It has been more than 3 years since the last post... I guess I've sort of "given up"... It's always more enjoyable eating the food than blogging about it. I mean, God knows the number of times I've eaten half the amount before realizing that I've forgotten to take pictures... haha... Besides, there are so many food blogs nowadays... Ok, enough of excuses...
Just wanna pen my thoughts on food enjoyment:
In Mandarin, a common description of a good dish is 色、香、味俱全. Literally, it means, full of "colour", "fragrance", and "flavour". It is not coincidental for the words to be in that order. One approaches a dish firstly through sight. A ghastly looking pot of goo will never taste good because psychologically, the mind would have dismissed it. How many times have we seen Japanese dishes that are so appealing aesthetically that we could not bear to eat them?
Next is smell. It has been proven that if one is not allowed to smell the food one is eating, one will not be able to tell what is being eaten (assuming of course that texture is constant, eg all blended into "baby food"). That is also why all food tastes bland when we are suffering from flu and blocked noses.
The last is taste.
Ever so often, when critics judge a dish, they only comment on the taste and texture. They have missed two-thirds of the criteria for a good dish.
Psychologically, our memory is not as good as we think. According to the book "How customers think", our memory is actually a creative product of our encounters, beliefs and plans developed at a preconscious level. Therefore, food will always taste better in the company we love (positive emotions affecting our judgment). Food will always taste better when the environment evokes positive memories (eg., noodles served in "cockeral" bowls in old hawker centres). In fact, food will also taste better if we have to wait/queue for it (a belief that long queue = good food).
Understanding the above will enable us to embark on our journey of becoming a food critic... haha... or at least act like one. :)
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