WEBVTT - Why Do Frogs Taste Like Chicken? 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:05.480 Hey, welcome to sign Stuff, a production of iHeartRadio or 0:00:05.559 --> 0:00:08.879 Hitchham and today we are answering the question why does 0:00:08.920 --> 0:00:14.080 frog taste like chicken? Or why does alligator or rabbit 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:17.759 for that matter. Those are all very different animals, and 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:22.560 yet people say they all taste like poultry. To verify this, 0:00:22.680 --> 0:00:25.040 we're going to do a taste test, and then we're 0:00:25.040 --> 0:00:28.120 going to talk to several experts, including a couple of 0:00:28.240 --> 0:00:31.640 meat scientists and a biologist. It's going to take us 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:35.560 through millions of years of evolution to find out where 0:00:35.600 --> 0:00:40.840 all meat comes from. So apologies to vegans, but get 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:43.120 ready to get to the meat of the matter as 0:00:43.159 --> 0:00:47.360 we answer the question why does frog taste like chicken? 0:00:53.840 --> 0:00:54.000 Hey? 0:00:54.080 --> 0:00:56.840 Everyone, Okay, In this episode, we're going to take a 0:00:56.920 --> 0:01:00.600 deep dive into what makes meat taste to way it does. 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:03.920 But first I wanted to find out if it really 0:01:04.040 --> 0:01:08.560 is true that so many different animals taste like chicken. 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:11.560 I mean, it's kind of a recurring joke to have 0:01:11.680 --> 0:01:15.399 someone eat an unusual kind of meat and then say, hmm, 0:01:16.120 --> 0:01:20.880 taste like chicken. So in the name of science, I 0:01:20.959 --> 0:01:24.319 decided to try this out. And to do this, I 0:01:24.360 --> 0:01:27.920 started by going to a specialty meat store here in 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:38.640 Los Angeles. I'm standing outside a butcher shop called Harmony Farms, 0:01:39.200 --> 0:01:48.320 and outside I see signs of turkey, chicken, lamb, buffalo, venison, rabbit, peasant, quail, deer, elk. 0:01:49.520 --> 0:01:51.640 All right, let's go inside. 0:01:52.840 --> 0:01:56.120 So I'm looking to buy some meat that people say 0:01:56.320 --> 0:01:57.520 taste like chicken. 0:01:58.440 --> 0:02:00.920 On top of my hand, trying to think rabbit. They 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:04.120 say it tastes like chicken. Rattlesteaks another one. But this 0:02:04.200 --> 0:02:07.320 is legal to sell in California. You can get in Nevada, 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:09.079 but not in California. 0:02:09.440 --> 0:02:12.040 I've heard alligator meat also tastes like chicken. 0:02:12.720 --> 0:02:15.440 I want to say, that's more like a fishy taste. 0:02:15.800 --> 0:02:17.040 Okay, but we do have that. 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:20.520 Also, I don't have a customer that bought some. She's 0:02:20.520 --> 0:02:23.880 a chef from downtown LA. She bought alligator to make 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:24.720 the beach out of it. 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:26.560 That's interesting. 0:02:26.560 --> 0:02:28.120 What about a frog? Do you have frog? 0:02:28.200 --> 0:02:30.160 We also have frog in that one. Consider that like 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:32.720 another fishy taste because you can see off the bat 0:02:32.840 --> 0:02:35.400 texture is real white and it looks like fish. 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:40.400 Okay, yeah, so frog, alligator? Have you tried these meats? 0:02:41.000 --> 0:02:41.280 I tried. 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:44.000 I like rabbit it's pretty good. It's like a white 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:46.760 meat you can fry, you can do a soup. 0:02:47.440 --> 0:02:48.919 I think I will take all the ones you put 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:49.160 it up. 0:02:50.200 --> 0:02:53.800 Do you think some seasoning, maybe some lemon pepper seasoning, 0:02:53.960 --> 0:02:55.560 or you know, salt and peppers also good? 0:02:55.639 --> 0:02:57.720 So you want to take the meat you don't want 0:02:57.760 --> 0:03:02.720 to with like a right good thickness. Thank you, yes, sir? 