Part One was back here
Here is Part Two:
in which How to Save the World temporarily sets aside the
cares and fears of the day and indulges in some essential education, and
then offers a savory segment of prose of somewhat questionable, er, taste.
The item pictured at right is a taste bud, so cool your imagination.
iv. [smell] -- chemistry lesson
From jitterbug perfume by tom robbins:
Tangerine seems to work ok as the top note. It aerates
rather quickly, but it rides the jasmine and doesn't sink completely into
it. With a middle note of jasmine, what we need is a base note with a floor
of iron. It can't just sit there, though, it has to rise up subtly and unite
the tangerine somehow with that bodacious jasmine theme.
From perfume-products.com:
Scents are classified as notes based on their olfactory
character. Top notes are those that are detected and fade first providing
freshness to the blend. They are light scents that are usually citrus or
grasses lasting 5-10 minutes. Middle notes are those that last several hours
and are the most prominent within the fragrance. These are usually combinations
of spicy, floral or fruit scents. Base notes give a perfume depth, last
the longest and are generally animal or woodsy notes. A perfume is a unique
mixture of top, middle, and base notes designed to give a particular harmony
of scents.
Perfumes generally fall into several families based on
the dominant note. These include spicy, leather/tobacco, woody, mossy, citrus,
floral, and oriental, any of which may be formulated for men or women,
although florals are not generally used in men's fragrances. The floral
scents of jasmine and rose are used in most women's perfumes. Many of today's
fragrances contain vanilla or a synthetic form of vanilla. Most men's fragrances
contain patchouli, and musk or synthetic derivatives are used in most fine
fragrances.
Essential oils are aromatic and highly volatile substances
isolated from plant materials. Numerous extracts, each one having a distinctive
character, are used in combination to formulate a fragrance. There is some
overlap in tones or notes with some of these scent extracts. Some such as
rosewood and ylang ylang have middle to base character and clary sage and
fennel have top to middle character.
TOP - Cajaput, cardamon seed, basil, bergamot, citronella,
coriander, eucalyptus, ginger, grapefruit, lemongrass, lemon, orange, lime,
marigold, peppermint, petitgrain, sage, spearmint, tangerine, tea tree.
MIDDLE - Ambrete seed, black pepper, carrot seed, cassia, chamomile, cinnamon,
clove, fir, cypress, juniper, marjoram, melissa, neroli, palmrosa, pine,
rose, rosemary, thyme, yarrow.
BASE- Amyris, anise, angelica root, clary sage, fennel, geranium, lavender,
lavandin, balsam, cedarwood, frankincense, jasmine, myrrh, patchouli, rosewood,
sandalwood, vetivert, ylang ylang.
Carrier oils are used to dilute and carry
the fragrance for use as a perfume. Carrier oils come from nuts and seeds
and are usually pressed out of commercially produced crops. The best carrier
oils are stable to oxidation and have little or no fragrance of their own.
The best choices of carrier oils are sweet almond, apricot, grapeseed, peach
kernel, sesame seed, soybean, sunflower, avocado, wheatgerm and jojoba.
Some of these oils can be used as the only carrier while others are only
safe for skin use at 10-25% of the total. Wheatgerm oil should be avoided
in those people with a wheat allergy and soybean oil can cause acne, allergic
reactions or hair damage. Alcohol is added to perfumes to carry the fragrance
by evaporation as well as dilute the ingredients. Perfumes contain 25% fragrance
and about 75% alcohol and other diluents (carrier oils) by volume while cologne
is composed of more than 90% diluent. Greater amounts of perfume concentrate
translate into a longer lasting fragrance that needs to be reapplied less
but at a higher price.
Fixatives are scented components that act to hold
the fragrance together and regulate evaporation rate for the fragrant components.
The fixatives often provide a base note and character to the mixture.Ambergis
is found in tropical seas or on the shore as a concretion from the intestinal
tract of the sperm whale. It is a gray to black waxy mass, very high in
cholesterol and oil, with a characteristic odor. Ambergis has been in use
since the 6th century. Civet is a semisolid, yellowish to brown, unpleasant
smelling substance from anal glands of the civet cat. The isolated component
civetone, produces a pleasant musky odor when used in extreme dilutions. It
has been in popular use in perfumery since the 10th century. Musk obtained
from plant and animal sources or by chemical synthesis adds a persistent
musky aroma. Natural sources include the musk glands of the male musk deer,
muskrat, and ambrette seeds.
