote: post #10
speeder wrote: post #2

I am from Brazil, here our economy depends greatly on commodity exports (meat, soybeans, iron, coal, and whatnot). Producers of commodities, tend to export the best stuff, and sell the crap internally... It has an interesting result: the flavour (or quality, for non-edible products) of some stuff, is drastically different, for example two famous cases is chicken, and oranges, it happened once to each industry to be u…

Since it costs the same to ship a mediocre product as the best products, it makes sense to ship the nicest stuff since a premium can be charged for it.

Yes! There's actually a name for exactly this effect in economics, if anyone's interested: The Alchian Allen Theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchian%E2%80%93Allen_effect

Re: The Dorito Effect

#59

Post by iolothebard »

beloch wrote: post #27

A significant portion of the blandness of some supermarket foods is the result of processing, with "pro-juiciness" treatments being some of the worst offenders. Chicken (even whole chickens for roasting) are injected with water, oil, and water-binding compounds to plump them up. The water mostly evaporates during cooking so the result is usually blander rather than juicier. Most hams sold today are cured by injecting…

Chicken is injected with water combos not simply to plump them up, it's called a brine.

By all means buy your poultry without being brined, I prefer mine with it.

Here's a nice "why" people do this:

http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/cooking-tips-techniqu...

Re: The Dorito Effect

#60

Post by NoGravitas »

nether wrote: post #42
rayiner wrote: post #3

In Bangladesh, we had scrawny little chickens that you'd buy live at the market. When we moved to the U.S. I couldn't eat chicken for 6-9 months because it just tasted so bland and flavorless.

Back home in South Carolina, we had apple trees in our front yard. Never used any pesticides or anything, just let them grow. Anyway, they were about half the size of grocery apples, almost completely covered in insect bites, and tasted like ass. Incredibly sour, strangely dry, and very little sweetness. So thank god for pesticides and Fuji apples.

South Carolina is kind of outside the range of apple cultivation unless you plant a specialized heat-tolerant variety. We have apple trees in the back yard, which we grow without pesticides or fertilizer, and the results are "okay". Small, but tasty, not a whole lot of production. You're better off growing peaches here. We stock up on apples whenever we drive through the mountains of North Carolina, which are just right for apples.
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