I am going to take a break today from food porn and food photography and not even talk about molecular gastronomy as you have read me do before (Essentialism and Authenticity in Food: Molecular Pablum, Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 2 – The Nose and receptors, Molecular Gastronomy 101: Biology Basics – Part 1, Molecular Gastronomy for the masses? (A Rant)) but, rather, I am going to talk about the real molecular universe of what we eat and how food becomes us and how that integration changes our bodies.

I am going to introduce you to a bleeding-edge scientific topic called Nutrigenomics.

“Nutri” comes from nutritional (relating to food) and “genomics” is a term we use to refer to the global study of the molecules that hold the information that becomes our bodies and minds (your genes or DNA, RNA, and other heritable and informational chemical structures).

You may or may have not noticed, in 2001, that the Celera based Private Human Genome Project announced that it had completed a good portion of the sequencing (chemical deciphering) of the entire human genome. Last year (2007), the founder of Celera, Craig Venter, published the sequence data from his own DNA, presenting the 6 billion letter genome of a single person for the first time.

Lots of this information is like an undecorated Christmas tree, lacking ornaments and meaning. It is through the combined study of the genomic data paired with information about a disease state or some other function that the true promise of all these billions of dollars of work is met.

These days, genomics is paired with super dense information about the proteins that your genes make and also ways that your genes are regulated (systems biology, pathway analysis, proteomics, etc) to help scientists understand to the molecular level exactly what is happening in your cells.

Nutrigenomics is a common-sense next step and is fantastically important for our way of life and that of our children for generations to come.

Nutrigenomics is determining how your body (your specific body, one day in the future) uses the food you eat. It is going to help us understand how the food we eat impacts our chemistry and the way our genes behave – why some of us get fat, some of us get diabetes, some of us get alzheimers, some of us get allergies, some of us grow larger others short, some of us are predisposed to heart attacks, etc.

Our nutritional state can make some genes be read abnormally and others not read at all (think autoimmune disease and cancer). Food that you put in your mouth has a direct effect on your genes and your genes have a direct impact on the way the food you eat becomes your body.

More important though, it will help us get molecular and get honest about the effect of the types of foods and the quality of that food has on our bodies.

The Chinese and other ancient cultures have known this simple truth for millennia – food can be medicine. Food can be medicine because what we eat BECOMES us.

(Erlenmeyer flasks from the Argonne National Laboratory glass blowing shop. source)

Today’s article, “The Essence of Nearly Anything, Drop by Limpid Drop“, by Harold McGee in The New York Times, has me thinking on what what we might call “real food“, authenticity, essentialism, and molecular gastronomy.

You likely know that Harold McGee is a food science writer who’s book “On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen” is a core primer on food science for non-food scientists.

In this article, McGee talks about a “new” method of making flavored liquids or essences by a “gelatin clarification” method.

The basic overview of this method is this:

• Prepare a liquid from desired food (lobster, peaches, carrots, spirulina, chicken, hog toenails, whale mesentary, simply anything at all)
• If the liquid was made without bones or some cartilage, add a small amount of gelatin, dissolve
• Freeze preparation
• Place frozen block in strainer (with cheese cloth?) in bowl in the fridge
• Allow ice crystals to slowly melt over days and release into bowl (be sure to seal up this assembly otherwise it will pick up other odors in the fridge)
• Use what drips from the matrix (gelatin, fats, proteins, etc) as an essence.

What is happening here is that the gelatin forms a matrix or net into which everything is bound. As is the wont with all things fluidic, upon freezing, the water portion of the fluid is excluded from the gelatin matrix as it freezes into crystals, leaving behind particulate matter. Water soluble components travel with the water.

When the frozen block is slowly thawed at temps that are too low for the gelatin and fats to become fluid, the ice crystals melt and water and water soluble fractions drip away from the matrix.

The molecular gastronomists like to call this an “essence”. With this, you have purified the water soluble flavors. You have also left behind fat soluble flavors which can be extraordinary.

The “novelty” here is that the water soluble essence may deliver a different and perhaps more intense flavor because it is no longer combined with what ever flavors may have been in the fat soluble fraction.

Those fats may have served to mask, dampen or modify the water soluble flavors.

