Momofuku Food Wizards Developing 'New York Umami'

David Chang and his Momofuku crew have recently been working on several new products in the top-secret Momofuku test kitchen in the East Village. The New Yorker chats with Chang and Momofuku's head of R +D Dan Felder about all the various fermentations they're crafting, including a sweet potato miso and a chickpea miso that's similar in texture and flavor to Parmesan cheese. Chang explains the goal of building this "microbial spice shelf" :

People talk about "terroir." Well, we want the taste of the microbial terroir, which isn't romantic but supplies the flavor...We're a research lab; we have intellectual property on all this. But we want it to be commercial if we can still control it. We can make a big dent in gastronomy that way.

The New Yorker's Jane Kramer suggests that Chang and his team are attempting to create "New York umami." This experiment started several years ago when Chang steamed and smoked a piece of pork loin and let it rot in a box of rice for six months. The result was something that "tasted like the East Village."
· Local Tastes [New Yorker]
· All Coverage of Momofuku [~ENY~]
[Photo: Reuters]

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