Taste Buds and Molecules: The Art and Science of Food, Wine, and Flavor

By François Chartier

Proper wine pairings for high-concept food have long been the realm of sommeliers relying on their mastery of classic pairings and, to an even greater extent, their highly subjective palates. Wine is ethereal, of the land and the people, and its connection with food is one that can only be pinpointed and perfected by a virtuosic conductor of flavors in a process of trial and error.

Well, the work that Francois Chartier has been doing in his lab, as well as in the elBulli kitchen with Ferran Adrià, turns that classic process on its head and throws it under the microscope. Chartier starts with a wine, breaks it down to volatile molecular components, and pairs it with flavors and foods possessing those same components. This field of research, called “food harmony and molecular sommellerie,” informs the makeup of Chartier’s book, Taste Buds and Molecules.

Perhaps the most powerful, and even empowering, elements of the book are the charts that link a main flavor with all of the culinary components and wines with which it shares a common molecular makeup. Take maple syrup, for instance: it includes beta-caryophyllene and furanones, woody and caramel-tasting molecules respectively, which chemically (and flavorally) link it with oak-aged wines… as well as licorice, coconut, peaches, and even roasted fenugreek seeds.  Take any of those flavors, and any wine with prominent oak flavors, and you’re going to pair just fine. As a general resource for creating highly inventive and well-paired meals, these charts are culinary gold.

With the small caveat that the book is sized rather too small to be a truly useful tool for playing in the kitchen and wine cellar, Taste Buds and Molecules is a must-have for oenophiles-turned-cook or cooks looking to pair wines with more confidence.

The aptly-named Kentucky Fat uses a special infusion of Bulleit bourbon—one of my personal favorites—combining it with unusual bedfellows: Goji berry liqueur, Antica Formula sweet vermouth, and Angostura bitters doused in pure bacon fat. Let’s consider that last component for a moment. In order to lace the bitters with the smoky-goodness of cooked pig, the staff at Bourbon Steak steep the bitters in heated bacon fat and then wait for it to solidify. After, they simply scrape off the congealed lard, and voila: the precious gift of bitters, enhanced with a profoundly robust explosion of pork. If this process doesn’t sound like pure magic, clearly there is something seriously wrong with you, and I’m not sure that we can be friends.

One taste of this inventive cocktail, however, and I’m sure that you’ll be great friends. There is a layered complexity to the flavors, as the sweetness of orange zest, Goji, and vermouth crosses your palate before giving way to the deeper, darker intensity of bacon-laced bitters. The end result is a surprisingly well-balanced drink that has the general aura of a classic Manhattan, but arriving there through an unctuously alternative path.

The Kentucky Fat is on special for the month as part of a celebration in honor of National Hamburger Month. For the remainder of May, you can enjoy this unique, fat-speckled spirit with a trio of succulent sliders for just $20. Burgers, bacon, bourbon? I love this country.

Finally, spring is here! A soft, warm breeze has rushed in a promise of youthful energy, and fun is waiting to be had. It’s time to turn off your heater, come out of hibernation, and work off that winter layer you’ve added to your belly. It’s also the time to revitalize your drinks with juicy berries, melons, and citrus while you do your closet cleaning.

BEER

Kick off your snow boots, throw on your flip-flops, and drop the heavy porters and stouts. Pick up a lighter, thirst quenching beer such as an ale, lager, or wheat beer. Spring beers are crisp and refreshing as they steer away from winter’s spices and are fermented with the clean taste of citrus, honey, and even fruit. From March 1^st to June 1^st you can enjoy toasted malt with a brisk hoppy finish in Ninkasi Brewing Company’s Spring Reign Ale (6% ABV). If you are looking for a brew with a touch of sweetness, grab an Abita Strawberry Harvest Lager (5.1% ABV) made with real Louisiana strawberries.

WINE

Whether you like white or red, your wine is more enjoyable when it goes hand in hand with the outside temperature and your days’ activities. A springtime picnic in the park calls for a tasty bottle of chilled white wine. Pick up a Sauvignon Blanc from the Marlborough Valley in New Zealand. It’s a versatile wine with aromas of apples, melons, and green bell peppers, ready to compliment your fresh tomato salads or your goat cheese and crackers. If red is your choice, a Grenache is divine with its flavors of raspberry and a hint of spice. And for something a little different, grab a chilled Lambrusco. It’s slightly sweet, slightly sparkly, and completely affordable with tones of strawberry, raspberry, and cherry.