Fat and water soluble favors have become uncoupled in an “un-natural” or not naturally occurring way that will usually not be present in legacy preparations, recipes, foods, or cuisines.

These clarified essences have become faddish. (Actually, I think they were “conceived” in such a way that faddism was a foregone conclusion.)

Chefs who strive for “fame” and profit jump on the essence bandwagon and deliver victual conceits such as lamb loin flavored with pretzel elixir, a creation by Wylie Dufresne of WD-50 in NYC. I have not had this dish but I suppose I would consider trying it if I were in a “gee wiz” mood.

I think I would know I have lost my way if I had to start a $500 meal (gratuity, alcohol, parking, and bathroom usage not included) by signing a non-disclosure agreement, be frisked for a prohibited camera, and eat crappy photos of sushi printed on oddly favored “food product” paper sheets while sniffing aerosolized “ocean” and watching hypodermic needles being used to extrude lyophylized clam deoxyribonucleic acid noodles that are then infused with cotton candy essence, incubated in fluorescein dye and all the lights doused while I am spoon fed the glowing concoction while being irradiated with a UV light by an unpaid intern wearing UV safe goggles and a meat jerky flavored gel bodysuit.

(Fluorescein dye)

I would much prefer to try such a meal prepared by a passionate food hacker (for a modest fee and at an ad hock food hacking party – all in the spirit of fun, experimentation and “science”) than as a status meal in an expensive restaurant served with considerable self-importance.

With respect to “authentic” food and whether pretzel essence infused lamb loin is authentic in any way, I think we need to stick a definition on that word.

From Merriam-Webster Online:

“Main Entry: au·then·tic
Pronunciation: &-'then-tik, o-
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English autentik, from Anglo-French, from Late Latin authenticus, from Greek authentikos, from authentEs perpetrator, master, from aut- + -hentEs (akin to Greek anyein to accomplish, Sanskrit sanoti he gains)
1 obsolete : AUTHORITATIVE
2 a : worthy of acceptance or belief as conforming to or based on fact <paints an authentic picture of our society> b : conforming to an original so as to reproduce essential features <an authentic reproduction of a colonial farmhouse> c : made or done the same way as an original <authentic Mexican fare>
3 : not false or imitation : REAL, ACTUAL <based on authentic documents> <an authentic cockney accent>
4 a of a church mode : ranging upward from the keynote — compare PLAGAL 1 b of a cadence : progressing from the dominant chord to the tonic — compare PLAGAL 2
5 : true to one’s own personality, spirit, or character “

Authenticity is not the impetus or motivation in “gee wiz” victual conceit molecular gastronomy. Innovation may be a motivator but I think that the vagaries of ego and business capsize that noble though misplaced ambition.

No, I fear that most of the commercial molecular gastronomy pablum we are “fed” would be better defined as “derivative”:

“Main Entry: ²derivative
Function: adjective
1 : formed by derivation <a derivative word>
2 : made up of or marked by derived elements
3 : lacking originality : BANAL“

I would prefer unadorned roasted marrow bones or a slice of headcheese with a side of just picked calabash tomatoes sprinkled with chunky sea salt to some expensive overwrought pseudo-imaginative and derivative essence delivered with pomp and circumstance.

(yawn)

Related posts:

• Molecular Gastronomy for the masses? (A Rant)
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Biology Basics – Part 1
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 2 – The Nose and receptors

Technorati Tags: The New York Times, real food, authenticity, essentialism, molecular gastronomy, Harold McGee, food science, On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen, food, science, gelatin clarification, method, Freeze, ice, crystal, matrix, essence, soluble, water soluble, fat soluble, legacy, clarified, faddish, victual conceits, pretzel, elixir, Wylie Dufresne, WD-50, pablum, marrow, bone, headcheese, calabash, sea salt

I have not really done this before but today I want to share a new blog find with you.

Cuisiner en ligne : le blog cuisine

Before you visit, be advised that you will need a computer that plays sound and a browser that plays well with others, namely, video-podcast web sites.

I do not speak French but I have a grounding in Spanish which gives me the ability to somewhat read it, though I am mostly captivated by the video-casts they have featured on the blog.

There are a couple videos on the main page about some molecular gastronomy techniques.

