CV of Marian Timofti, the president National Federation of Authorized Tasters (FNDA), is so bushy that it would take up far too many lines for such a short interview. I asked Marian Timofti about the role of such an institution in the local culinary landscape, about the usefulness of courses for authorized tasters of charcuterie, cheeses, olive oils, etc.
I started a long-term collaboration with FNDA. In the first phase, together with Marian Timofti and Dana Pop, I organized the Parisizer tastings from Corks, the first of a series with different standard products, we are going to organize the National Championship of Zacuscă and we will see. I became a FNDA member after completing the Eurosommelier course, but we're more than likely to be group mates for the rest of the courses if you sign up.
What does authorized taster mean? What can qualifications be obtained in, what do you do with them afterwards?
Like any profession, that of a taster is certified by a diploma, issued by certain competent bodies, which certifies your mastery of taste sensations, vocabulary, memory and of course the "library of names" for describing those sensations.
FNDA (www.fnda.ro) brought for the first time in Romania accredited and internationally recognized schools to train future tasters, we only have at our disposal the ADAR association that deals only with wine. We wanted to multiply the range of food products for regular consumption, collaborating with different profile associations similar to ADAR, whose training team includes university professors, doctors in food chemistry, established tasters, etc. All established professionals.
These courses also help those who have only personal interest, curiosity or are only for professionals. What advantages there are for some and others.
I think the biggest benefit is for amateurs, for the normal consumer because it helps to make quality selections directly on store shelves or at market stalls. You learn to read a label, you learn about the ingredients used, you know how to prepare the product you want to buy, and just from the visual aspect you start to realize the correctness of the manufacturing process and therefore the quality of the product. You read the label and you are almost fully aware of the ingredients used, etc. At that moment you will decide whether or not to purchase that product.
Our laziness, convenience or lack of notions about quality, I consider to be nothing more than an encouragement of the manufacturer's use of cheap ingredients, of the "automatic fire" production of semi-prepared products that require maturation periods before being sold, based on that criterion of "Let it go as it is".
I keep hearing about multisensory - what does this thing actually "eat" with?
We all know that the tasting results in a note obtained through a subjective... quality. We wanted to overcome this limit, human by the way, by moving to a higher level, namely sensory analyses. Through a correct sensory analysis, the sensory profile of a product that has a DOC, PDO or other European recognition can be established, which product, analyzed after a period of time, from a new production, should have the same sensory profile, i.e. the same perfume and taste, the same aromas, intensity and persistence. Telemeau de Ibănești, for example, is a telemea that must be produced only with milk obtained from cows that have consumed grass from a delimited area. If you bring milk from other regions, from animals that have consumed a different type of grass with a mixture of other plants, you will get a telemea with a different taste, or with different perfumes, with different aromas, intensities and persistences. This is prohibited in the EU.
You recently launched in Iași a - what I call a whole concept and an example of good practice in the field of regional gastronomic branding - Golia wine. what's the story
In the spring of 2022 at the wine and gastronomy festival VIN LA CULTURĂ (www.vinlacultura.com) from Iași, I tasted together with several friends, including Cezar Ioan (www.vinul.ro) a wine made from a new variety called GOLIA, a controlled crossing between Sauvignon Blanc and Şarba, at SCDVV-IAȘI.
Everyone liked it, probably also for the novelty offered, and then Cezar told me: why don't you do something to promote this wine, this variety? Maybe even proclaim a national day of it and create a local celebration of the variety? So the initiator, the advisor in this direction was Vinul.ro through Cezar Ioan.
Of course, I went on to organize this event and a year later, during the press conference before the same festival, but in 2023, I proclaimed this day of the GOLIA variety. I hope to continue and organize a celebration of this kind every year in Iași, thus extending the festival by one day, which would benefit the entire city.
Advice for coffee drinkers from an international jury?
Drink the coffee you like: pot, sand, filter at Starbucks, but don't confuse coffee with an Espresso. There are two different types of coffee.
For Espresso there is an Italian National Espresso Institute (http://www.espressoitaliano.org) has a special preparation method, I liked it since I lived there but I was initiated into Espresso by my colleague Vasile Ghimpu who had taken the courses there. As president of FNDA I contacted IIAC (www.assaggiatoricaffe.org) and we brought the biggest Italian espresso specialists to Romania, where several amateurs of this type of coffee joined, but also for the preparation of this drink according to all their rules. All those who want to know more can find all the information on our website and can contact us to organize a new course with the same Italian specialists who are also teachers of sensory analysis.
Advice for olive oil consumers from the one who runs olive oil taster classes.