The powerful "odour-memory-emotional recall" connection
is called the Proust effect from his description "that sweet
aroma released the vast structure of recollection"; a Scientific
American study paraphrased this as "scent evokes a powerful and
visceral remembrance, a rare experience of simultaneity". Women
generally have a much stronger sense of smell than men, though sensitivity
varies throughout the menstrual cycle; the leading hypothesis is that this
conveys selective procreation advantage as women sense and select as mates
men whose antibodies (which emit distinctive smells) complement their own.
v. [taste] -- guess
when i woke up i was blindfolded, and tied, déshabillé
, with silk scarves, to the corners of the four-poster.
i'm going to give you ten things
to taste. you have to describe each of them using purely the language of
taste -- sweet, sour, salty, and bitter. if you need help, remember that
sweet tastes strongest at the tip of your tongue, sour at the sides, salty
in the middle, and bitter at the back. in your description you can compare
the flavour to other flavours, but if you use tactile, visual or any other
sensory descriptions, the tasting is over. are you ready?
okay [laughing]
here's number one. stop laughing and open
your mouth.
oh, wow... mmmmm!
uh, uh... no flattery...and that's not a
description. behave. describe the flavour.
salty. sweet. floral. i can't separate the
taste from the smell.
you obviously need a lot of practice. that's
ok. we have lots of time. all day. go on...
mostly salty, like sweat. a bit sweet, like
milk. the floral would break down into 30% sweet, 30% sour, 40% bitter, lovely.
good. number two. ready?
ah, exquisite. [thoughtfully] 80% sour, 20%
sweet. fruity. a perfect minor chord. i wonder why sour flavours make us
drool?
[slapping me] fruity is not one of the four
tastes, and aural references are not allowed, it's a terrible analogy anyway.
you can't compare a combination of flavours to a combination of sounds. and
you were doing so well, too! try again.
i object. it's a perfect analogy. if it had three of the four tastes it would
be like a dominant seventh, and if all four it would be like a major seventh,
dissonant, conflicted, tragic. but with just the two tastes, sour and sweet,
it's a minor chord. if the ratio was reversed, mostly sweet, like clover
honey, it would be a major chord.
the japanese claim there is a fifth taste,
savory, though the taste buds that would support that theory haven't been
found yet. you know what taste buds look like, don't you. they're voluptuous,
obscene. and they just open up and taste everything indiscriminately. miniature
flavour nymphos, spreading for every molecule that comes along. sense sluts.
i suspect youres are especially bad, utterly shameless. here's number three.
[long, lingering, smacking interlude] hmm.
that's not fair. that's the gustatory equivalent of looking in the mirror,
or listening to your ears ring. but i can tell you've been sampling some
of taste number two. clear your palate and give me another taste. [another
lingering, smacking interlude, even longer than the first. i wanted it to
go on forever]. okay. a subdued balance of all four tastes. sweet and bitter
like the floral of number one. you had chamomile tea with honey this morning,
right? and sour from your sampling of taste number two and salty from...
hmmm... [i blushed a little, then smiled]. damn i'm good at this!
pretty smug, aren't we. here's number four. and i want you to be very specific.
i'm going to cover your nose at first, to see whether the olfactory senses
get in the way of your taste perception. ready?
bitter, bitter, and a trace sour. no salt,
very little sweetness. a beaujolais perhaps.
not bad. now try with your nose uncovered.
wow, that does change everything. much more
information. not a beaujolais. maybe a merlot?
keep your day job. chardonnay. without the
colour cues you're hopeless. here's number five. did you know that most human
poisons are bitter, and that scientists think we're programmed to automatically
retch at bitter flavours, which is why they put those taste buds closest
to the gag reflex point?
mmm. no retching at that flavour! all four
tastes, almost in equal balance. no wonder they call it nature's perfect
food. swiss?
lucky guess. here's number six.
mmph...ahh, delicious. let me guess. champagne.
yogurt. hey, you're covering my nose again!
shush... you'll need to taste this very slowly
and carefully to be able to identify the combination of tastes precisely.
in fact the taste may change, so take your time, might need a couple of hours
to keep tasting and think about it...
[laughing] i see what you mean. the taste
is vaguely familiar. mmph...
shut up and keep tasting...mmm...
|
MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
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