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:08.360 All right, exotic meats secured. The next thing I needed 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:11.960 to do was to do a taste test. So I 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:16.040 took each kind of meat and cooked it. I sprinkled 0:03:16.040 --> 0:03:19.920 the little salt, little corn starch, and then I roasted 0:03:19.919 --> 0:03:25.760 them and for tasters, I decided to recruit my kids. 0:03:28.080 --> 0:03:30.959 That's because A I did this the night before the 0:03:31.120 --> 0:03:33.760 edit for this episode was due, and they were the 0:03:33.760 --> 0:03:36.520 only ones willing to eat a bunch of mystery meats 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:40.520 late at night, and b because kids are notoriously honest 0:03:40.800 --> 0:03:43.320 about what they think when it comes to food. 0:03:43.960 --> 0:03:45.560 If you're a parent, and I think you. 0:03:45.520 --> 0:03:52.360 Know what I'm talking about. So here's how that experiment went. Okay, 0:03:52.400 --> 0:03:55.320 I'm gonna give you four meats and you're just gonna 0:03:55.320 --> 0:03:56.520 tell me what do you think of it? 0:03:57.200 --> 0:03:57.640 Okay? 0:03:59.000 --> 0:03:59.560 Very dark? 0:04:01.160 --> 0:04:06.960 Yeah, what do you think very extra quish? Oh, it 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:09.200 was like very hard. 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:18.520 It's like an overpowering like gamey game me. 0:04:18.680 --> 0:04:24.479 Tastes tastes like chicken. Does not taste like chicken. Chicken. 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:29.039 Probably the rabbit or the alligator alligator meat. 0:04:29.839 --> 0:04:37.960 Yeah, that was the alligatory. 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:41.120 Now I can. 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:47.400 Say, okay, it's just a lot better. Very chicken, very chicken, 0:04:47.680 --> 0:04:53.919 chicken chicken like the texture yea, the taste and. 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:56.480 Taste that is actually chicken. 0:04:57.240 --> 0:05:01.160 Oh, just kidding, it's not one. 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:10.200 It's rabbit. Let's have cannibalism. No, this is probably the 0:05:10.279 --> 0:05:10.920 frog meat. 0:05:13.279 --> 0:05:17.560 Yup, what do you think it is very mushy? No, 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:23.400 how about the taste chicken. Taste tas like chicken. That 0:05:23.640 --> 0:05:32.240 was actually chicken. Okay, last one. 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:38.160 Tastes like chicken. What does it look like? 0:05:39.000 --> 0:05:42.600 Frog remains taste more like chicken than the others. 0:05:43.279 --> 0:05:46.479 Tastes more like chicken than the chicken. Yeah. So the 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:52.719 alligator meat definitely tastes like chicken. Tastes like overcooked. Okay. 0:05:52.800 --> 0:05:54.200 What do you think of your dad experimenting? 0:05:55.880 --> 0:05:56.560 I'm sewing. 0:05:59.560 --> 0:05:59.880 Okay. 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:03.279 I was pretty surprised by these results. So to recap, 0:06:04.200 --> 0:06:09.200 alligator doesn't quite taste like chicken. Rabbit could totally pass 0:06:09.200 --> 0:06:14.400 his chicken, and frog apparently tastes more like chicken than chicken. 0:06:15.480 --> 0:06:19.040 And this is surprising because all these animals are pretty 0:06:19.080 --> 0:06:23.280 far away from each other in the evolutionary tree of life. 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:27.120 I mean, a chicken is a bird, frogs are amphibians, 0:06:27.520 --> 0:06:32.080 alligators are reptiles, and rabbits are mammals. They couldn't be 0:06:32.160 --> 0:06:35.440 more different from each other, and yet they all taste 0:06:35.680 --> 0:06:36.760 fairly similar. 