After watching those, you should then go deeper by clicking the “Podcasts Videos” link at the top of the sidebar on the left.

It looks like this:

(Click here to go straight to that page)

Drum roll please because what you have here is an astounding number of video podcasts (in French) that fall into several categories:

• Recette
• Techniques
• Chefs
• Sommelier

Each category has many entries, many videos, which will give you exposure to French chefs, basic techniques, the world of the sommelier, and illustrated recipes.

Even though I do not understand everything they are saying, there is a whole lot of context and a complete and utter lack of Bobby Flay.

I don’t mind saying, its the latter point that is one of the huge selling points for me.

I am still exploring this site and am disturbing the family with the sounds of French streaming into the room, talking about chocolate and cream and all manner of naughty things.

The food world is an amazing place.

Its even better when you go global.

Technorati Tags: blog, Cuisiner en ligne : le blog cuisine, video, podcast, French, molecular, gastronomy, sommelier, recipe, Bobby Flay, food world, global

(Xanthan Gum. Chemical model graphic used with permission from Dr. Martin Chaplin of the London South Bank University, London, UK)

Molecular Gastronomy plays with established food identities to challenge the semiotics of food. It explores the use of chemicals and processes previously the domain of high-throughput industrial food producers and food scientists to deliver non-intuitive gastronomic experiences.

Our expectation than an egg yolk contains egg is flipped and inverted when one bites into one of Ferran Adrià‘s encapsulated broths, extractions, or infusions. Instead of egg yolk, when one bites down and pops the membrane, mango essence may bloom onto your palate. Food hack for food play.

A lot of the “food hack” aspects of Molecular Gastronomy flows from the transformative effects of a few certain ingredients, or reagents as we would call them in the lab.

One key reagent is Xanthan Gum.

So, what is this xantham gum you speak of?

Xanthan gum (shown at top) is a polysaccharide, meaning that it is a large molecule composed of several saccharides or sugars linked together. The size and shape of this molecule dictates how it interacts with it’s environment, chemical and physical. Xanthan gum has several interesting qualities that makes it very useful in the mega-food industry and also in molecular gastronomy.

Some of those qualities are:

it thickens

it stabilizes

it emulsifies

it helps with the creation of foams

it retards or controls the formation of ice crystals

In particular, the one characteristic of xanthan gum that makes it so valuable is something called pseudoplasticity or thixotrophy.

Believe it or not, you have experienced thixotrophy. Yes, you have, I promise.

When you start to shake a bottle of ketchup, the goo inside pretty much stays put (while your fries are cooling into an unappealing mass of transfats). As you whack on it, it begins to experience something call sheer. The molecules in the ketchup are whipped past one another (shear) and the ketchup and the xanthan gum, and other similarly reacting chemical species, dynamically and temporarily liquefies. Once it shoots out onto your plate or fries or whatever needs ketchup, it is no longer experiencing sheer and returns to its thicker more viscous state. If it were not for this thixotropic behavior, we would need to buy ketchup in jars like peanut butter and use a knife.

You can see experiments on thixotrophy by NASA at their NASAexplores site.

In the industrial setting, it is desirable to have and maintain thickness (viscosity) during production, storage, and shipping, while also delivering a product that is not TOO heavy in the mouth. I think that what they mean is, to put a less than fine point on this, that its thick without being snotty.

It is often mixed with guar gum because they work synergistically to boost the thixotrophic qualities of food or liquids.

So where does this artificial stuff come from anyways?

Well, its actually the by-product of a bacterium called Xanthomonas campestris. In the 1950′s, the USDA ran a large project to scan for organisms that produced interesting biopolymers. One of those biopolymers that they found was xanthan gum.

What sorts of foods have xanthan gum in it?

(Borrowed from ADM)

How is it used in Molecular Gastronomy?

Xanthan gum is added to “your favorite food/liquid” to change it into a gel, thick paste, gloopy mix, or foam. If your are whipping up carrot clouds, you may want to pitch in some xanthan gum to stabilize the loft of the foam. If you want that mango puree to be more viscous when you make it into mango-yolks, add some xanthan gum and, voila, its thick and stabilized.

How is it used in Gluten-Free baking?

