Blink

tasters are taught a very specific vocabulary, which allows them
to describe precisely their reactions to specific foods.
Mayonnaise, for example, is supposed to be evaluated along six
dimensions of appearance (color, color intensity, chroma, shine,
lumpiness, and bubbles), ten dimensions of texture
(adhesiveness to lips, firmness, dense-ness, and so on), and
fourteen dimensions of flavor, split among three subgroups —
aromatics (eggy, mustardy, and so forth); basic tastes (salty,
sour, and sweet); and chemical-feeling factors (burn, pungent,
astringent). Each of those factors, in turn, is evaluated on a 15-
point scale. So, for example, if we wanted to describe the oral
texture of something, one of the attributes we would look at is
slipperiness. And on the 15 -point slipperiness scale, where o is
not slippery at all and 15 is very slippery, Gerber’s Beef and
Beef Gravy baby food is a 2, Whitney’s vanilla yogurt is a 7.5,
and Miracle Whip is a 13. If you taste something that’s not quite
as slippery as Miracle Whip but more slippery than Whitney’s
vanilla yogurt, then, you might give it a 10. Or take crispiness.
Quaker’s low-fat Chewy Chocolate Chunk Granola Bars are a 2,
Keebler Club Partners Crackers are a 5, and Kellogg’s Corn
Flakes are a 14. Every product in the supermarket can be
analyzed along these lines, and after a taster has worked with