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:38.000 How can that be? 0:06:38.640 --> 0:06:40.720 To get to the bottom of this, I reached out 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:44.480 to a couple of meat experts. The first is Professor 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:45.880 John Gonzalez. 0:06:48.920 --> 0:06:51.960 My name is doctor John Michael Gonzalez. I am a 0:06:52.120 --> 0:06:55.560 professor at the University of Georgia and the Department of 0:06:55.560 --> 0:07:00.280 Animal Dairy Sciences. My special reality is muscle bio ging 0:07:00.360 --> 0:07:05.320 and meat science. So we study anything from embryo development 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:08.960 all the way through the powder rays livestock species to 0:07:09.200 --> 0:07:14.640 produce poadable and nutritious muscle products for consumers to eat. 0:07:14.760 --> 0:07:18.320 And so I've been doing this around thirteen years now professionally. 0:07:19.680 --> 0:07:22.440 Okay, So my thinking going into this was that what 0:07:22.520 --> 0:07:26.040 people think of as meat is usually the muscles of 0:07:26.080 --> 0:07:29.200 the animal and so I wanted to know, how is 0:07:29.200 --> 0:07:33.120 the muscle of say a frog or a rabbit different 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:37.720 than the muscle of say a chicken. Okay, so for 0:07:37.760 --> 0:07:40.880 those of us that are not familiar, meat is usually 0:07:40.960 --> 0:07:44.200 the muscle of the animals. Do all animals use the 0:07:44.320 --> 0:07:45.800 same muscles? 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:48.680 Yeah, that's a great question. I would say, for the 0:07:48.720 --> 0:07:52.080 most part, most animals on the earth do have the 0:07:52.120 --> 0:07:55.320 same type of skeleton muscle. And so when I think 0:07:55.360 --> 0:08:00.360 about our livestock species and anything birds, cattle, pigs, deep, 0:08:00.680 --> 0:08:03.480 you know, my dogs that are there, the overall principle, 0:08:03.520 --> 0:08:06.600 it's the same of how muscle contraction works, how the 0:08:06.720 --> 0:08:09.440 muscles put together. There is a colleague that I had 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:13.920 from Kansas State University, and she studied the fruit fly 0:08:14.960 --> 0:08:19.120 in fly muscles, and they had the same exact biology, 0:08:19.280 --> 0:08:21.480 and so I would say, yes, for the most part, 0:08:21.520 --> 0:08:23.200 they're all exactly the same. 0:08:23.440 --> 0:08:26.560 Wow, So maybe we should be asking whether fly meat 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:28.000 tastes the same as chicken too. 0:08:28.440 --> 0:08:29.320 Yeah. 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:30.880 I don't even know how you would be able to 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:34.800 collect that much fly meat. I guess sure mostly must 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:36.640 have eaten a fly once or twice in our lives 0:08:36.679 --> 0:08:40.040 of accident. So my hypothesis would be it would taste 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:40.880 the same as chicken. 0:08:41.800 --> 0:08:42.760 All right, this is. 0:08:42.720 --> 0:08:46.000 A really big clue about the mystery we're trying to 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:52.680 solve today. As different as animals like alligators, birds, raccoons, snakes, 0:08:53.120 --> 0:08:58.360 even fruit flies and dinosaurs are their meat or mussels 0:08:58.840 --> 0:09:03.280 are kind of the same. Can you dig a little 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:07.200 bit deeper. You mentioned muscle structure. Can you give us 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:09.960 a breakdown of what muscle is for all of these 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:10.880 different animals. 0:09:11.040 --> 0:09:13.560 Yeah. Yeah, the whole muscle that we're used to seeing 0:09:13.600 --> 0:09:17.160 the steak in the grocery retail case that is comprised 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:22.319 of many bundles. Those muscle bundles are composed of muscle fibers. 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:27.680 So the basic unit of muscle is the muscle fiber. 