The Incompatible Food Triad | Hacker News Reader

The Incompatible Food Triad

atlasobscura.com

66 pointssamclemens78 comments

Having eaten at a few Michelin three star restaurants, I have come to realize that flavor incompatibilities are all in your head. Seafood flavored ice cream doesn't sound too good, but maybe it is, if you aren't thinking about where the flavors originate. Also, what tastes good is just, like, your opinion man.

Before eating at a Michelin star restaurant, I'd have suggested sea urchin, raw beef and meringue as an incompatible triad.

So you thought they would taste good paired but terrible with all three?

Squid ink ice cream is a thing, isn't it?

Many ice creams have carrageenan in them. It's a thickener / stabilizer derived from seaweed, ergo...

I haven't tried it but Google says it is a thing.

I think flavor in general is very contextual. I routinely enjoy funky, fermented, strong-tasting foods that in a blind tasting with novice participants could probably be mistaken for garbage. As long as I have "culinary permission" to enjoy a food, it's unlikely that I'll find it disguisting, almost regardless of what the ingredients are!

I like your use of "culinary permission", as I'm the same say. If someone tells me a food is safe to eat, I'll give it a chance regardless of how strange it seems.

Yeah, and a nice presentation goes a long way towards removing the context you normally put around a particular food. If something looks appealing, you're more likely to try it, and then you discover flavors you never thought to combine.

When I heard about this, I wrote a Python script to search allrecipes and find solutions (see here: https://github.com/sweeneyrod/three-food-problem). Unfortunately they seem to have changed their website format, so the code doesn't currently work. The most recent generated solutions I can find are: cheese, red wine, rump roast; corn, tart, dill pickle; hot pepper, cocoa, bun; apple, spinach, cup; cheddar, paprika, brown rice; split, tomato paste, maple syrup; crescent roll, cream cheese, apple pie; taco, pie, peanut butter; sour cream, honey, cup; vanilla, maraschino, grape;

As you can see, there are some problems with what things WordNet classes as foods.

> crescent roll, cream cheese, apple pie

That one just looks awesome... well, a crescent roll is similar to pie crust anyway

I feel like red wine and tough beef get you "braised beef", and braised beef and parmigiano is a thing.

Cheddar, paprika, and brown rice also sounds kind of conventional.

Hot pepper, cocoa, bun has me positively salivating in anticipation.

My favorite answer is: tequila, tequila, tequila.

Sorry, nope: back in my student days, I tried that combination on more than one occasion and greatly enjoyed it!

Merely adjust the quantities to fit the individual in question.

Liquor, Beer, Wine?

Its that third drink that turns the night.

I learned this many years ago as the Borromean food problem, after Borromean rings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borromean_rings

Chocolate and brie sounds delicious...I'm going to eat some right now. It sounds like a salty, chocolaty, creamy dream come true. I'm going to have some red wine with it.

Yeah. That's what I thought when I read that.

I tasted some cheese-flavoured speciality chocolate once, you can buy them from the Barcelona chocolate museum.[0] I will not be doing that again. Possibly the most disgusting thing I have ever eaten...

[0] http://www.museuxocolata.cat/museu.php

> Salted cucumbers, sugar, and yogurt might work, but if you count the salt, that’s four ingredients, not three. You might not like the thought of potatoes, mayonnaise and cabbage, but someone has invented a corned beef salad that has all three.

So, which is it? "More than 3 ingredients doesn't count" or "it counts as long as it contains all 3"?

I agree. The article isn't consistent. It references the

> Lemon, cocoa, and curry don’t sound great, but it’s not too hard to imagine a decent lemon mole sauce.

> Salted cucumbers, sugar, and yogurt might work, but if you count the salt, that’s four ingredients, not three.

Mole sauces seem to contain quite a bit more than 3 ingredients, such as chili peppers [1]. If salt counts as a single ingredient, then surely a mole sauce is extremely disqualified. Sugar should also be considered an ingredient.

> Tiffany Inglis, a programmer and digital artist, took some time a few years ago to design a lemon affogato, in order to patently prove that a top Incompatible Food Triad contender—espresso, lemon, and milk—wasn’t so bad after all.

