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The Maillard reaction is a chemical reaction between an amino acid and a reducing sugar, usually requiring heat. It is vitally important in the preparation or presentation of many types of food, and, like caramelization, is a form of non-enzymatic browning.
In the process, hundreds of different flavour compounds are created. These compounds, in turn, break down to form yet more new flavour compounds, and so on. Each type of food has a very distinctive set of flavour compounds that are formed during the Maillard reaction. It is these same compounds that flavour scientists have used over the years to create artificial flavours.
Food products like caramel made from milk and sugar, roasted coffee, roasted meat, maple syrup, etc., get their particular flavours from this process. It is highly sensitive to temperature and the presence of other chemicals (ingredients) and will result in the creation of different compounds (flavours) with slight variations of these parameters. The whole process is still not yet completely understood.
What does it mean for cooks and gourmet lovers?
First, the list of ingredients on a product label is not at all a guarantee of the flavours that the product contains. For example, you may find big differences in flavour between caramels even if they all contain only milk products and sugar.
Secondly, some producers, sensitive to this issue by experience or by knowledge, have tested hundreds of variations to find out the most delicious one and have created a procedure and controls to produce the same good results systematically.
That is what marks the difference between run-of-the-mill products and those produced by meticulous artisans and connoisseurs. OGourmet is doing its best to discover these outstanding products and to let you enjoy them with confidence.
Interested in producing your own Maillard reaction? This recipe is for you: Foie gras on maple tiles.
Most people know brown rice when they see it, but what about all the other grains?
It’s one thing to rattle them off, but it’s an entirely different matter to know their various nutritional profiles and how to cook them. Then there’s the confusion of defining or classifying grains, as some grains that we call grains are not.
To become an expert on grains in 5 minutes, read Official grains of Canada from The Canadian Grain Commission.
A whole-grain glossary from Carrie Floyd in Culinate.
Or Tips for Grain Products from Health Canada.
Honey has a long history as a comestible and is used in various foods and beverages as a sweetener and flavouring.It has also played a religious and symbolic role in various cultures.
Wild honey has been gathered for human consumption since the Stone Age. Cultivation of honeybees began during the Bronze Age, and the Egyptians kept beehives 5,000 years ago. In South America, the Aztecs and Mayans raised domesticated stingless bees for honey.
Honey contains less calories than sugar (64 calories against 84 for 20 g). It has the same glycemic index but it provides more antioxidants.
To learn more, read Food Facts on Honey from Foodland Ontario.
Try the Honey with Orange Flavouring from Caprices d’Angéline, Quebec.
Suckling pigs have more crackling when the head of the pig is cut immediately after being roasted. True or false?
Surprisingly it’s true, with test results published in Scientific American Magazine1. Blind tasting by 143 people confirmed that the skin of pigs with the head cut was crispier!
Why? Here is what researchers found.
“The underlying mechanism was easily discovered, as it was observed during cooking that in one pig a stream of vapour was escaping from a hole made during preparation.
Heat evaporates water from the surface of the meat during cooking, making the crust. Vapour formed inside the meat is not enough to compensate for the loss of surface water.
When the pigs are not heated any longer, the crust softens if vapour goes through. Cutting the head prevents vapour perfusion, as it escapes through the opening”2.
This is a good example of the open-minded approach needed to test such statements.
1 This, H., and N. Kurti, 1994. Physics and Chemistry in the Kitchen. Scientific American, 270, 44–50.
2 This, Hervé. 2005. Modelling dishes and exploring culinary ‘precisions’ – The two issues of molecular gastronomy. British Journal of Nutrition (2005), 93, Suppl. 1, S139–S146.
One
of the most representative yet still little-known dishes of Mexican cuisine is mole. Mole is the generic name for several sauces used in Mexican cooking, and also refers to dishes based on these sauces. The word is also widely known in the combined form guacamole (avocado sauce).
The word mole comes from the Nahuatl word molli or mulli and in its original meaning refers to any type of sauce that has been milled in a mortar.
