An idea has been floating around that has me scratching my head a bit but also wondering what we mean by "better" sometimes. Today, Jeff Alworth wrote "Do Women Taste Better Than Men?" after reading Melissa Cole's link to an article in The Sun included in her post entitled "Women Better Beer Tasters". It got me wondering because I thought a bit of idea creep was going on.
It appears pretty well established that there are non-tasters, moderate tasters and supertasters in both genders, with a rough 25-50-25 ratio across the population. Tasting perception changes with age. It is also affected by personality and dietary experience. It differs in gender with 35% of Caucasian women being supertasters compared to 15% of Caucasian men. And Caucasians have a lower percentage of supertasters than Asians, according to The Independent from the UK.
There are plenty of variables on the go but at its most basic, supertasting is about intensity of perception. Here is a description of a supertasting woman's experience of beer:
"I can't stand cake," says Michelle Triplett, a 31-year-old stay-at-home mom and supertaster from Olympia, Wash., who spoke, coincidentally, on her birthday. "It's too sweet for me. And when I drink beer, I gag. It's like drinking urine."
Mmmm... urine. Is that better taste perception, simply greater sensitivity or a greater appreciation for beer? Depends on what you are looking for, I suppose. If you are looking for someone to detect an off putting bitterness as a means to diagnose brewing errors - like a canary in a coal mine - go for a supertaster. If you like your supertasters Caucasian, well, that means you are more likely looking for a female supertaster given they represent 70% of the category. It might not be the case with other ethnicities and, even with that, 65% of the Caucasian female population are not supertasters. They are just like 85% of the paler men. But if you are looking to find out what most people want, scientists looking into the perceptions of bitterness in beer sometimes aim at a moderate tasters as they can give a "better prediction than the overall data"... whatever that means.
So, is intensity of perception all there is to tasting? Is a super taster going to tell you what DIPA or blackened imperial stout is more balanced? Maybe not. Maybe for that you want other skills, too - other tasters more representative of the general population or that part of your population that you are aiming to serve. Is that the idea creep? Is there a big difference between being a better taster of beer and the taste of better beer? Could be. One may involve what seems like a mouthful of piss. But that might be the thing we need experienced and reported upon along our way to a better tasting glass of beer.
Comments
Stephen Beaumont - July 6, 2010 9:43 AM
Supertasting is only a part of the equation, Alan, and not even half of it, at that. Olfaction, or the sense of smell, plays a major role in taste perception, and according to the author of one of the few books on the subject, Rachel Herz, there is some evidence that women are better than men in this regard, although it is not definitive. Fact is, there appears to be much about both taste and smell that we still don't know. (It was only relatively recently, for instance, that umami was added to the principle taste perceptions, and also that the whole "we taste sweet, sour, bitter and salty on different parts of the tongue" thing was thoroughly debunked.)
I have been tested and found to be a supertaster, but I can assure you that beer does not generally remind me of urine. (Although there was that one suspect beer in a homebrew competition I judged some years back.) Which brings to mind the question: how does it remind her of the taste of urine, anyway? I would suggest that perhaps she is reacting not at all as a supertaster in that regard -- which trait would normally bring the bitterness to the fore -- but to an intensity of smell that makes her recall urine. In that regard, there might be an emotional key at play, since smell is the only sense we have which is hard-wired into the emotional core of the brain -- hence the strength of memory that certain smells will evoke.
As I noted at the outset, there's a lot involved in all this and little of it is as cut and dried as that original article would have the reader believe. I strongly recommend Herz's book, The Scent of Desire, as a great place to go for further reading.
Alan - July 6, 2010 10:22 AM
Excellent information, Mr. B. I bet at the end of the day so many factors play into it that each person stands largely on their own - but that includes of course women. So, again, my quibble might be use of "better" as "accurate" or "attentive" or even focused on a set of perceptions to the detriment of others. Then there is the secondary use of the data of perception. I thought the point about medium tasters being the marketplace was a good one.
I had come across an interesting article that I can't lay my cursor on at the moment about East Asian immigrants in London and their perception of spices. Apparently, some older female members of the test group were able to use the word "bland" to describe things that you and I might find extremely strong tasting (and smelling).
On the pee reaction, I would only note the Sauvignon blanc experience - some perceive cat pee and some perceive gooseberries. You are going to have to do a lot of work to overcome the cat pee reaction but it would really be much simper to give them a Riesling.
Lisa - July 6, 2010 2:03 PM
I'm a supertaster/female/beer judge...and I can't stand wine. Every variety I've tried just tastes like (different kinds of) vinegar to me - and while there are certain beers styles I don't care for (typically lambics, although I don't mind some individual beers, and rauchbiers are out for me - both flavor profiles are overpowering for my overly-sensitive palate) , I can always find something I like. We supertasters are actually rather under-studied; I'm a tricky one since I like certain types of bitter things (IPAs, for example), but can't stand something like coffee (although a stout or porter with some coffee undertones is just fine - go figure). It's much more complex - and complicated - than one might think at first glance - and that's before you start working texture into the equation...
Jeff Alworth - July 7, 2010 2:05 PM
As I speculated in my own post, I think attention is a major factor in all of this. At least when we're talking about the general population. As for supertasting et al, I suspect in twenty years we'll know a lot more.
FWIW, my wife, who generally has a better palate than me, has a lesser nose. That's where I make up ground. I think Stephen's right there, and I wonder if we shouldn't be spending at least as much time on olfaction as papillae.
Alan - July 7, 2010 2:18 PM
I married into a family of apparent super tasters (male and female) and (with all due respect) it makes for a pretty dull menu. They reject anything that I think has flavour. I heard that many chefs are drawn from low tasters who got into the job driven by their need to turn up the volume of flavour intensity.
I suspect I am a boring old middle taster but one with a really good memory for the experience of tasting and smelling. I can think of the difference between, say, a sultana and Thompson raisin and think of beers I have had that align with each as a pleasant daydreaming exercise.