Here is the list of 5-8 ingredients in that affogato [2]:

- 1 cup milk

- 1cup sugar

- ¼ cup condensed milk

- 5 egg yolks, lightly beaten

- 5tbsp lemon zest

- ½ cup fresh lemon juice

- 2 cups heavy cream

- 1 shot of espresso

In my opinion, the only reasonable way of approaching this problem is to strictly limit what counts as an ingredient and to carefully limit the amount of preparation involved to count ingredients as "paired". This way, pickles actually count as two ingredients, due to the vinegar involved. Sugar also cannot be assumed as a glue to bind the triad together. "Curry", being a mixture, could also not count as an ingredient. Therefore, I propose my own solution:

chili powder + espresso = spicy espresso

espresso + lemon juice = sour espresso

chili powder + diluted lemon juice = spicy lemonade

chili power + lemon juice + espresso = spicy sour espresso (bad)

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mole_sauce

[2]: https://www.theguardian.com/science/alexs-adventures-in-numb...

>> Salted cucumbers, sugar, and yogurt might work, but if you count the salt, that’s four ingredients, not three. You might not like the thought of potatoes, mayonnaise and cabbage, but someone has invented a corned beef salad that has all three.

>So, which is it? "More than 3 ingredients doesn't count" or "it counts as long as it contains all 3"?

Not sure what the confusion is, but neither of the two examples counts as "three foods where any two of those foods taste good together, but all three combined taste disgusting". The first example fails (if you count the salt) because it has four foods, not three. The second example fails because someone has made a (presumably non-disgusting) recipe with all three combined.

The question is about flavors, not specific food items.

> Salted cucumbers, sugar, and yogurt

Isn't that cucumber raita, more or less?

When scrounging, I tend to assume that "The Incompatible Food Triad" hypothesis is false ;) But then, I've eaten some strange stuff. Spicy shredded beef fried crispy in sugar syrup, say. Hot-pepper chocolate ice cream.

The addition of other ingredients is required to make an actual dish containing the relevant pairs. So it doesn't matter if A and B, B and C, and A and C all taste good together; if A, B, C, D, E, F and G together taste good, that's counterexample like the corned beef salad. But, the first point is talking about ingredients A, B and C, C and D, and A, B and D, where A is salt and B is cucumber; this is not a triad. Also, the recipes with A and B together would presumable contain A, B and P, Q and R; A, C, S, T and U; B, C, V, W and X; that is, each combination is used to make a dish that has other, ancillary ingredients.

Am I missing something here? What about bread, cheese, and tomatoes? Even the Strawberries/Chocolate/Brie example in the article would not sound horrible to some people — I've had chocolate with cheese on many occasions.

I like caprese on toast, and also just cheese-on-toast with a slice of tomato under it. Both are better with the usual seasonings (basil & olive oil or pepper respectively) but neither are horrible without them.

I agree strawberries/chocolate/brie doesn't sound that horrible, though. That's just a fondue party with two pots, isn't it? Or is that cheating?

How is grilled cheese dipped in tomato soup not delicious?

Bread, cheese, and tomatoes sounds like a perfectly delicious sandwich.

Pizzas are also a pretty popular food I think

bread, cheese and tomatoes are practically a canonical sandwich!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruschetta

Anything that would kill you 3/3 but would be arguably palatable for all 2/3?

It seems to me this is more a chemistry question than a math question. Ignoring the subjectivity element, why is it ever the case that two things that taste good separately taste bad together? Maybe it's because they have a chemical reaction. So maybe what we should be looking for is chemicals that don't react as a pair (or react so slowly you don't notice), but will react in the presence of a catalyst which is pretty inert by itself. So I think one ingredient should be Platinumschlager (which is like Goldschlager except stupider).

There are multi-component reactions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-component_reaction

The Hantzsch reaction looks promising (producing pyridines which are apparently pretty nasty); from looking at which foods contain which compounds, the obvious ones are cinnamon (cinnamaldehyde), apples (malic acid, which links to keto acid, which is linked from β-keto ester... I didn't take organic chemistry), and aged cheese (glutamate, a nitrogen donor).

