PSA: I finally understood my old chef's obsession with tasting spoons.

I was plating a new halibut dish last week and realized I'd been tasting from the main pan, not a clean spoon each time. A new cook pointed it out, saying the sauce tasted 'different' at the end. How many subtle flavors did I mess up over the years? Anyone else have a basic habit they corrected way too late?

2 comments

2 Comments

lilyb2727d ago

Yeah, that's a brutal lesson to learn the hard way. Susan424 has a point about reduction, but a dirty spoon adds its own layer of old flavor that throws everything off. I keep a small deli container of water on my station just to drop used spoons in, so I'm forced to grab a clean one every single time.

susan42427d ago

Wait, are you sure it was the tasting spoons? I've seen that happen more from letting a sauce reduce too far in the pan between tastes. The flavor concentrates and gets saltier, so the next ladle from the main batch tastes weaker by comparison. Could that be what your cook noticed?