COCKTAILS

While sitting on your front steps, luxuriating in the afternoon sunshine, pour yourself a rejuvenating cocktail over ice. Store away your heavy dark liquors and reach for the clear stuff. Vodka, gin, rum, and tequila are lighter and mix wonderfully with many of spring’s fruits and vegetables. For a surefire Sunday morning hangover cure, shake up a pepper vodka Bloody Mary with a pinch of celery salt and a dash of horseradish. You can use your creativity and reach for your muddler to bruise up a fresh and minty rum concoction or blend a cucumber, kiwi, or pineapple for some cocktail satisfaction. And if you just need a good old stand by, there’s always a gin and tonic.

by Courtney Harrel

MOM-osa

• 1 oz Frangelico
• 1 oz passion fruit juice
• Champagne or sparkling wine top

 Combine Frangelico liqueur and passion fruit juice in a shaker, add ice and pour into a champagne flute. Top with sparkling wine or champagne.

 (as another option to straight juice you can use “Cascal” which is a great tropical fermented soda available at Wholefoods nationwide)

Cityhouse in San Francisco’s scenic Parc 55 Hotel (55 Cyril Magnin Street) is serving up a specialty cocktail this weekend that is—as they say—sweet and a little bit nutty, just like Mom.

Mommy Dearest

• 1 ¼ oz Frangelico
• 1 ¼ oz pomegranate liqueur

Stir over ice and pour over ice in rocks glass.

The following recipe comes courtesy of Level III (500 Post Street), a hip and modern cocktail lounge in the heart of San Francisco’s photogenic Nob Hill neighborhood:

Mama’s Little Helper

• 1 oz X-Rated Fusion Liqueur
• 1 oz Grapefruit Juice

Top with Champagne, serve in a flute.

To save us all from this unspeakable malaise, Blind Tiger Ale House (281 Bleecker Street) in the West Village comes to the rescue, offering 31 taps of microbrewed goodness along with an expansive bevy of limited edition bottled beers. Here you’ll come across a whole slew of West Coast style IPAs from the likes of Bear Republic and Green Flash—the good stuff that is very difficult to find anywhere in the East Coast, let alone in a city not exactly known for craft beer offerings.

The taps are running until 4AM, 7 days a week and you’ll always encounter a good crowd while parked in their friendly confines. The wood facades and dim lighting make for an inviting vibe and the bartenders know a thing or two about the suds they serve. There’s also an impressive food menu here featuring artisanal cheeses and familiar pub grub like chicken wings. I can’t speak for their desirability, however, because I come to this place to drink and for that I’m never disappointed.

As they say in their Mission Statement: “Craft beer is our focus..And our passion.” One trip to this Greenwich Village all-star will prove to you that they’re not just mincing words. And best of all, the taplist is constantly rotating. So come on in and come often!

The Macallan is the second biggest selling single malt by volume (behind Glenlivet).  They will be sampling a variety of whiskeys at the San Francisco event, held May 8 through May 11. Tastings are free but you do need to be 21 or over, of course.

As you can imagine, The Macallan has a proud and rich history. What else would you expect from a brand that requires the definite article in its title. So if you want to appear a bit more knowledgable about this storied spirit, go and check The Macallan’s blog so you can fake it ’till you make it at the big tasting. Personally, I’ve never been too much of a Scotch guy myself, but what I am is a tremendous fan of free booze, like virtually every other soul in my demographic. So I’m definitely willing to give it a shot, or six. Hope to see you there…

RSVP online for the event by clicking on the preceding link.

If you were at all like me growing up, you probably drove your mother to the liquor cabinet at least once or twice… on a bad day. How fitting is it—now that you’re all grown up—that you can bring the liquor cabinet to her with a magnificent Mother’s Day Martini. This thoughtful libation is sweet and delightful, just like Mom. Best of all, if you share a few of them before going out for dinner; it’s bound to make the entire evening more lively for everyone involved.

All you’ll need to make it happen are a few specialized ingredients, such as pomegranate liqueur, coarse sugar and pink grapefruit juice. Rub a lemon wedge around a martini glass, then dip the glass into the coarse sugar in order to sweeten the rim. Next, mix 2 ounces of high-class vodka (you can break out the Goose for Mom) with an ounce of the liqueur and an ounce of the grapefruit juice. Shake vigorously and strain the mixture into your garnished martini glass and voila! Happy Mother’s Day, Moms!

My love for pizza has stayed strong since childhood, but now that I’m technically classified as an ‘adult’ the accompanying beverage that I choose to wash it down with has evolved from artificially-flavored pop to something far more mature. And I’m not talking generic American lager here, folks. I mean, to each their own, but have you tasted some of the world-class artisanal pizza being produced in major cities across the country these days? You wouldn’t go to a five-star dining establishment and finish off your fine filet mignon with cheap swill, so why would consider doing such with an authentic Neapolitan-style pie made with all-natural, locally-sourced ingredients?