Apple-cinnamon and apples+cheese are both well-known pairings. The only question is cinnamon cheese, and surprisingly enough there's a review: http://www.thekitchn.com/cheese-review-trader-joes-cinn-1307.... It's apparently pretty good. But, when eating the cheese with the apple, "the cinnamon flavor didn't really enhance the cheese, ironically enough, and so I opted to eat the cheese separately from the fruit." I guess that means this question is solved...?

If we're posting solutions...

Peanut butter + jelly = traditional snack

Jelly + cream cheese = common on pastries

Peanut butter + cream cheese = good cracker spread

Peanut butter + cream cheese + jelly = ???

equals yum!!!

my girlfriend willingly eats the last combo

Chocolate, Pretzels, Mustard.

Chocolate-covered pretzels - great!

Mustard on a pretzel - great!

Chocolate and mustard - http://archive.jsonline.com/features/recipes/159818205.html

All three? WTF!

I think the fact that chocolate and mustard is a thing (and that you had to link to proof of this) is probably a bizarre enough fact to hint that all three might also be somehow workable.

The chocolate mustard used in that brownie recipe is specifically marketed as being good on pretzels. :) http://store.mustardmuseum.com/product/1296/exotic-mustards

coffee+lemon = espresso

coffee+cream = latte

cream+lemon = ricotta

coffee+lemon+cream = curdled mess!

Yeah, you could substitute a lot of stuff for espresso there: chocolate, for example. Basically the curdling reaction is the key there.

It's debatable whether curdled == bad though (e.g. ricotta)

Strain it through some cheese cloth, and it would probably be fine, especially with some cinnamon, grapefruit peel, or chicory.

I'm pretty sure you can make a dessert from ricotta and espresso. A coffee canoli sounds delicious.

You can do a simple cheesecake with ricotta, cream, and sugar (and a biscuit base). Flavour it with coffee, seems like it would taste OK.

Similar:

tea + lemon = good

tea + milk = good

lemon + milk = buttermilk

tea + lemon + milk = Boudica weeps.

spinach, peanut butter, celery

spinach + peanut butter = pra ram (this assuming the ingredients can be cooked)

raw spinach + celery = a salad

raw celery + peanut butter = a common child's snack

spinach + celery + peanut butter together, whether cooked or raw....:/

An apple pie without the cheese, Is like a hug without the squeeze

This was a popular conversation among friends of mine years ago. The best answer a friend of mine had was "tequila, tequila, tequila"

Sesame paste, salt, molasses.

The paste with salt makes tahini sauce, the paste with molasses makes a dessert. All three together sound horrible.

canned sardines, pink bubblegum flavored ice cream, fresh pineapple

If you limit it to just those 3 things then it's easy: Vanilla, Chocolate, ice cream. Vanilla + chocolate = tasty, Chocolate or Vanilla ice cream = tasty. Mixing Vanilla and Chocolate ice cream fails.

The only way it's a problem is they keep adding other stuff such as a banana ice cream Sunday.

You'll find that many people disagree with you on this... https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1...

Yet you don't find chocolate vanilla ice cream pre mixed.

A machine that mixes it for you doesn't count? Or this: http://www.breyers.com/product/detail/113883/vanilla-chocola...

And either way, the challenge would allow chocolate topping to a vanilla icecream base, or chunks of chocolate in a vanilla ice cream. Both of which are extraordinarily common.

Only if there is also a third of it that is strawberry also.

The only ice cream my granfather would buy was neapolitan, aka choc-van-straw.

Chocolate chip ice cream is very popular. Ice cream sandwiches are another popular combination in the US with chocolate cookie bases surrounding a wedge of vanilla ice cream.

Ben and Jerry's Half Baked? (vanilla and chocolate ice cream with chunks of brownie and cookie dough)

Soft serve is still a type of ice cream, at any rate, and I sell a lot more twists than I do chocolate cones at my fast food restaurant. Black and white shakes are also popular. I'm a huge sucker for vanilla soft serve with chocolate syrup drizzled on top. Lots of vanilla+chocolate+ice cream possibilities!

(If you insist, the argument: butterfat is measured by volume and soft serve by default has less because it's aerated a lot more than what you consider to be ice cream. we also have low-fat ice cream but it's still called ice cream. and what do you call gelato if you think butterfat is what defines "ice cream"?)