Mole is also strongly associated with celebrations. The expression “to go to a mole”, for example, means to go to a wedding. Some mystery surrounds the creation of mole because it is the fusion of knowledge and ingredients from three continents.
By now, the original recipe has been adapted by each region of Mexico to suit its own tastes and local ingredients. Many festivals are held to promote regional versions of mole, like the Feria Nacional del Mole, held each year in October in San Pedro Atocpan.
Mole is always a complex, rich, flavourful and dense sauce, but it differs widely from one region to another. For example, the black mole, typical of the Oaxaca area in south-western Mexico, is very different from the red mole, typical of the Puebla area in central Mexico. The range of mole dishes and sauces is vast and varied.
To discover some of the best mole from Mexico, try the Cocina Mestiza mole from La Chunga, Mexico.
Read more in:
Mole in Wikipedia.
Mole Poblano: Mexico's National Food Dish in MEXonline.com.
Demystifying Mole, México's National Dish Karen Hursh Graber in Mexconnect.
Molecular gastronomy is based on the scientific observation of phenomena related to food processing. It’s not surprising that the results of these observations often transform common knowledge into kitchen myths.
Statements about food and cooking – “kitchen stories” and/or "culinary precisions" – are being collected and analyzed by scientists and are now the subject of research and compilations around the world. The INRA in France, for example, has created a culinary information bank that contains more than 25,000 entries.
To analyse, understand and test such statements, Eric Fooladi has developed a comprehensive rationale to distinguish truth from myths.
Posts on “culinary precisions” and laboratory analyses are published regularly on this blog. The results are often amazing!
Read more in:
Kitchen Myths, a website on kitchen myths by Peter Aitken.
Kitchen Myths, a Discovery Channel website on kitchen myths.
The word biscuit applies to two distinctly different products in American and British English.
In British English it relates to a small and hard, often sweetened, flour-based product, most akin in American English to a cookie. It comes from the Latin word “biscotus”, which means "twice baked". Not surprising that it is referred to by a variety of names as “biscuit” in French, “biscotto” in Italian and “beschuit” in Dutch.
The second cooking of the biscuit, at 90-100ºC, is intended to remove the remaining moisture. The resulting dried and hard biscuit was the perfect easy-to-carry and long-lasting food for sailors. It would stay intact for years as long as it was kept dry.
In American English a biscuit relates to a softer bread product baked only once, somewhat similar to a scone. In Canada, the terms biscuit and cookie are used interchangeably, depending on the region, with biscuits usually referring to 'hard' sweet biscuits (like digestives) and cookies for 'soft' baked goods (like chocolate chip cookies).
Read more in:
A bite of cookie history by Food.ca.
Biscuit in Wikipedia.
Most commercial paprika comes from Spain, South America, California and Hungary. The highest quality paprika and most expensive paprika comes from Spain. It is known as “pimentón” and comes in three versions, mild, moderately spicy and very spicy. In Hungary there are six classes or types of paprika ranging from delicate to hot.
The colour of paprika, measured in ASTA´s, is the main factor used to determine the quality and price of the spice. The ASTA (American Spice Trade Association) system, the international measurement of the extractable colour, is the technical way for both buyers and suppliers to be assured that they’re speaking the same language. Paprika prices are generally given per ASTA unit per kilogram.
OGourmet offers more than a dozen paprika products, including the famous Pimentón de la Vera.
Read more in:
Paprika from RecipeZaar.
Spanish Paprika - What you need to know before you buy from MarketUno.com.
Read what the researchers of INRA-France have to say on the role of perceptions of satiety and satisfaction:
“The sensory characteristics of foods contribute to both stimulating and inhibiting food intake…
The pleasure of eating, rather than acting as a guide to help adjust food consumption, sometimes compromises the regulation of energy intake and weight control…
The sensory pleasure of foods participates in determining meal size and stimulating food consumption through a variety of mechanisms.”
Therefore sensory analysis will increasingly become a tool in the design of dietary or food programs. Controlling your weight and your health with sensory perception? Now that’s something!
