Smoked items at non-bbq places - I expect disappointment

It occurred to me the other night as I was eating yet another clumsily over-smoked dish, that these dishes almost always disappoint. In my experience, it's a rare exception when a smoked ingredient doesn't go way overboard and take the entire dish down with it. Or even worse, when an entire dish is smoked in such manner to suggest that the person who smoked it had very little experience with the process.

Currently, it seems that obsession with smoke has combined with lack of touch to create a trend that perpetuates such unfortunate dishes. I applaud the fact that chefs recognize the value of smokiness -- some of the greatest foods known are smoked -- but so many of these 'new' dishes taste like creosote, ashtrays, burnt furniture or worse.

It's no trick to impart food with smoke. To do so in a way that tastes good and actually enhances the food requires experience, skill and the all-too-rare ability to taste something and admit it to oneself when it goes off the rails.

Hey, just because there are 64 crayons in the box doesn't mean you have to use them all. And if you are going to use them, at least know how to wield them. The bottom line is that unless I know the smoke is being applied deftly, when I see an item on a non-bbq menu that is smoked -- or includes a house-smoked ingredient --it has become an automatic avoid for me.

Ok, rant over.


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On the off chance this is a coded takedown of the everyone-must-drink-Mezcal-all-the-time trend, I'm in full support.

As for abuse of a buzzword flavor profile, seems logical for it to be overused and abused. If everyone is eating a shitty smokey flavor, is it really a shitty flavor?

bweiny wrote:On the off chance this a coded takedown of the everyone-must-drink-Mezcal-all-the-time trend, I'm in full support.

LOL, I actually love mezcal, so no.

bweiny wrote:As for abuse of a buzzword flavor profile, seems logical for it to be overused and abused. If everyone is eating a shitty smokey flavor, is it really a shitty flavor?

As for buzzwords or hot flavor profiles, that's not my concern. I just hate having to experience smoke being applied so clumsily and so harshly all over the damned place. If all this 'new' smoke were executed skillfully, I don't think I would have even thought to start this thread.

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I couldn't agree more with what Ronnie said, and I'd even go a step further to include more than a few BBQ joints.

I rarely eat BBQ that I don't cook myself because so many so-called pitmasters have no clue how to use smoke as an ingredient, rather than as a nasty statement.

ronnie_suburban wrote:I just hate having to experience smoke being applied so clumsily and so harshly all over the damned place. If all this 'new' smoke were executed skillfully, I don't think I would have even thought to start this thread.

I know where you're coming from. I'm just saying that once an ingredient/flavor becomes trendy and marketable, it becomes a race to the most extreme use, in this case smokiness, nuance be damned. It's tough to find efficiency in investing in perfecting something when you'll scrap the profile for the next trendy ingredient in a few months anyways.

bweiny wrote:I know where you're coming from. I'm just saying that once an ingredient/flavor becomes trendy and marketable, it becomes a race to the most extreme use, in this case smokiness, nuance be damned. It's tough to find efficiency in investing in perfecting something when you'll scrap the profile for the next trendy ingredient in a few months anyways.

The hipsters can eat all the nasty creosote-flavored food they want. Just because it's trendy, that doesn't automatically make it good, or something I care to eat.

I can very much tell when a restaurant uses the "smoke machine" or an electric smoker in general... very bad times.

stevez wrote:The hipsters can eat all the nasty creosote-flavored food they want. Just because it's trendy, that doesn't automatically make it good, or something I care to eat.

To be clear - I agree with you 100%. I'm not saying the overuse is a good thing at all. Just that the dilution of what was previously a technique used occasionally, by those who knew what they were doing, is not coincidental, but rather the result of conformity in meeting a valuable subset of customers' expectations.

I bend over backwards to go to independent, predominantly ethnic, restaurants that are not under the empire and foodie-groupthink of Sodikoff, Melmans, etc. (who, in all fairness, are excellent capitalists in the most difficult of markets to conquer).

bweiny wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:I just hate having to experience smoke being applied so clumsily and so harshly all over the damned place. If all this 'new' smoke were executed skillfully, I don't think I would have even thought to start this thread.

I know where you're coming from. I'm just saying that once an ingredient/flavor becomes trendy and marketable, it becomes a race to the most extreme use, in this case smokiness, nuance be damned. It's tough to find efficiency in investing in perfecting something when you'll scrap the profile for the next trendy ingredient in a few months anyways.

Excellent point. Hopefully 'new' smoke gets left for dead as soon as the next whatever wave hits and we can all get on with our lives.

And btw, get off my lawn!

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stevez wrote:. . . and I'd even go a step further to include more than a few BBQ joints.

Sadly, yes. It's also a problem, though not quite as predictable.

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Just pour some white truffle oil over the offending items and you will have a superb, high-end dish.

Even places that should know better have gone crazy with smoking. I got 2 smoked chubs at Kaufman's a few weeks ago that were inedible. They were like petrified wood.

Smoke does not go with everything.
Many years ago at a reputable sushi bar, we got salmon sushi.
The smoke caught you mid bite as it was just smoke and no salt.
Very unsettling to a traditional cold smoked salmon lover.
Never been offered it since!
We mostly smoke ourselves and spend considerable time and resources on smoking.
Only place I order takeout is from Hillary's and that's every few years or so.-Richard

A couple notable happy exceptions by chefs with a deft touch:
Smoked buttermilk sorbet at Elizabeth. Mind-blowingly awesome. Not every item she conceives of will be loved by everyone, but the creativity and flavors definitely wotked here.

Smoked mackerel pate at a restaurant in Amsterdam. Salt and acid balanced the oily, smoky fish perfectly.