Does cooking with wood inprove the taste of food?
By goodhunter
@goodhunter (334)
January 31, 2011 11:00am CST
I have wondered why using fire wood as the fuel for cooking rather than electricity or gas taste so much better for me. Does wood have a certain aroma that makes food tastier? What is your opinion my friends.
5 responses
@damned_dle (3942)
• Philippines
31 Jan 11
Yes it does, if you are going to roast your food. But if you just gonna fry it on a pan and you use wood instead of electricity or gas, then it has no effect. Even the type of wood used to roast food has an effect.
@alrarahman (82)
• Indonesia
10 Mar 11
I too love meals cooked with wood, it tastes much more delicious, be that grilled food or stew. Commercial Indonesian sticky sweet cake (dodol) are only cooked with wood. The food is placed inside a giant earthen or iron pot or giant wok. So time consuming, it's for special occassion. I'm not much of a scientific guy but, I think, just like everything else, when something gets burned, its properties get destroyed and release some energy that you can smell, feel, and taste as the air. The air penetrates the food and is mixed with the food liquids. Just think about when we inhale vehicle smoke, we can taste it if it's too much. And yes certain wood can give different effect to food taste. Here in my country, coconut shell charcoals are still widely used for cooking in restaurants, especially for barbeque, because of the delicious taste it gives. I've used coal charcoals a couple of times for cooking but the food tasted horrible. So I gave it up. In some parts of my country, people prefer to use Ceylon oak wood to other types of wood or gas to smoke beef.
@alrarahman (82)
• Indonesia
10 Mar 11
Correctionn: the properties doesn't get destroyed but broken down. wrong term.
@louievill (28851)
• Philippines
31 Jan 11
I think that something good we cannot understand lay deep beneath our genes, passed on from generation to generation starting from the time cave men first discovered fire and used it for cooking. We must remember that it is only man of all animals that cooks his food, we taught animals especially our pets to eat cooked food but we must cook for them. Other methods of cooking are fairly new so wood and charcoal cooking stuck more to our genes, also the same way most of us find building a camp fire quite exciting
1 person likes this
@Theresaaiza (10487)
• Australia
31 Jan 11
I have not really come across any scientific study or research to back this theory up but per experience, there certainly is a certain smell or aroma that the food gets when cooked using firewood. There's more flavor and, if cooking meat, it becomes more tender. Gives it that "smoked" flavor too which really makes the food tastier.
I also tend to enjoy my food better, and consume much more if the food was cooked on firewood.
1 person likes this
@moneymakerteen (87)
• United States
31 Jan 11
I do believe that when cooking in a barbaque the wood gives off an aroma. Although i find when using a stick that came from your backyard instead of the store, it brings a different smell. More of an earthy smell. I acually perfer the earthy smell when cooking on the barbque cause it will give more of a smoked flavour also.
1 person likes this