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:31.440 Some interesting facts about muscle fibers are that they're the 0:09:31.480 --> 0:09:35.280 only cells in animals and in your body with more 0:09:35.360 --> 0:09:39.880 than one nucleus. Every other cell has one nucleus each, 0:09:40.360 --> 0:09:45.280 but muscle fibers can have hundreds of nuclei. Also, the 0:09:45.400 --> 0:09:49.240 number of muscle cells you or any animal is born 0:09:49.280 --> 0:09:52.120 with is the number of muscle cells they're going to 0:09:52.160 --> 0:09:54.000 have for the rest of their lives. 0:09:56.120 --> 0:10:00.120 Your muscle cell numbers determined that birth are certainly at 0:10:00.520 --> 0:10:03.640 depending on species. So I always tell students to compare 0:10:03.679 --> 0:10:05.920 me to the rock. He probably has a lot more 0:10:06.080 --> 0:10:08.800 muscle cells than I do. Because I don't know, I 0:10:08.840 --> 0:10:11.160 blame my mom, I guess, so she hears it should 0:10:11.200 --> 0:10:13.400 be mad at me. But but yeah, I say, my 0:10:13.440 --> 0:10:15.800 mom didn't give me a lot of muscle sell and 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:18.160 I will admit to you, Yes, I do not work out. 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:20.959 So that's part of the small too. 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:23.880 No, no, it's biology. I taken solid. Yeah, it's not 0:10:24.000 --> 0:10:24.920 your fault. 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:26.760 Okay. 0:10:26.960 --> 0:10:32.160 So inside muscle fibers are repeated bundles of long proteins 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:35.480 called actin and myocin. You might have heard of these. 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:38.720 They pull and slide past each other, and that is 0:10:38.760 --> 0:10:43.559 how muscles contract and create a force. These two proteins 0:10:43.760 --> 0:10:48.479 are the workhorse of all movement in the animal kingdom. 0:10:48.800 --> 0:10:53.079 All animals basically use these two proteins, and that includes 0:10:53.120 --> 0:11:04.319 animals as diverse as jellyfish, octopuses, elephants, hyenas and ticks, slugs, salamanders, pterodactyls, whales, 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:08.840 all animals. We'll get to why all animals have the 0:11:08.880 --> 0:11:12.360 same muscles later in the program, but this is one 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:17.360 reason frogs tastes like chicken. The meat is basically made 0:11:17.440 --> 0:11:20.760 of the same proteins. If you were to strip down 0:11:20.920 --> 0:11:23.520 the meat of any animal on Earth down to the 0:11:23.640 --> 0:11:27.840 proteins acting and lycin, they would all taste the same. 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:31.840 Now you're probably thinking, but orgey, then what makes beef 0:11:32.160 --> 0:11:36.120 taste like beef or pork tastes like pork? And you 0:11:36.160 --> 0:11:41.760 still haven't answered why specifically frogs tastes like chicken. Well, 0:11:41.800 --> 0:11:44.559 when we come back, we'll answer all of these questions 0:11:44.600 --> 0:11:48.120 and trust me, we'll serve it to you. Well done, 0:11:48.280 --> 0:12:06.280 so stay with us. You're listening to sign stuff and 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:06.760 we're back. 0:12:08.000 --> 0:12:08.360 Okay. 0:12:08.520 --> 0:12:11.559 We talked about how all animals use the same two 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:16.160 proteins myocin and actin to build their muscles, which means 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:20.240 they should all taste the same. Everything should taste like chicken. 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:25.000 But clearly and thankfully, if you like meat, that doesn't happen. 