Monday, December 20, 2010

Sensory experts

There's a bit of sickness running through our house again - nothing like the last bout thank goodness.  This is just a cold.  Ginny and CeCe have had the worst of it.  I've heard a few different names for colds - chest colds, head colds, night-time achy fever runny-nose colds.  Now, thanks to Jorja, I've heard of another one.  This is apparently the cold that Ginny and CeCe have, and the description is actually quite fitting:  the snot cold.  Yes, according to Dr. Jorja, they are both suffering from the 'snot cold' which occurs when snot runs from your nose and touches your top lip.

A lot of the basic skills I use at work, I learned in school.  There is however one skill that they don't teach at SIAST and that is sensory training (some may call it tasting).  This had to be learned on the job.  Before you laugh, there was a lot of training that went into this.  It is a critical component in the Quality Assurance of the finished product.  You can do all the chemical analysis you want, but if the beer doesn't taste good, what do you have?  To make a long story short, you could call me a beer sensory expert.  Apparently this sensory gene can be passed down, and I think Jorja might have it.  A few days ago we were running low on milk, so I ran out in the evening.  All that were left were 2 litre cartons (no 4 litre plastic jugs).  Not thinking anything of it, I bought the 2 litre carton.  Well, you should have heard the outcry from Jorja when I put that on her cereal in the morning.  "I don't like this milk.  I only like milk from the jug."  I thought she was just being a diva and forced her to keep using the milk until it was gone.  Finally we reached the end one morning and I filled her glass up with the 2 litre carton and her cereal got the new 4 litre jug milk.  She asked if it was new milk and I told her that she should tell me.  She took a sip of her cup and turned up her nose.  Then she had some from her bowl and sighed in relief.  She could tell the difference.  Who knew?  I guess we have a milk sensory expert in the house.  Later.

No comments:

Post a Comment