Test your foodie I.Q.

I used the search function and it doesn't appear that this has been posted as yet. The Wednesday food section in the Trib had a quiz entitled "Test Your Foodie I.Q." in homage to Top Chef and Top Chef Masters. I scored a 22 out of 25 and I don't consider myself a foodie.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/ ... triviaquiz

It's nice to know that I'm still a good test taker--I got them all. But folks, this test should be easy for any LTHer who has been paying attention.

EvA wrote:It's nice to know that I'm still a good test taker--I got them all. But folks, this test should be easy for any LTHer who has been paying attention.

Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

ronnie_suburban wrote:Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

Not a difficult test if you're into food. I got them all, but I do know people who'd have trouble getting any of them right -- just because they don't care (hard as that is to imagine).

Cynthia wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

Not a difficult test if you're into food. I got them all, but I do know people who'd have trouble getting any of them right -- just because they don't care (hard as that is to imagine).

Well, yes. I'm figuring that if you're not into food, you're not going to even bother taking the test.

=R=

OK, just for fun, I am going to take this question seriously.

IQ test scores have a normal distribution. This test lacks not only harder items for those who fall more than two standard deviations above the mean, but easier items for those who struggle with the material, and whose scores fall well below the mean. I'd say this test is more of an achievement test anyway. IQ tests are supposed to be tests of ability--though that is debatable.

Still, it's kind of interesting to think about what capacities an actual food IQ test might measure. For instance: the IQ test is designed to measure verbal and nonverbal reasoning, processing, and working memory. As a test of nonverbal skill, one might have an actual cooking task. The test linked above might serve as a portion of the vocabulary subtest. However, one might need to include such items as, "What is beef?" As with other IQ tests, results of some of the subtests might depend heavily on one's basic capacities (as measured by an actual IQ test). For instance, with poor working memory, one might have trouble functioning in a restaurant kitchen under pressure.

Another problem with the linked test (as with much intelligence testing) is that it is heavily dependent on cultural exposure, and thus the results would be skewed toward those who have experience with French (and some other cultures). This would generate meaningless results for those with high food intelligence but little exposure to the cultures represented in the questions.

That said. I'm pleased to report that I will be joining Foodie Mensa based on my score on this test- and lording it over the other Foodie Mensans who missed an item! Where do I sign up?

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Cynthia wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

Not a difficult test if you're into food. I got them all, but I do know people who'd have trouble getting any of them right -- just because they don't care (hard as that is to imagine).

Well, yes. I'm figuring that if you're not into food, you're not going to even bother taking the test.

=R=

Yes -- that actually occurred to me only a minute or two after I made the comment.

Clearly, it's a big week for testing one's foodie-ness. A friend on a road trip called from Iowas to tell me to check out this "You Know You're A Foodie..." item from the Des Moines Register: http://dmjuice.desmoinesregister.com/ap ... 9907080321

look ma! no hands!

25/25

yay.

Cynthia wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

Not a difficult test if you're into food. I got them all, but I do know people who'd have trouble getting any of them right -- just because they don't care (hard as that is to imagine).

It's not that we don't care, sometimes we don't have the money or the time to devote to such things.

sweet. 25/25 babay!
Tho I'd never even heard of "pain perdu."

seebee wrote:sweet. 25/25 babay!
Tho I'd never even heard of "pain perdu."

It's French for "lost bread" -- because you use the stuff you would have thrown out.

Ms. Ingie wrote:

Cynthia wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

Not a difficult test if you're into food. I got them all, but I do know people who'd have trouble getting any of them right -- just because they don't care (hard as that is to imagine).

It's not that we don't care, sometimes we don't have the money or the time to devote to such things.

I was actually speaking of people I know who don't care. I have one friend who could get by on oatmeal three times a day. She hates cooking and barely tolerates eating. A few other friends love eating, but want ribs or steak, not "foofy" food. So they don't care. So this was not intended as a general blast against anyone who didn't know the answers, but rather a comment on people I know who wouldn't even bother taking the quiz, because they don't care.

I got all of the questions on this scientifically designed and completely accurate internet quiz correct. I attribute this to both my unhealthy obsession with food and the fact that I am extraordinarily affluent.

EvA wrote:It's nice to know that I'm still a good test taker--I got them all. But folks, this test should be easy for any LTHer who has been paying attention.

100% here as well, but 3 answers I owe to test taking skills rather than any "foodie" knowledge. In all honestly, I didn't know what "hamachi," "cravolo nero," or "halloumi" were, but given there were no repeated answers and each answer appeared multiple times on the test, the correct one was easy to suss out. And "pommes dauphine" I only identified because only one of the answer contained the word "potato."

Too many high scores... I should write one.

Ms. Ingie wrote:

Cynthia wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:Ditto. Not a particularly difficult test.

=R=

Not a difficult test if you're into food. I got them all, but I do know people who'd have trouble getting any of them right -- just because they don't care (hard as that is to imagine).

It's not that we don't care, sometimes we don't have the money or the time to devote to such things.

Hey, 88% is no slouch; I also got them all but sussed out one or two out by knowing romance languages a bit. I'm not sure what foodie means, but I do spend an unhealthy amount of time reading about, planning, and buying food - I bring Saveur or its ilk whenever I'm going to be in a waiting room. Not suprising that those who posted are getting 100%, you could search threads here with the keywords and find the answers, I bet...

