In the Spring of 2011, Good Food Revolution embarked upon a video project that would take almost three years to come to fruition.
After filming well over 1,000 test subjects being pressured/coerced into placing a PTC strip upon their trepidatious tongues, this project was unceremoniously shelved due to its Sisyphean nature (simply crediting everyone correctly would have been a full time job in itself) and, to be quite frank, both of us at Good Food Revolution were both sick fed up of the whole thing.
Imagine attempting to explain, in layperson’s terms, what you were up to in asking so many people, many of them complete strangers, to place a dodgy-looking paper strip on their moistened tongues. And then multiply this minute-long summation by around 1,300.
In hindsight what is truly astounding is that only three individuals refused to comply with our ask…
Despite some lovely media attention courtesy of Leanna Delap for the Toronto Star, the project had grown out of control and so was quietly filed away, never to see the light of day.
Fast forward to February of 2014…
We recently stumbled across all of the archived footage and realised that it was actually terrific fun.
It was time to revisit the Supertaster project again in a lighthearted manner. Even just to see how we all looked back then was enough fun in itself, and watching the varying reactions to the reagent across the course of the 45 minute piece an almost hypnotic experience.
With contributions from Jancis Robinson MW, Chef John Placko, Prof. Gary Pickering PhD, Barb Stuckey, and Jennifer McLagan concerning the legitimacy and the science behind the study, the piece is over 45 minutes long, and our first Good Food Revolution Feature Documentary.
It is essential to note here that the term supertaster is quite the misnomer, seeing as an individual’s sensitivity to PTC (Phenylthiocarbamide) bears little or no relation to their ability to taste, as is demonstrated in our exhaustive study.
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If you are having trouble viewing this video please click here.
For a seriously HD version click here.
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Edinburgh-born/Toronto-based Sommelier, consultant, writer, judge, and educator Jamie Drummond is the Director of Programs/Editor of Good Food Revolution… And he is so glad that this finally came together. Thanks to all who participated.
