Osmazome brillat savarin biography
Today is the birthday () of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, a French lawyer and politician who was, and still is, an enormously..
May 4
Nineteenth century scientist became intrigued by a substance that they referred to as osmazome.
Using literature and his imagination, Brillat–Savarin gives a history of gastronomy.
Osmazome was a substance - or perhaps it was a concept - that had been recogniseable to gourmets everywhere for ever, but was difficult to pin down. Was it a taste? A smell? A single substance?
Osmazome is what the Japanese call 'umami' or 'deliciousness' – the savoury taste characteristic of soy and fish sauces, yeast and meat extracts.A combination of substances?
It was first given its name by a French scientist, M. Thénard, in first few years of the nineteenth century, and was finally defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as A name formerly given to that substance or mixture of substances soluble in water and alcohol which gives meat its flavour and smell; (more generally) meat juice or extract.
Brillat-Savarin, in his Physiology of Taste, described it thus:
Osmazome is the most meritorious ingredient of all good soups.
This portion of the animal forms the red portion of flesh, and the solid parts of roasts. It gives game and venison its peculiar flavor.
Osmazome, discovered after having bee