Just watched that and was about to comment the same. I wish there was some kind of quantification to this stuff, or at least a subjective graph demonstrating the different aspects of foods and which ones are complementary: flavor, texture, color, smell, etc. if we had this kind of quantified space to explore, i think we could programmatically find some bizarre combinations that taste amazing

Flavour thesaurus is very good, if quite small relative to what I think you want (or I might be projecting -- it's what I want). Would be a good start for seeding the graph anyway, it's a great book.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flavour_Thesaurus?wprov=sf...

I don't think there's as much science to it as he implies but this is how heston blumenthal cooks.

I genuinely can't find the book (it's not modernist cuisine) but he recommended a book which is sort of part chemistry textbook part cookbook.

I think you are talking about to “On Food and Cooking” by Harold McGee. It is a very good book and I do refer to my copy from time to time.

Almost definitely, thanks.

A high-school friend once made a chicken milkshake.

Pot may have been involved.

It was just a dish of prawns served with chocolate sauce. Ramsay made the smoothie and fed it to the blindfolded chef to demonstrate the combination doesn't work.

I've watched that show way too much...

> I've watched that show way too much...

The cultural differences between the UK and US versions are really something

I'm sure reality TV hosted by Gordon Ramsay and whoever's his American counterpart isn't a great example of either's culture, nevermind basis on which to compare them.

Though I haven't seen either. I have seen both original UK & US The Office, which after the first few episodes of the latter (which just uncomfortably rip off the former, making the same jokes but poorly IMO) are each good in their own right, and definitely highlight differences between the respective television cultures, even if not actual society too.

Gordon Ramsay is the host of both that's why it's a good point of comparison - American TV is violent and usually emasculation-porn, the UK version of the show is often very gentle and doesn't feature extremely loud musical cues to tell the audience when to gasp and when to salivate. The media set and follow trends.

Just to pick up the point about the office - the office US is really good, but the office is UK is an order of magnitude deeper. The US version hits it's stride long after they ran out of UK-material.

They do serve as analogues of the countries they're set in, but ultimately the office UK is much more of character study of Brent and is generally really uniquely shot and directed. Michael Scott is funny, Brent is truly tragic.

Also one thing that really annoys me about US television, is that they clearly assume their audience is too stupid to get many gags, i.e. the office UK is full of clever little gags that don't really make you laugh but really sell the format and location of the show, even if you don't notice them.

To prove "British" can be shit too -> Afterlife is rubbish.