0:12:25.559 --> 0:12:28.960 Lamb doesn't taste like turkey, which doesn't taste like fish 0:12:29.440 --> 0:12:32.440 or snake. So what is it about the different meats 0:12:32.559 --> 0:12:35.440 that make them taste the way they do? I asked 0:12:35.440 --> 0:12:40.079 doctor Gonzalaz this question. Okay, let's get into the topic 0:12:40.120 --> 0:12:45.120 of taste in meat. What makes meat taste a certain way. 0:12:45.640 --> 0:12:47.960 So surprisingly you don't have anything to do with the 0:12:48.000 --> 0:12:50.880 miralofibular or the mussel protein. It has to do with 0:12:50.960 --> 0:12:54.880 the fat. So it's all fat driven. Okay. So chickens, 0:12:54.880 --> 0:12:57.960 a private example, should not have a lot of fat 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:01.800 in it, and so it's a lie lean source of protein, 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:04.200 but doesn't have the most fat in the world, and 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:06.600 so it's not very flavorful. And so if you think 0:13:06.600 --> 0:13:09.680 about beef has a lot more fat, people go for 0:13:09.840 --> 0:13:13.080 the beef flavor because they enjoy how that tastes, and 0:13:13.120 --> 0:13:14.840 so it all has to do with how much fat 0:13:14.920 --> 0:13:17.040 you have in there. So I go to Japan a 0:13:17.080 --> 0:13:20.040 lot eating that wagou beef. You know, I don't even 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:22.719 really have to put salt on that type of wagoo 0:13:22.840 --> 0:13:25.960 because it's so flavorful that And so when you go 0:13:26.240 --> 0:13:29.520 and you buy different types of lean grinds and say 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:32.560 for handiger meat eighty twenty seventy three whatever, you could 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:36.360 probably taste the difference there of how much beefy flavor 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:39.199 you would have going through there. And so that's why 0:13:39.240 --> 0:13:41.280 a lot of those species, you know, like frogs, that 0:13:41.360 --> 0:13:43.560 have a lot of lean tissue and not very much 0:13:43.600 --> 0:13:45.640 fat in there. They all taste the same. 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:48.240 So what you're saying is that really the taste of 0:13:48.360 --> 0:13:50.880 what we think of as a chicken is really just 0:13:50.920 --> 0:13:55.000 a taste of that myofibrillar, those myofibrillar sells. 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:57.520 Yeah, for the most part, yes, because it doesn't have 0:13:57.559 --> 0:13:59.040 a lot of fat in it. It does have a 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:02.360 little bit of fat, but it doesn't have the most 0:14:02.480 --> 0:14:03.880 compared to the other species. 0:14:05.120 --> 0:14:07.760 So what doctor Gonzalez is saying is that it's not 0:14:07.880 --> 0:14:11.160 really the mussel to give a meat it's distinct flavor. 0:14:11.720 --> 0:14:12.880 It's the fat in it. 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:16.600 And so the reason frog or rabbit taste like chicken 0:14:16.880 --> 0:14:20.440 is that these are all lean meats with low fat, 0:14:20.520 --> 0:14:23.200 and so most of what you're left with is the protein, 0:14:23.640 --> 0:14:26.480 which is what we associate with the taste of chicken. 0:14:27.040 --> 0:14:29.440 If you had never eaten chicken in your life, and 0:14:29.480 --> 0:14:32.200 you lived in a culture that ate frog all the time, 0:14:32.600 --> 0:14:35.040 then when you did eat chicken for the first time, 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:39.160 you would probably say it tastes like frog. In fact, 0:14:39.200 --> 0:14:42.840 the protein and the fat are so interchangeable that doctor 0:14:42.880 --> 0:14:46.560 Gonzalad says, you can make any meat taste like any 0:14:46.600 --> 0:14:47.200 other meat. 0:14:49.600 --> 0:14:52.280 You know, I could take the fat from a lamb, 0:14:52.560 --> 0:14:54.680 and I could mix it in ground beef and make 0:14:54.720 --> 0:14:57.760 it taste like lamb a little claw, yeah, and it 0:14:57.800 --> 0:15:00.600 would be like, ooh, that's kind of different profile if 0:15:00.600 --> 0:15:03.040 you told them supposed to be beef flavors some people, 0:15:03.200 --> 0:15:05.680 let's say that, you know, wow, that's all. Or I 0:15:05.720 --> 0:15:07.560 could take some pork fat and mix it in with 0:15:07.640 --> 0:15:11.000 something and it would taste very Dutch like pork too. 0:15:11.200 --> 0:15:14.240 And so you could always manipulate by taking those fat 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:17.440 sources and doing that. Now hardly nobody does that, but 0:15:17.560 --> 0:15:20.479 that's how you can manipulate some of those products. 