Category recommendations

Harold McGee is blogging!

My very first encounter with food chemistry and molecular gastronomy was through the first edition of Harold McGee’s book “On food and cooking”. The good news is he has started a blog with News for curious cooks (with the subtitle:…

One more article by Hervé This

Now that I’m at it, I found yet another article by Hervé This entitled Molecular Gastronomy and the Foundation “Food Science and Food Culture”, published in Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety, 2006, 5, 48. About the name…

New article by Hervé This

In a recent issue of EMBO Reports, Hervé This (who coined the term “molecular gastronomy”) writes about “Food for tomorrow? How the scientific discipline of molecular gastronomy could change the way we eat” (free download: html or pdf). He asks:…

Gastro physics

There is certainly some overlap between molecular gastronomy, kitchen chemistry, gastro physics, culinary physics and everyday chemistry… That’s why I thought the January 2004 issue of Physics Education would be of interest. It features a section on food physics, covering…

IgNoble prize for food chemistry!

Slightly off topic, but quite amusing: Last night the IgNoble prizes were awarded. Their slogan reads “First it makes you LAUGH, then it makes you THINK”. The 2006 IgNoble prize in chemistry was awarded to a research group studying “Ultrasonic…

Suppression of bitterness

I received an email last week from a supertaster (read more: BBC, Wikipedia) with an interesting question: Certain foods contain bitter substances that only a fraction of the population can taste. Examples include a group of compounds called cucurbitacins, found…

Video on alginates

My fellow blogger on molecular gastronomy, Göde Schüler (check out his German MG blog Gourmetrics) found a great video on YouTube. The video shows how a red beet paste mixed with alginate solidifies when dripped into a solution of calcium…

Podcasts about kitchen chemistry

Back in 2004 Webjørn Espeland from NRK P2 (Norwegian radio) interviewed me about chemistry in the kitchen. These are now re-aired in the program “Verdt å vite” which can be downloaded as mp3 files (only in Norwegian): August 22, 2006 – Why do you smell after eating garlic? August 24, 2006…