How to Balance Flavors – And Make Your Food Taste Great

For a lot of chefs – both professional and home cooks alike – things begin to change when they actually start to taste their food during the cooking process.

The next step is to decipher what it is you’re tasting.

When you begin this journey, your first thought upon tasting something might be to ask “What’s missing?” and then try to add more of whatever it is you think is missing (i.e., needs more garlic, needs more rosemary, needs more…).

So, you start adding things in – and pretty soon, you’ve got an ingredient list 50 items deep, and nothing tastes like anything because there’s too much stuff in there all competing for your tastebud’s attention.

Guess what? Less is more.

In other words, to quote the great Wolfgang Puck: “Keep your ingredient list short. Get the best ingredients you can afford, and try not to f*ck’em up.”

If you refer to the wheel above, you’ll see that in order to balance flavor, you need to be thinking about the following: Salt, Fat, Acid, Sweet. These elements need to be in balance with each other.

So, next time you’re making gravy, or spaghetti sauce, or soup – and you’re getting to the end of the process – try this as a finishing technique:

Take a taste of what you’ve cooked. How does it taste? A little bland? Add some salt. Taste again. Now what? A little too salty? Add a pinch of sugar. Taste again. Now what? A little dull? Add some vinegar, or lemon or lime juice (remember: vinegar is a flavor enhancer, like salt… not a flavor additive).

Now what? A little sharp? Mellow it out with a splash of cream or a little knob of butter.

Additionally, remember that Salt & Sweet balance (or dampen) each other, and Acid & Fat balance (or dampen) each other. Similarly, Fat & Salt enhance each other (think potato chips), as do Sweet & Acid (think a lemonade).

Don’t be afraid to add a little bit at a time until it starts tasting the way you want – this is how we learn! You will be amazed by the difference this makes.

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