800 Degrees (10889 Lindbrook Drive) in Los Angeles totally gets it. This innovative parlor offers an artful array of craft beer and wine on tap, all befitting of the top-notch, customized pies that continuously crank out of their wood-burning ovens. And yes, you read that correctly: they feature wine on draft, 4 to be exact, including Darcie Kent‘s 2010 Cabernet Sauvignon, and Tangent‘s 2011 Pinot Grigio from Edna Valley.

They recently opened their doors in the quaint village of Westwood, just blocks away from the heart of UCLA’s campus. But you don’t need an advanced degree to understand how such a simple-yet-seldom-used formula attracts the high-paced lines that frequently spill out onto the streets here. Fast, fresh, finely-crafted, and most importantly: flavorful.

I sat down with General Manager Jolie Duhon for a crash-course in pizza pairing and what I learned was as pleasing to the palate as it was informative and insightful.

First lesson: wines with strong acidity go well with fatty, robust flavors as the acid tends to cut through the fat and bring balance to the tongue. She recommended pairing their 2009 Laetitia Pinot Noir with the Tartufo Pie—a popular combination of truffle cheese, roasted mushrooms and arugula. The earth tones of the well-balanced red danced ever-so-delicately with the deep flavors of mushroom and truffle topping the Tartufo. Another good partner for emboldening thick and smokier flavors is a full-bodied IPA. In addition to New Belgium’s Ranger IPA on tap, 800 Degrees also serves bottles of Green Flash’s West Coast IPA—a holy grail for Hopheads.

Second lesson: fruitier wines go well with sweeter foods. The Sausage and Peppers special, made with the slightly-sugary house tomato sauce, sweet italian sausage, and caramelized onions begged for a bright Chardonnay or even better—a slightly sweet sparkling Lambrusco.

Final lesson: Prosecco goes well with everything, so pop the bub and celebrate some good grub.

Photo By: Sarah Henry

After many months of eager anticipation, Berkeley favorite Gioia Pizzeria (2240 Polk Street) has arrived in San Francisco. And the iteration on this side of the Bay includes several notable additions that make it well worth the wait.

Most importantly, owners Will and Karen Gioia have added an impressive collection of beer and wine to their delicious SF menu. In addition to a rotating list of 5 Italian reds and 5 whites, the bar also features 6 satiating local microbrews. If you make your way over to the beautiful new Polk Street digs, you’ll be able to indulge in several limited edition beers from right across the Bay in Oakland: Linden Street Brewery’s exquisite Burning Oak Black Lager–roasted to perfection to taste slightly sweet with a very light body. Also on tap is Dying Vine’s Hop Candi, an English-style IPA with tender tones of rye and citrus.

From deeper in the Bay Area you can enjoy some fermented infectiousness from Heretic Brewing Company, based out of Pittsburg–not the one in Pennsylvania. This imaginative producer implores its drinkers to “be a heretic, don’t drink ordinary beer.” And their suds are anything but pedestrian. Evil Twin is an unusual blood-red ale with a perfect ratio of malt to hops, neither too sweet nor too bitter. If you’re in the Bay Area, be on the look out for their special releases, including Torment–a Belgian-style dark ale aged in French oak barrels that boasts a whopping 12% ABV.

The husband and wife team behind the eponymous restaurant received their culinary pedigree at Chez Panisse, so clearly you’re in for a culinary experience to accompany these inspired libations. The quality of ingredients and thoughtfulness of preparation really shines through in the dining experience at this new Russian Hill standout. When tasty East Coast-style pizza meets great West Coast-style microbrews its the best of both worlds!

NorCal Beer Blog

Does your fiesta need a soundtrack? Of course it does. And Tortilla Jo’s has you covered in that regard as well with world-class entertainment provided by the Grammy award-winning Mariachi Divas. Admittedly, I know very little about Mariachi music, but if they are divas they’ve got to be doing something right.

Tequila is always a tasty spirit and after an entire afternoon of sucking them back, you’re probably going to be in need of something tasty to sop it all up. I’m as big a fan of tortillas and salsa as anyone, but even that can get a little old after a while. That’s why this Mexican restaurant is bringing the heat in terms of a three-course menu of delectable dining throughout the holiday guaranteed to satisfy you’re hankering for cultural cuisine.

Margaritas, music and mayhem will ensue. So it looks like they’ve got all of their bases covered. Southern California is a region of the country known for it’s rich Mexican heritage. And it sure does shine bright on Cinco de Mayo. Have good fiesta-ing everybody!