Champagne tastes...

Great. So, now I have new, expensive taste. Snail caviar.

There are times when I really wish I could return to the unenlightened era when I hadn't tried certain foods or thought I did not or would not like them. Caviar. Lobster, which I never tasted till I was in college. Prosciutto. Foie gras. Sweetbreads.*

By the time I graduated from college, I was a full-fledged adventurous eater, willing to try anything at least once (and, usually, more than once, since I've become convinced that if I don't care for something on first try, there'll probably some other preparation of it I will like). But in some ways, I'd be better off if I'd never tried some of them. Especially when the budget is running, too often, to pastas and hot dogs. (Even there, it would be better if I could stand cheap hot dogs.)

This is perhaps no issue to those of you who dine at the likes of Alinea and L2O every week. But for others, are there tastes you wish you'd never acquired? Are people with simple tastes, who genuinely prefer cornbread and blackeyed peas to truffles and dry-aged prime steaks, happier?

__
* I know I can get moderately priced sweetbreads at several Latin places, and I do enjoy them, but they don't replace the versions I yearn for, which are served at pricey French restaurants.

Not only do I have this concern for myself, but I've managed to beget progeny with equally expensive tastes: caviar (at least we'll both settle for Ikura,) lox, shellfish of all kinds including escargot - and the child wants prosciutto instead of bacon with breakfast. I've been studiously avoiding truffles (fortunately, in my rent bracket all truffles are tainted with truffle oil, which I loathe) but at some point I'm going to have them and will probably like them - after all, I loved fresh porcini, as did the progeny. Don't even get me started on cheese - Sparky's mac and cheese project probably set me back $60, and a good two-thirds of that went to expensive cheddar and a series of beers (most of which I freely admit were tasted, but not cooked with) I also found - in a post-Poe daze - I like Amontillado, and not the cheap stuff.

I plan to eschew snail caviar, unless the garden slugs in my yard start producing it in an easily harvestable sort of way.

Uni butter *sigh*

Mhays wrote:I plan to eschew snail caviar, unless the garden slugs in my yard start producing it in an easily harvestable sort of way.

Not a bad idea for LAZ to consider, Mhays.

I don't know about garden slugs, but when I was a student, the family I lived with in France had a snail apartment complex in their front yard. It was made out of bricks stacked about knee high and wire mesh, which kept all but the littlest snails inside. They were always retrieving the escapees from nearby bushes. (I guess that's the practical thing about snail farming-you don't have to chase them around the pasture.) In any case, this was seen as a way to economize on an expensive taste. However the lady of the house couldn't tolerate the smell of the snails cooking, so she built a separate kitchen in the basement of the house, where she spent a day cooking them, and she maintained a separate freezer all year to store them in.

I imagine harvesting snail roe might require some specialized gear as well, but it sure would be something to write about, thus recouping some of the expense.

During the same era, I returned to France amid a front-page media extravaganza: the Swiss had decided that raising and eating snails constitutes cruelty, and were planning to ban the practice, (with no mention of cruelty to the creatures more likely to be found on the dinner table, I might add.) The French were quite aflutter about this, as you might imagine. Like the Belgian taste for frites, Swiss snail rights advocacy got a round mocking in the press.

probably too literal for this thread but...

Vintage Champagne has all but ruined me from drinking sparkling wine. I can tolerate a
glass of domestic BdN during holiday lunches at my parents house but given the chance give me a glass of 1996 or 1993 or 1990 or.......

Calvados. French, aged, expensive. Got hooked on it when I had an apple tart in Paris and it was used as a topper. I came home and searched for it. Bought an inexpensvive one, and by that I mean $50, not $100 +. Not even in the same league. I splurge for that and my Laurent Perrier Rose once a year.

Another splurge is the Grand Marnier 150 year anniversary edition(Cuvée Speciale Cent Cinquantenaire) in the flower bottle. It's incredible. Taste it side by side with regular Grand Marnier. 2 different creatures.

Nutella. <sigh>

RevrendAndy wrote:Another splurge is the Grand Marnier 150 year anniversary edition(Cuvée Speciale Cent Cinquantenaire) in the flower bottle. It's incredible. Taste it side by side with regular Grand Marnier. 2 different creatures.

Ah, I've had that pleasure just once in my life ... so far...

XO Cognacs - and I probably haven't even had the really good ones. My bro-in-law and I split a bottle of Hennessy XO two years ago at the holidays and split a bottle of Remy Martin XO last year and we both felt them well worth the splurge. The layers of flavor and lingering finish make it a memorable quaff, especially when coupled with a nicely aged Trinidad or Cohiba.

Also - Balvenie Portwood 15-year-old single malt. IMO, aging in port barrels makes it a complex palate pleaser. I thought Portwood was the ne plus ultra Balvenie until I was in NYC earlier this month and saw a bottle of Balvenie 30-year-old displayed for sale at $700. Don't know that I'll ever get to the place where I can drop seven bills on a single bottle of something!

