are Gail Vance Civille and Judy Heylmun, and they taste food
for a living. If Frito-Lay, for example, has a new kind of tortilla
chip, they need to know where their chip prototype fits into the
tortilla chip pantheon: How much of a departure is it from their
other Doritos varieties? How does it compare to Cape Cod
Tortilla Chips? Do they need to add, say, a bit more salt?
Civille and Heylmun are the people they send their chips to.
Having lunch with professional food tasters, of course, is a
tricky proposition. After much thought I decided on a restaurant
called Le Madri, in downtown Manhattan, which is the kind of
place where it takes five minutes to recite the list of daily
specials. When I arrived, Heylmun and Civille were seated, two
stylish professional women in business suits. They had already
spoken to the waiter. Civille told me the specials from memory.
A great deal of thought obviously went into the lunch choices.
Heylmun settled on pasta preceded by roasted-pumpkin
chowder with a sprinkling of celery and onion, finished with
crséme fraîche and bacon-braised cranberry beans garnished
with diced pumpkin, fried sage, and toasted pumpkin seeds.
Civille had a salad, followed by risotto with Prince Edward
Island mussels and Manila clams, finished with squid ink. (At Le
Madri, rare is the dish that is not “finished” in some way or