0:15:20.720 --> 0:15:23.840 That is fascinating. I feel like you're saying that all 0:15:23.880 --> 0:15:25.440 meat tastes like chicken. 0:15:25.880 --> 0:15:29.320 Yeah, and theory, if it has zero very little fat 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:31.440 in it, they all should taste the salmon. As being 0:15:31.520 --> 0:15:34.840 taught meat science, they said, if we took every specta 0:15:34.880 --> 0:15:36.840 fat out of a meat product and put them all 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:38.360 in front of you, you wouldn't be able to tell 0:15:38.400 --> 0:15:39.560 us what species it is. 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:45.200 Wow. Okay, So that answer is the first big question 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:48.720 we had, which is why does frog taste like chicken? 0:15:49.040 --> 0:15:51.800 And the answer is that both meats are lean with 0:15:51.960 --> 0:15:55.000 low fat, and so most of what you're tasting are 0:15:55.000 --> 0:15:59.400 the proteins which all animals share. But now this raises 0:15:59.520 --> 0:16:03.720 two one how exactly does the fat give you the 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:08.000 unique taste of each kind of meat? And two why 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:12.200 is it that all animals use the same muscles? To 0:16:12.240 --> 0:16:16.080 answer the first question, taker Gonzalez preferring meat to Professor 0:16:16.240 --> 0:16:21.040 Jared Legeco, another meat scientist and one who specializes in 0:16:21.160 --> 0:16:22.640 meat flavor. 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:29.640 I am a faculty member at Texas Tech University, and 0:16:29.960 --> 0:16:33.600 I study food and meat science. My research tends to 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:36.480 focus on safety, but more so on the quality. Again, 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:39.560 where we're looking at things like how meat holds up 0:16:39.640 --> 0:16:44.240 during storage, the factors that influence tenderness, juiciness, and flavor. 0:16:44.600 --> 0:16:47.440 Fantastic. It sounds like you're a perfect expert for us 0:16:47.480 --> 0:16:49.800 to talk to today, So I thought I'd start by 0:16:49.840 --> 0:16:53.320 asking you what makes meat, any meat taste the way 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:53.800 it does. 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:57.200 Right when we say it tastes, we use that term 0:16:57.520 --> 0:17:01.560 to predominantly meat flavor. Flavor is the combination of taste 0:17:01.600 --> 0:17:08.119 and aroma. So taste would be those five sensations sweet, sour, salty, bitter, 0:17:08.680 --> 0:17:12.080 and then more recently you mommy, which is the savory 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:16.479 type sensations. But then aroma's perceived then the back of 0:17:16.520 --> 0:17:19.840 the throat through the nose. When you're eating, we have 0:17:20.160 --> 0:17:23.159 small what are referred to as volatile compounds, meaning they 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:26.400 can just kind of float in the air, and we 0:17:26.560 --> 0:17:30.760 perceive those and so with that we get that response 0:17:31.160 --> 0:17:33.560 from both the tongue and then the nose. 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:34.040 Oh. 0:17:34.160 --> 0:17:37.280 Interesting, So those aromatics come in, you said, to the 0:17:37.320 --> 0:17:39.480 back of the throat. It's not like me smelling and 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:40.400 chewing at the same time. 0:17:40.480 --> 0:17:42.960 It's kind of described that way that it kind of 0:17:42.960 --> 0:17:45.440 comes in through the back of the throat. Odor would 0:17:45.480 --> 0:17:49.119 be when you're maybe sniffing or smelling something prior to eating, 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:52.840 and that can have an influence. But classically we think 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:57.119 about the aroma kind of coming in combined with taste 0:17:57.160 --> 0:17:59.360 when the food is in the mouth during consumption. 