If you have ever made your own bread, you would appreciate the magic that wheat gluten brings to the party. It is what gives the stretch to the dough and is that which allows bubbles to form in the bread as gases are produced by the yeast. Without gluten, the gases are not trapped into gluten surrounded bubbles, and the bread is flat and, well, not really bread-like at all. Obviously, gluten-free means you do not have gluten. Xanthan gum replaces gluten by providing the viscosity to the batter to trap the gases, forming the airy texture you want in bread.

This has been a quickie introduction to xanthan gum. There are some fun links through out this post that you might want to explore.

Molecular Gastronomy sites of interest:

• Food Hacking main site
• Food Hacking Wiki

Sources for Ingredients:

• Xanthan Gum, 4 oz.
• Guar Gum, 8 oz.

Related Posts:

• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Biology Basics – Part 1
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 2 – The Nose and receptors

Last year the kind people at the International Boston Seafood Show gave me a press pass so that I could cover this event for the Well Fed Network. I wrote an article for the Growers & Grocer’s blog (article link) and a few for this blog (Auto-design that has gone to the fishes, Ducktrap orgy, Ichthyological super models, King of Crabs, Cornucopia del Mar).

I am going to be covering this amazing event again this year and will hopefully be meeting a few other Boston area food bloggers (4 at last count). This should be a lot more fun because its always better to share fantastic experiences than to go it alone. I learned that lesson when I lived in Alaska by myself. I climbed mountains and sat alone at the top, with strangers, wishing I could have shared it with a friend or loved one. Same with just about any part of Alaska really. This show wasn’t quite such a transcendent experience, no comparison, but it will be great to share it!

This time I going to fast for like a week before (kidding) just to get ready for the experience of hundreds of people practically forcing you to eat prime quality seafood. I am not kidding.

So, last year, I took many photos (many didn’t come out with excellent quality but they serve to give a sense for the experience). I am going to post them here today in no special order so that I can get them out there and then wow you with this year’s photos (with a better camera no less) when the time comes.

Some of the things you will see is Tom Douglas cooking for me (OK, making samples for everyone but he handed them to me!), a cooking competition with salmon and mussels and other delectable treats, crazy blow up and furry displays, molecular gastronomy ingredients (reagents to be more specific), and acres of gobsmacking beautiful seafood.

The show this year is March 11-13 so check after then for coverage of 2007.

Photo montage of the 2006 International Boston Seafood Show:

The Chef:

The competition:

The beauty:

The delicious:

The demos:

The Silly:

Related Posts:

• Fishing for some clarity (Well Fed Network article)
• Auto-design that has gone to the fishes
• Ducktrap orgy
• Ichthyological super models
• King of Crabs
• Cornucopia del Mar

Additional Resources:

• International Boston Seafood Show

Technorati Tags: International Boston Seafood Show, Well Fed Network, event, Boston, food blogger, Alaska, seafood, Tom Douglas, samples, cooking, competition, salmon, mussel, molecular gastronomy, ingredient, beautiful seafood, 2007, 2006, Chef, competition, delicious, Related Posts, Additional Resources

I continue the Molecular Gastronomy series that I started in this post with a discussion of the nose, a sensory organ crucial for sensing what we eat.

Whereas with the mouth we speak of “tastants” when we talk of the chemicals that excite our tastebuds, we use the word “odorant” to refer to the volatile chemical compounds that excite the receptors in our nose.

Specifically, the region that is affected by odorants is the olfactory epithelium region (Regio olfactoria) that is located on the roof of one’s nasal cavity (actually there are two, below each eye, inside the sinus).

This regio olfactoria is about 2.5 square centimeters in area and contains some 50 million primary sensory receptor cells.

Odorants must be able to partition into (dissolve and move through) the mucus that lies over the olfactory epithelium. Such chemicals are volatile, water soluble, miscible into lipids (can dissolve into fats), as well as several other characteristics. This could serve as a severe barrier but in fact non-mucus dissolvable odorants can be chaperoned across the mucus barrier by “odorant binding proteins” or “lipocalins”. These proteins allow for a selective sensing of these non-mucus soluble odorants (selective barrier method).