Davooda

Parents think it's cool when they can boast "Oh MY kids eat sushi." Then try taking three teenage boys out for sushi and trying to fill them up. All I can say is, order lots of appetizers.

Jonah

Organic and/or local. My grocery bill was a lot smaller before I realized that food produced by people who care tastes better than food mass-produced on industrial farms.

Davooda wrote:Balvenie Portwood 15-year-old single malt. IMO, aging in port barrels makes it a complex palate pleaser. I thought Portwood was the ne plus ultra Balvenie until I was in NYC earlier this month and saw a bottle of Balvenie 30-year-old displayed for sale at $700. Don't know that I'll ever get to the place where I can drop seven bills on a single bottle of something!

I was going to say single-malt scotch. It started with my friends & I choking down the cheaper, younger stuff way back when in a bid to be seen as "sophisticated", but the next thing I knew I'd acquired the taste & found myself wondering what the next higher-priced variety on the menu or in the store was like...and it was all downhill from there. Fortunately I haven't reached the point where I'm dropping hundreds per bottle (yet), and the bottles I do have tend to last me quite a while (six months to a year, generally).

Funny you should mention the Balvenie Portwood 15...it was in my collection until I turned it upside-down & shook the last few drops of it directly into my mouth a few months ago. It was a sad day. I was tempted to get another one a few weeks ago, but decided to try something new & expand on my recent liking for peatier scotches by getting a bottle of Laphroaig Quarter Cask...it tastes like concentrated campfire! Looks like I've got some serious taste-acquiring to do

Mhays wrote:...tainted with truffle oil, which I loathe

Amen!

Khaopaat wrote:[I was tempted to get another one a few weeks ago, but decided to try something new & expand on my recent liking for peatier scotches by getting a bottle of Laphroaig Quarter Cask...it tastes like concentrated campfire! Looks like I've got some serious taste-acquiring to do

It's definitely Scotch for me too. If you're in to peat, try Bruichladdich's peaty ones (3D3, Peat Proposal, etc.). Ardbeg and Laugavulin are worth trying as well in the uber-peat category.

-Dan

Mhays wrote:I've been studiously avoiding truffles (fortunately, in my rent bracket all truffles are tainted with truffle oil, which I loathe)

If you really hate truffle oil, you may not like truffles, either. The biggest problem with truffle oil is that too many chefs are heavy handed with it. But the flavor profile is similar enough that I doubt that anyone who loathes the flavor of truffle oil will really like fresh truffles, either.

It's like the difference between vanillin and vanilla beans.

Santander wrote:Nutella. <sigh>

You have to think about Nutella in the right way, Santander. It's a pricey compared to, say, peanut butter, sure. But compared to chocolate hazelnut truffles, it's a bargain!

I don't really like vanillin, either, except in very limited circumstances (I don't mind it in milkshakes and things that have a kind of cold greasy profile, though I know it's there) I don't get the impression from aficionados that real truffles have the cigarette-lighter-fluid profile that puts me off truffle oil. I guess I can hope, though!

In my youth, I preferred margarine (which I'd been raised on) to butter...that is, until I started baking. Now I can't stand the stuff and have been known to drop $5 or $6 on expensive cultured butters.

Mhays wrote:In my youth, I preferred margarine (which I'd been raised on) to butter...that is, until I started baking. Now I can't stand the stuff and have been known to drop $5 or $6 on expensive cultured butters.

Cheese is my biggest temptation splurge-wise, (it might be beef if not for my brother the farmer's generosity). I recently found local CT cheese from Cato Corner Farm that really is outstanding. Since I have yet to find a good purveyor of French cheese in the area, I will be able to resist Epoisses for awhile.

I too was raised on margarine, but I never looked back after developing a taste for Beurre de Charentes, which is the secret to GWiv's preferred biscuits. I do feel slightly guilty making an American classic with French butter, even without considering the fossil fuel cost. But here in CT, there is a lot of excellent Vermont butter available, so I'd better try that.

dansch wrote:]It's definitely Scotch for me too. If you're in to peat, try Bruichladdich's peaty ones (3D3, Peat Proposal, etc.). Ardbeg and Laugavulin are worth trying as well in the uber-peat category.

I picked up a very reasonable-priced bottle of Lagavulin 16 from Costco earlier this year...it was $61.99, which I see now is $30 less than at Sam's. If they still have it, that might be right up your alley.

As for Ardbeg and Bruichladdich, you've piqued my curiosity...I think one of them might have to be my next "impulse buy". This habit really is trouble

Mhays wrote:I don't really like vanillin, either, except in very limited circumstances (I don't mind it in milkshakes and things that have a kind of cold greasy profile, though I know it's there) I don't get the impression from aficionados that real truffles have the cigarette-lighter-fluid profile that puts me off truffle oil. I guess I can hope, though!

