Flavors Quotes

But people, as Alan had once reflected to Greenie, were not at all like recipes. You could have all the right ingredients, in all the right amounts, and still there were no guarantees. Or perhaps they were like recipes, he pondered now, and the key to success was in finding the ingredients you had to remove, the components that turned all the others bitter, excessively salty, difficult to swallow; even too jarringly sweet. He had seen Greenie clarify butter, wash rice, devein shrimp, and meticulously snip the talons from artichoke leaves.

~ Julia Glass

Human beings, in a sense, may be thought of as multidimensional creatures composed of such poetic considerations as the individual need for self-realization, subdued passions for overwhelming beauty, and a hunger for meaning beyond the flavors that enter and exit the physical body.

~ Aberjhani

Whether you're a bride or a birthday boy, your options are much the same. Cake comes in chocolate, yellow, or white. Frosting comes in chocolate or vanilla buttercream, or you can opt for whipped cream. Fillings are either chocolate or vanilla custard, fresh bananas, or strawberries or raspberries in season. For birthday cakes, you can have either flowers or balloons in your choice of colors. For wedding cakes, you can add either fondant or marzipan covering, or either smooth or basket-weave buttercream, in white or ivory, with either pearl-like dots or ribbony swags made of frosting, and fondant faux flowers are extra.

~ Stacey Ballis

I knew that sunny citrus helped put things in focus, sharpened the memory, just like a squeeze of lemon juice could sharpen and clarify the taste of sweet fruit. I was also well aware that too much citrus could indicate a corrosive anger. My first wedding at Rainbow Cake had taught me that. But this was a gentle, subdued citrus, like the taste of a Meyer lemon.Spice usually indicated grief, a loss that lingered for a long time, just like the pungent flavor of the spice itself, whether it was nutmeg or allspice or star anise. The more pronounced the flavor, the more recent the loss and the stronger the emotion. So there was some kind of loss or remembrance involved here. Yet there was also a comfort in the remembering, knowing that people had gone before you. That they waited for you on the other side.

~ Judith Fertig

She couldn't see the homemade colored sprinkles, the tender yellow cake, or the pale pink frosting made with strawberry syrup enhanced with a little rosewater. Although our local strawberries weren't in season yet, I had conjured the aroma and taste of juicy berries warmed by the sun. I hoped this flavor would help the two old people return once more to their youth and the carefree feeling of a summer day.

~ Judith Fertig

I love the caraway seeds in the classic rye bread, but I wonder if the rich dough might not also hold up to other flavors. I jot down some notes. Aniseed. Fennel seed. Orange zest. Golden raisins. Coarse salt? Maybe if Herman doesn't come down when I am working on the dough, I can use a small batch for a little experiment. I'm thinking rolls, not loaves. The kind of rolls you want to smear with cold sweet butter at dinner, or split and toast and spread with cream cheese for breakfast. Savory and sweet. Maybe semolina on the bottom instead of the coarser cornmeal we use for the regular rye loaves.

~ Stacey Ballis

The cake is pretty simple; they didn't want anything too fancy. Two tiers. The bottom is the Frango mint tier from the cake contest, but the top is a new one. An almond cake with a whipped honey caramel filling and a layer of thinly sliced spiced poached pears, with vanilla buttercream. The whole cake will get a smooth white fondant coating, and then a detailed lace pattern hand-piped with white royal icing. They've opted out of toppers, so I've made some simple wildflowers out of gum paste, colored with the powdered food colors to look incredibly real.

~ Stacey Ballis

When I lived in New York and went to Chinatown, I learned that these flavors and their meanings were actually a foundation of ancient Chinese medicine.Salty translated to fear and the frantic energy that tries to compensate for or hide it.Sweet was the first flavor we recognized from our mother's milk, and to which we turned when we were worried and unsure or depressed.Sour usually meant anger and frustration.Bitter signified matters of the heart, from simply feeling unloved to the almost overwhelming loss of a great love. Most spices, along with coffee and chocolate, had some bitterness in their flavor profile. Even sugar, when it cooked too long, turned bitter. But to me, spice was for grief, because it lingered longest.

~ Judith Fertig