Mhays wrote:Not suprising that those who posted are getting 100%, you could search threads here with the keywords and find the answers, I bet...

Hey, I got 100% without any searching. Might not have been quite as successful if they hadn't repeated multiple choice answer options, tho.

got 2 wrong, and I am not a "foodie"(hate the term).

Jazzfood wrote:Too many high scores... I should write one.

Maybe collecting questions from the crowd, and throwing out the ones that appear to be "too common knowledge" would be an easier task than coming up with one by yourself? I'd love to see what you come up with if you are considering writing one. I'm definitely not implying that I'd "ace" it or anything, I just love food trivia.

I have a recurring dream that I'm on "Jeopardy!" and double jeopardy is all categories devoted to food/drink/cooking. The most notable thing (to me) in my dream is not that I answer ALL of the questions correctly, but that I ask for the questions completely out of synch with their dollar amounts (start at the middle, then go directly to the last, then back to the first, alternating categories,) and that I also use my ringer before the question is presented. Furthermore, I actually think that I'm pretty kewl while I'm doing it. In the dream, of course. Then, Final Jeopardy is some garbage category like "authors of the 18th century." I risk 1.00 and lose.

Thanks for posting the link. 23/25. Like others mentioned, I didn't know something like "pain perdu" but I knew it was something bread related so french toast it was.

Without the multiple choice, it would have been too difficult to achieve a passing score for most people.

Binko wrote:

EvA wrote:It's nice to know that I'm still a good test taker--I got them all. But folks, this test should be easy for any LTHer who has been paying attention.

100% here as well, but 3 answers I owe to test taking skills rather than any "foodie" knowledge. In all honestly, I didn't know what "hamachi," "cravolo nero," or "halloumi" were, but given there were no repeated answers and each answer appeared multiple times on the test, the correct one was easy to suss out. And "pommes dauphine" I only identified because only one of the answer contained the word "potato."

Actually, while I knew hamachi, halloumi (a cool cheese you can actually fry to a golden brown without its melting), and pommes dauphine, I too only got cavolo nero by virtue of good test-taking skills. I did a Google search, and it is apparently popular in Tuscany, especially in bean soup. So maybe that stuff in my soup in Italy wasn't spinach. But yes, test-taking skills were definitely needed for that response..

nr706 wrote:

Mhays wrote:Not suprising that those who posted are getting 100%, you could search threads here with the keywords and find the answers, I bet...

Hey, I got 100% without any searching. Might not have been quite as successful if they hadn't repeated multiple choice answer options, tho.

Not meaning that folks (or myself) were using the search option, meaning that if you look around a bit here, an awful lot of those topics have been put under a magnifier and dissected with great care on these boards. Avid participants in LTH would stand to naturally get high marks, as there have probably been fisticuffs over at least one of the topics at some point....

Cavolo nero got me, too - but nero is close enough to negro and noir that I figured it was black cabbage.

Mhays wrote:Cavolo nero got me, too - but nero is close enough to negro and noir that I figured it was black cabbage.

That's how I figured it out too. That was the only one I really had never seen before. But that is test-taking skill and not culinary knowledge per se. Really this was a culinary vocabulary test more than an I.Q. test (as if any tests are really I.Q. tests as Josephine suggests).

Mhays wrote:Cavolo nero got me, too - but nero is close enough to negro and noir that I figured it was black cabbage.

I've seen it as the local farmers' market under that name, but more frequently I've seen it called Dinosaur Kale, or Lacinato.

NAV MAN came in at 13/25, which is slightly better then 50%.

nr706 wrote:

Mhays wrote:Not suprising that those who posted are getting 100%, you could search threads here with the keywords and find the answers, I bet...

Hey, I got 100% without any searching. Might not have been quite as successful if they hadn't repeated multiple choice answer options, tho.

100% for as well, without searching! But I agree that the repetition of multiple choice options definitely helped

Seeing halloumi cheese on there brought back memories of my childhood in the Middle East. I also remember my mom using halloumi as a substitute for paneer (Indian cheese) when she didn't want to go through the trouble of making it herself. It's a pretty good substitute for any Indian recipe that calls for paneer.

I went and bought some halloumi yesterday. Darn this quiz!

NAV MAN wrote:NAV MAN came in at 13/25, which is slightly better then 50%.

NAV MAN doesn't need any quiz to prove his elite haiku skillz or entertaining use of the royal third person. Thanks as always for the posts.

EvA wrote:

Mhays wrote:Cavolo nero got me, too - but nero is close enough to negro and noir that I figured it was black cabbage.

That's how I figured it out too. That was the only one I really had never seen before. But that is test-taking skill and not culinary knowledge per se. Really this was a culinary vocabulary test more than an I.Q. test (as if any tests are really I.Q. tests as Josephine suggests).

Funny -- I was thinking that, because the Romans were the first to breed most of the forms of cabbage we have today that nero being Roman meant they were talking about cabbage. (Though the main reason I got this question correct is the oft-mentioned repetition of possible answers.) I have to remember to look for some of this stuff next time I'm somewhere with odd greens.