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:03.640 So this is kind of interesting. First of all, your 0:18:03.680 --> 0:18:08.280 tongue really can only detect the broad strokes of flavor, 0:18:08.680 --> 0:18:14.920 whether it's generally sweet, salty, bitter, sour, or savory or mommy, 0:18:14.960 --> 0:18:18.800 what we send as complex or unique to a particular 0:18:18.880 --> 0:18:23.000 food really mostly comes from your nose, and it comes 0:18:23.000 --> 0:18:26.680 in through the back of your throat, according to doctor Legaco, 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:30.200 and second for us to detect them as aromas. What 0:18:30.240 --> 0:18:34.119 we sense has to be volatile, meaning it has to 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:36.720 evaporate easily and float in the air. 0:18:37.480 --> 0:18:39.000 Okay, back to doctor Legaco. 0:18:40.800 --> 0:18:44.400 So then what makes lamb meat taste like lamb and 0:18:44.800 --> 0:18:48.520 dug tastes like dug? You know, Byson tastes like bison. 0:18:48.800 --> 0:18:51.919 Right, All those are going to be derived from the 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:56.520 components of the meat products. We have enzymes breaking down 0:18:56.840 --> 0:19:00.920 skeletal muscle and releasing things that will in part tastes 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:05.800 you mommy. In particular is from amino acids. Maybe've heard 0:19:05.840 --> 0:19:10.960 the term of aging of meat, so you have spoilage organisms. 0:19:11.520 --> 0:19:16.000 They can also impart some unique flavors oftentimes. But then 0:19:16.040 --> 0:19:18.719 the other thing that we have here are fats, and 0:19:18.920 --> 0:19:22.760 fats are unique to species. Then that's where a lot 0:19:22.760 --> 0:19:26.280 of this comes from. The components of skeletal muscle that 0:19:26.320 --> 0:19:30.160 can vary a lot too across species, but the big 0:19:30.359 --> 0:19:33.320 source of variation is from the fats. So you think 0:19:33.359 --> 0:19:36.879 about red meats, they tend to have saturated fats, but 0:19:36.880 --> 0:19:40.000 they also have a large amount of monounsaturated fats and 0:19:40.119 --> 0:19:44.800 poly unsaturated. Lamb is very unique in that it also 0:19:45.000 --> 0:19:49.399 has some branch chain fatty acids that are very I 0:19:49.400 --> 0:19:52.119 guess specific to lamb. We don't see those show up 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:55.119 in other species. So not a lot of lamb consumers 0:19:55.160 --> 0:19:57.280 in the US. But if you are, you know it 0:19:57.359 --> 0:20:00.919 has a very unique flavor compared to be compared to, 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:03.720 certainly to any of the poultry products. 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:10.080 Okay, here is a key piece of information. Animals all 0:20:10.200 --> 0:20:13.360 use the same proteins to make muscles, but they use 0:20:13.359 --> 0:20:17.800 different fats which give each meat its own signature flavor. 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:21.760 Now I've been oversimplifying a little bit when I've said 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:25.160 all animals use the same proteins to make muscles. It's 0:20:25.200 --> 0:20:28.960 true that all animals basically use actin and myocin to 0:20:29.040 --> 0:20:32.760 make muscles, but how those proteins are arranged can vary. 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:35.520 And this is where the concept of red meat and 0:20:35.680 --> 0:20:39.439 white meat comes in. Here's how doctor Legeko explains it. 0:20:41.720 --> 0:20:44.399 So maybe a metaphor as you think about cars are 0:20:44.440 --> 0:20:47.600 all similar for the most part. Right, they have four wheels, 0:20:48.080 --> 0:20:52.280 maybe some doors, so they have a cross species similar components, right, 0:20:52.800 --> 0:20:56.800 But it's how they're put together, and so muscle fibers 0:20:57.359 --> 0:20:59.960 are going to vary in their type or composition. 