The structure of the epithelium is shown below:

Each epithelial sensory cell has tiny hair-like structures called cilia that fan out into the mucus. The cell detects an odorant and then sends a neural impulse along it’s axon (nerve fiber) into the olfactory bulb that lies above the olfactory epithelium.

There is a second type of smelling called trigeminal chemoreception which detects mechanical and temperature related stimulation (found in the mouth, nose and eyes). Chemicals that excite these sorts of sensory cells tend to be perceived as mechanical or temperature in nature. For example, the volatile chemical that gives peppers their heat, capsaicin, affects the trigeminal chemoreceptors and is sensed as heat versus a certain smell. Other examples include menthol, camphor, mustard oils, onion odors.

There is a third type of smell sense called vomeronasal chemoreception. Scientists are currently testing to see if humans have a functional vomeronasal organ (VNO), found in all mammals. This is an interesting type of smelling in that it seems to use different receptors and is not linked through the brain. This sort of smelling is social, relating to inter-animal relationships and chemoreception through the VNO affects social behavior. Pheromones are detected by this gland. If indeed humans have a functional and not just vestigal VNO we would not be consciously aware of detecting anything because the VNO works outside of the brain, directly on our bodies.

Receptors of Olfaction

Getting down to business, one should ask “How do those chemosensory cells detect odorants?”

As with so much found throughout our bodies, signals are mediated by proteins embedded in the surface of the receptor cell. These proteins have the ability to bind odorants and then activate signaling inside the cell, leading to sensation.

Genes for olfactory receptors are legion, some 350 receptor genes have been identified in man. This is a huge number of genes, less only than the very large family of genes involved in immunity, an enormously complex system.

These genes encode what are called olfactory seven transmembrane G-protein coupled receptors (a common structure that is reflected the human body and that of other animals). A good overview of these structures is found at THIS LINK.

What we sense as a vague gradient of recognizable and not so recognizable smells in our environment is actually detected in a very discreet or specific manner. Our ability to interpret what those specific chemicals are may have been more informative eons ago, perhaps similar to the way dogs can detect as yet poorly understood odorants exuded by human cancer patients.

Today, our sense of smell serves us as well as we seem to need it. We no longer forage amongst strange plants to survive and thus we no longer consciously tune into the specific wholesomeness of our food.

What we do retain is a propensity to disdain new taste and odor sensations, a cautiousness that has served us well for millenia.

But, as most foodies and gastronauts know intuitively, we monkeys are powerful curious and some of us put just about anything in our mouths, at least once!

Stay tuned for the next installment of this Molecular Gastronomy series.

Books on Molecular Gastronomy:

Related Posts:

• Molecular Gastronomy for the masses? (A Rant)
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 1 – The Nose and receptors
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 2 – The Nose and receptors

Technorati taggage:
Molecular, Gastronomy, Molecular Gastronomy, food, culinary, cooking, science, food science, taste, chemoreception, 101, olfaction, olfactory, Gray’s Anatomy, nose, nasal, molecular biology.

The diagram above shows one view of a mouth and tongue. On the surface of the tongue, as you well know from touching your own, is a whole rugged landscape of bumps and crevasses.

There are many misconceptions regarding the regions of taste sensation in the mouth. You have likely seen those diagrams where sweet is on the tip of the tongue, bitter at the back, sour towards the middle, and salty along the edges.

In fact, each of these gustatory buds is capable of detecting all five “flavors”.

I will discuss the molecular biology of taste or chemoreception in the next post.

Beyond the chemicals or “tastants” that we detect in the food that comes in contact with our tongue and inner cheeks, we also use olfaction (smelling) to appreciate and evaluate the food or drink we are enjoying.

The next question should be, how does that taste bud experience flavor?

My next post will discuss the concept of receptors and how the taste bud translates exposure to certain chemicals in our food into a neural impulse that we integrate in our minds as a flavor.

Stay tuned!

Books on Molecular Gastronomy:

Related Posts:

• Molecular Gastronomy for the masses? (A Rant)
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 1 – The Nose and receptors
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 2 – The Nose and receptors

Technorati taggage:
Molecular, Gastronomy, Molecular Gastronomy, food, culinary, cooking, science, food science, taste, chemoreception, 101, nose, tongue, Gray’s Anatomy, oral, mouth, molecular biology.