Geloato and soft serve have different flavor profiles, and of course different names. Ice cream sandwich etc are again different, you would think if it was a good combo someone would have plain old cololate vanilla icc cream pre mixed.

I'm so baffled by your continued denial that this exists, let alone is edible. I already linked to one that's exactly as you describe, the first hit on google for me for chocolate and vanilla ice cream: http://www.breyers.com/product/detail/113883/vanilla-chocola...

That's chocolate and vanilla in the same box, but not mixed. You will see most people go for one side or the other at a party.

I can't understand the mental hoops you're going through to justify this. It's like a real-life version of an invisible dragon: http://lesswrong.com/lw/i4/belief_in_belief/ What even would 'mixed' vanilla and chocolate ice cream be if it's neither machine-swirled soft serve, nor store bought both-ice-creams-in-a-box hard serve nor chunks-of-chocolate-in-vanilla nor chocolate-covering-on-vanilla? Mixed chocolate and vanilla icecream would be called chocolate ice cream! After all, vanilla is an ingredient in chocolate icecream.

Salt is an ingredient in pasta, mixing extra salt and pasta quickly makes it unpalatable. Adding vanilla extract to chocolate ice cream is similarly nasty. Now sure, a hint where it's hard to tell in full chocolate or less chocolate, less vanilla and less cream to make that more bland helps. As does mixing some milk etc. But the full flavors don't mix well.

No one is disputing that it's possible to add too much vanilla to your ice cream recipe.

Please just try this experiment: take a scoop of chocolate and a scoop of vanilla ice creams and mix them together and eat it. Is it unpalatably overly vanilla? No, of course not, it tastes like mildly chocolatey ice cream. Which is to say, it's pretty good.

I'll admit that I'm interested in what contortions you can come up with next to keep justifying this. I'm greatly amused by this conversation.

I have done this with high quality aka strong vanilla ice cream with that real creamy taste and high quality aka strong chocolate ice cream and no it was not tasty.

You can try the same thing what cheaper ingredients by adding the same fairly large quantity of vanilla extract to unflavored ice cream and chocolate ice cream. But, you miss out on some of that strong cream flavor.

PS: Even just good chocolate is hard to find in the US. Hint it has zero wax content and a short shelf life.

Ah, so if I try this, it won't count because it's No True Icecream.

On the other hand, I commend you on being completely consistent and somehow going through with this conversation without a hint of sarcasm, snark or anything other than a deep passion for the subject. More than I can say for myself. But I'll still hold this as perhaps the most surreal exchange I've ever had and can't quite remove the feeling that this was a masterfully executed joke.

No way! "Mixing Vanilla and Chocolate ice cream fails."

Chocolate and vanilla soft serve twist is a thing, a glorious, glorious thing.

https://www.google.com/search?q=vanilla+and+chocolate+soft+s...

"Soft serve is generally lower in milk-fat (3% to 6%) than ice cream (10% to 18%)" So, soft serve is not ice cream IMO.

You are welcome to your opinion, but the fact is that soft serve is ice-cream: "Soft serve is a type of ice cream[0]"

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_serve

In the same way 2% and skim milk are made from milk, but they are not milk Soft serve is related to ice cream but not what I am talking about. </done beating the red mound that used to be something else>

You're splitting hairs to support your opinion. However, while your perspective and opinion enrich the conversation, the facts ensure it is merely an opinion.

You can see it, wish it, present it, however you like, but soft serve is ice cream, that is a fact, and mixing vanilla and chocolate ice-cream does not fail, also a fact, or it would not have survived for more than 60 years[0].

You still don't have to like it.

Additionally, thank you for entertaining such trivial matters with a passion. I have been amused.

[0] http://www.albertleatribune.com/2001/06/column-hes-the-man-w...

I worked at an ice cream shop. Chocolate + vanilla in a shake is called a black and white shake and in a cone is called a twist cone. It's a common enough combo it had its own name.

Most recipes I see for chocolate ice cream include vanilla[0]. Not to mention the typical chocolate vanilla swirl soft serve.

[0] https://www.google.com/amp/www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton...

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