In my youth, I preferred margarine (which I'd been raised on) to butter...that is, until I started baking. Now I can't stand the stuff and have been known to drop $5 or $6 on expensive cultured butters.

Are you a supertaster? A friend of mine who falls into that category did not like fresh truffles when she tried them and described them just that way.

Besides the one I linked to above, on vanilla in baking, Cook's Illustrated did a taste test of vanilla ice creams. They found that, blindfolded, their tasters preferred ice creams made with artificial vanillas. Eyes open, they liked ice cream with black specks -- even though those specks were made from tasteless ground up vanilla pod, not the flavorful seeds.

Thankfully, cultured butter isn't a taste I've really acquired. I prefer regular salted sweet butter. I hope, though, I am never again so poor as to have to give up butter for margarine. (Although, again, it's all about usage. In certain baked goods, margarine, or even Crisco, is better than butter.)

The vanilla thing, to me, is like the root beer tasting years ago where the supermarket brands trounced Sprecher's. Of course they did-- they taste like root beer like you're used to, and Sprecher's is unfamiliar and has multiple flavors.

What tasting cultured butters, European butters, artisanal butters has made clear to me is that there isn't one butter any more than there's one cheese. When I bake French bread, I want the slightly cheesy tang of a cultured butter or even a goat butter to spread on it, but those would be out of place in a muffin. So butter for me is another variable, to be chosen for the task at hand.

I thought of another good one - Russell's Ribs. Addicted since I was 5. Overpriced, dirty, terrible, yet I can literally drink those little cups of sauce, and find myself hosting guys' night there once a month.

I'm not a supertaster (I'm pretty sure, anyhow), but I also find truffle oil has a kind of kerosene-y flavor to it. It actually kind of drives me crazy, because when I smell it, I start drooling instantly, it smells like heaven. I want to DRINK it, it smells so good. The taste in my mouth, though, is layered- heaven with a healthy dousing of gasoline.

I've never had actual truffles to compare, but I'm w/Mhays. I'd rather assume I wouldn't like them, because regular trips to Spiaggia are in no way part of my budget.

Great thread, I don't normally bother with shellfish, fancy steaks, or expensive wines outside of major special occasions because of major budget constrainst. That being said like most on this board i'd be miserable eating pasta-roni or fast food all the time.

As with others, i get hung up on cheese, I think because good cheese it a great way to stretch pasta into a really nice meal without many other ingredients. Seems like I’m spending $10 a week on parm alone.

Lately I’ve been trying to get more of the flavors I love without the expensive proteins, the result has been a lot of pork shoulders, beans, rice curry dishes and simple pastas. I can’t say I’m happier, but I still eat well.

I don't think I've ever had white truffles, but I have had good black truffles in season on their own turf. I also get the gasoline-y taste and smell. And I always ask them to leave the truffle oil off, if I can, since as noted chefs are often quite heavy-handed with it.

Aged balsamic vinegar.
And I've spoiled my SO, too.
When we first started dating "Ya mean there's more than one kind of vinegar?"
Now, "And don't try to pawn that 'aged 10 years' stuff on me. I want the good stuff"

Mike G wrote:The vanilla thing, to me, is like the root beer tasting years ago where the supermarket brands trounced Sprecher's. Of course they did-- they taste like root beer like you're used to, and Sprecher's is unfamiliar and has multiple flavors....

So butter for me is another variable, to be chosen for the task at hand.

The main thing with vanilla really is the task at hand. In baking, especially cookies, which get to higher temperatures, a lot of the volatile complexity of vanilla's flavor cooks off, so the differences between vanillas don't matter. Some artificial vanillas actually retain their flavors better in baking. Then, too, pure vanilla has more alcohol flavor, which may not be appropriate for some uses, and distinctive color, which you may not want in your icing. So vanillin has its uses.

I use artificial vanilla, pure vanilla and homemade vanilla for different purposes. Fortunately, in the amounts one uses, real vanilla isn't that expensive.

Asado coffee beans and others that sell fresh, locally roasted beans. Farmers market garlic, too. Oh, and Prairie Fruits Farm honey. And yeah, aged balasamic. And poaching fish or meat in extra virgin olive oil. And an extra dollar of pork in the ma pow tofu at LSC, thanks to G Wiv.

I don't think I'm a supertaster and for all I know truffles taste like gasoline...I secretly hope so. It's funny - I don't like vanillin in cookies (e.g. vanilla wafers) but I don't mind it in the cream fillings.

So, today, we're going on a picnic lunch - and having homemade bagels with arugula, prosciutto and shaved parmesan (that's another one - strangely, I hated jarred grated cheese even as a kid, but love the expensive wedges. I'm starting to wonder if I wasn't really a "picky eater" but just someone who aspired to greater things.) At least the bagels are cheap...unless you count my hourly wage...