Today I cruised over to Slashfood and saw a post regarding the Gastronomie blog‘s day by day expose (a delicious and curious one) on her visit to Alinea in Chicago.I have never visited Alinea but from the accounts you read on Gastronomie and eGullet, it is clearly in the vein of high-tech molecular haute cuisine (Molecular Gastronomy).

The most prominent practitioner of Molecular Gastronomy would be Ferran Adria chef of El Bulli in Rosas, Spain.

As per the Discovery Channel article by Noelle Paredes, the following chefs are also noted MolGas practitioners (listed with one of their keynote dishes):

• Juan Mari Arzak of Restaurant Arzak (San Sebastian, Spain): Pumpkin-and-squid ravioli.
• Heston Blumenthal of the Fat Duck (Bray, Berkshire, UK): Carpaccio of cauliflower with chocolate jelly.
• Grant Achatz of Alinea (Chicago, IL): Dried Crème Brulee.
• Pino Maffeo of Restaurant L (Boston, MA): Avocado carpaccio with brulee grapefruit.
• Homaro Cantu of Moto (Chicago, IL): Peanut butter and jelly sandwich dumpling.
• Dominique and Cindy Duby of Wild Sweets (Richmond, B.C.): Apple red-cabbage gelee and chestnut praline (chocolate filling)”

If molecular gastronomy is a new concept to you try this google search and some of these links:

• Molecular Gastronomy on the Discovery Channel
• Molecular Gastronomy : Exploring the Science of Flavor by Hervé This.
• Molecular Gastronomy – Wikipedia article
• Various discussions regarding molecular gastronomy at eGullet
• McGee on Food and Cooking : An Encyclopedia of Kitchen Science, History and Culture by Harold McGee

Here is a link at L’Epicerie for some of the chemicals one needs to work magic in today’s Molecular Gastronomy, such as agar-agar, calcium chloride, sodium alginate, carrageenan, and other likely molecular grade reagents (from the looks of it on the page).

Whew, that’s a lot of information and its just a cursory peek at Molecular Gastronomy.

But, after all this, I would like to get to my point.

If you surveyed all these restaurants you would find at least one commonality beyond their use of molecular gastronomy: they are fantastically expensive, some in the range of a half-grand per person.

Here is my point, as a person of regular non-Paris-Hilton means, that sort of price tag makes me nauseous.

I am the sort that can not see spending a lot on a luxury car, new off the lot. I can not fathom spending many 100s of dollars for one night’s stay at a luxury hotel or resort. When faced with these sorts of things, my eyes do not see the value, literally. I gape, I stare, I try to get in touch with my feelings wondering if I am missing something. I am left cold and bit insecure that I am missing some huge not-the-trees-but-the-whole-forest picture.

One can convince themselves, I suppose, that the consumption of a $500 meal is more value-inherent than a night’s stay at a very expensive hotel. You consume the food, you have an intensive interactive experience that will be something you remember the rest of your life.

Sure, but I would not be able to do that.

When you are like me and have to trade precious life for dollars (time away from family and commuting huge distances to work), each dollar spent represents that time lost. It is not value-less or trivial.

Those of us who live at the “bottom of the affluence scale” have no choice but to imbue money with this sort of meaning because it is the deal or trade we make to survive in this economy.

Thus said, to spend, to invest, $500 on 24 micro-dishes, however revolutionary and profound, is folly.

Here is my soap-box and my vision:

Molecular Gastronomy is in some part about play and experimentation. When that spirit is swept away by the nausea that comes with the bill, that is a DARN shame.

I say, let us find a way to make Molecular Gastronomy more populist, more accessible.

I would love to find a way to get training in Molecular Gastronomy (beyond my own PhD in Cell Biology) and teach it as a course in Elementary and High schools and even at the undergraduate level, OUTSIDE of the culinary school setting.

I think Molecular Gastronomy has important things to teach us all BUT the pompous and sickening prices found in the restaurant setting is such a high barrier that it’s message may be lost or never found.

Related Posts:

• Molecular Gastronomy for the masses? (A Rant)
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 1 – The Nose and receptors
• Molecular Gastronomy 101: Part 2 – The Nose and receptors