0:21:00.520 --> 0:21:03.280 So there's a different muscle fibers. How many would you 0:21:03.320 --> 0:21:04.120 say there are. 0:21:04.160 --> 0:21:08.639 Well, there's really three or four predominant types. We have 0:21:08.680 --> 0:21:11.040 what's referred to as type one, and this is really 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:14.160 where the term red meats come from, because they have 0:21:14.680 --> 0:21:18.879 the metabolism that lends them to appear more red. They 0:21:19.080 --> 0:21:25.200 are doing more predominantly aerobic type metabolism. The metaphor there 0:21:25.600 --> 0:21:28.800 is like the long distance runners, right, So they're using 0:21:28.880 --> 0:21:33.040 oxygen and with that they require a lot of myoglobin, 0:21:33.400 --> 0:21:36.320 which is a red pigment molecule that kind of makes 0:21:36.359 --> 0:21:38.399 them look red. And then we have a few that 0:21:38.480 --> 0:21:41.240 are type two. That's not incredibly important, but if we 0:21:41.320 --> 0:21:44.280 just lump all the twos together, you go to the 0:21:44.320 --> 0:21:47.400 white meats. So they're short bursts of energy you think 0:21:47.400 --> 0:21:50.879 about like a bird flapping its wings. It's really rapid, 0:21:51.080 --> 0:21:53.560 and they tend to be those that use a lot 0:21:53.600 --> 0:21:58.199 of glucose for their metabolism and contract really rapidly, and 0:21:58.240 --> 0:22:02.159 they appear more white because they don't require the amount 0:22:02.160 --> 0:22:05.600 of oxygen that we would see over for the red fibers. 0:22:06.960 --> 0:22:09.840 So there are different types of meat and they have 0:22:09.920 --> 0:22:13.480 different color, but what really makes them taste different is 0:22:13.480 --> 0:22:16.959 how much fat they keep around to use as energy. 0:22:17.440 --> 0:22:20.879 The slower red meat uses more fat, whereas the faster 0:22:21.080 --> 0:22:23.240 white meat uses more glucose. 0:22:24.720 --> 0:22:28.120 The type ones tend to, because of their metabolism, need 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:32.040 fat associated with them and near them so that they 0:22:32.080 --> 0:22:37.040 can do their metabolism. Your locomotive muscles tend to be 0:22:37.160 --> 0:22:42.240 more towards that type two. White type fiber poultry is 0:22:42.280 --> 0:22:44.560 a great example. You go over to the breast meat. 0:22:44.800 --> 0:22:47.560 There's a very lean muscle. There's a lack of fat 0:22:47.680 --> 0:22:51.760 associated with that muscle because of the fiber type within it. 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:55.119 I see that fiber type doesn't need as much fat 0:22:55.240 --> 0:22:59.560 lying around it, right, all right? The last thing I 0:22:59.640 --> 0:23:03.040 asked Firleigeka was how do we go from those fats 0:23:03.080 --> 0:23:05.840 in the meat to the flavors we smell through the 0:23:05.880 --> 0:23:09.840 bag of our throats. Now, what's the connect ch between 0:23:09.960 --> 0:23:12.800 the fatty types of fats and the flavor. 0:23:13.280 --> 0:23:17.080 There's some research that is becoming stronger that shows that 0:23:17.119 --> 0:23:20.199 we may be able to perceive some fatty acids on 0:23:20.280 --> 0:23:23.040 the tongue. But classically we talk more about the fat 0:23:23.520 --> 0:23:29.960 being degraded during cooking to form smaller volatile components. That's 0:23:30.000 --> 0:23:32.919 where we get that flavor is through the breakdown of 0:23:32.920 --> 0:23:36.080 those during cooking. You can also see this in storage, 0:23:36.119 --> 0:23:38.920 and if it becomes too predominant, you get off odors, 0:23:38.960 --> 0:23:43.119 off flavors. If there's too much breakdown during storage. 0:23:42.760 --> 0:23:47.320 During storage, you might ruin those delicious smelling fatty acids. 0:23:47.560 --> 0:23:48.000 Yeah. 0:23:48.320 --> 0:23:51.320 Right, So then it's those fatty acids. When they get cooked, 0:23:51.480 --> 0:23:54.600 they break down into volatail compounds which go up to 0:23:54.640 --> 0:23:57.960 our nose, and that tell us us, hey this is lamb, 0:23:58.080 --> 0:23:59.679 or hey this is meat. 0:23:59.720 --> 0:24:01.120 Or bit or anything. 0:24:01.200 --> 0:24:01.680 Yeah. 0:24:01.800 --> 0:24:02.320 I see. 0:24:02.560 --> 0:24:05.480