In Search of Umami
Sunday October 11, 2009
Today I went in search of that elusive fifth taste 'umami'.
I attended a presentation by Kumiko Ninomiya of Japan's Umami Information Center, chef and author David Thompson and chef Alexandre Bourdas. The presentation was part of the Sydney International Food Festival. Their goal was to try to demystify this obscure culinary concept.
There are five basic tastes which humans can sense when eating food: sweet, sour, salty, bitter and umami. The first four are easy. Umami is harder to pin down.
Even though umami is a relatively new concept in western cuisine, it is vital to our sense of taste. Describing a taste is difficult, but Ninomiya, Thompson and Bourdas were up for the challenge.
Photo: © S. Wongkaew (2009) licensed to About.com, Inc
Comments
Syrie: I, too, am fascinated by the concept of umami (plus, it’s such a greatly fun word to say!!!). Lots of umami flavors are pinned down to that heavy salt-like savoriness of milk and meat products. If you learned anything about vegan umami foods, please share!!
very interesting read.