This "medicine", provided by Mother Nature herself, deserves to be consumed when it best expresses its qualities, i.e. fresh, to be used in the kitchen, for cooking, because it has a very high burning point, if not the most highest among all natural oils. We have many imported oils, but surely an importer looks first at the business and then at the benefits that the imported product brings. However, there are also dedicated people, with their own brands and large investments in this field, who I think deserve to be cited: The ELIADA brand www.eliada.ro) of an investor in olive plantations, Cătălin Adam Marian, who leaves every year, during the picking period in Greece, to supervise the new harvest and the immediate pressing of the production to obtain maximum quality. He brings his production to Romania where he sells it through his own store, online but also in collaboration with other specialized stores or wineries. It's not the only one, I've found other good, imported oils, but I appreciate the effort of the people at Eliada to keep the quality at the highest level.
We will resume these courses, if there are requests, but at the moment we also have new trainers who can do this and the diplomas will be issued by the FNDA and will also contain the ONAOO logo, the association that sent three university professors and a master's degree to Romania blender to prepare us.
Salami/Sausages - how to avoid non-compliant ones?
It is very difficult to exemplify in a few words what nonconformity means for salamis or charcuterie, especially since, in order to protect yourself, you only have the visual part to analyze, what you see in gallantary. Not that it is impossible, but it is difficult to exemplify. I will try to lay out just a few visual criteria that are accessible to anyone:
The color of the lean meat in the salami, the uniformity of that color, the color of the fat, cracks in the meat, holes (which may be from fermentation), the size of the mince, the amount of fat and its distribution and compaction, which relate to the period of tumblerization (mixing in the tumbler), the presence of tendons or other undesirable parts in a salami.
I emphasized the part with the fat because pork fat, from the middle of the elbows down, is not used in salamis, as it is considered harmful. It's that sebum that melts for other products. The correct fat is the back fat, a tough fat that is diced and mixed with the minced meat. In many domestic salamis, the belly fat, seul, is melted and mixed with the ground meat in the tumbler, which is why we no longer notice the color. It is no longer red because by absorbing the sebum it becomes a pale red to a light brown.
As a conclusion, salami is difficult to appreciate only visually, but we are waiting for amateurs for a full course through which we can give them more information.
Cheeses - which Romanian cheeses would you recommend and why?
Another counterfeit product to which it is advisable to learn some main criteria of visual, olfactory and gustatory appreciation. All the respect for the cheeses of Sibiu, but that area does not have enough cheese to feed the whole country, because there is no market in the country without also having a stall with Sibiu people....
It is an additional reason to be careful when choosing cheeses, where our colleague Dr. Ing. in Food Chemistry, Dana Pop, is the best able to give some explanations. I personally consume cheeses from "Brânza Cinstită" from ZADA srl in Suceava, semi-ripened also by them and the matured by those producers from Transylvania who completed training courses in Switzerland, France, Italy and brought an increase in the quality of processing of milk in our country.
What can I tell you about this product, which we always see in gallantary and we have to appreciate it only visually: pay attention to the external appearance of the cheese wheel, the appearance of the paste when it is cut, the fermentation meshes and the molds, in the part under the crust of matured cheeses which is subjected to a fluidification process that leads to the leaving of the paste and even to its exit from under the crust.
Another type of paste can be chalky, crumbly, whiter and more acidic, which demonstrates a demineralization of the paste (through excessive loss of whey), which we find in soft cheeses.
Cracks and holes in the cheese, which can be caused by temperature jumps during ripening or an inappropriate environment, excessive acidity of the paste or even excessive salting. It is found in semi-hard cheese or spun pasta (mozzarella type).
We recommend cheeses from safe, controlled, verified sources and not those from market stalls that can cause us serious inconvenience.
The two of us kept talking about a "alteration" of the Romanian taste. I would like you to elaborate.
It is a finding that I have verified over time, this after taking the sensory analysis courses, courses that opened my horizons in terms of tasting and the way of understanding it by different people, who, all of them have justice even if their assessments are different. I hope I'm not misunderstood, but I don't have space to elaborate more.
"Taste change" is an expression I gave myself when I encountered several dishes, in top locations, Ex: at a seaside restaurant I ordered "prawns pulled in garlic butter".
The recipe says to saute one or two cloves of garlic in butter until they take on a little color, then remove and discard. Add the shrimps and drag them in the butter, the garnish being simple so as not to cover the soft fragrance and sweet-salty taste of the shrimps. I was not a little surprised to see that I received a portion of shrimp on top of which was placed a healthy spoonful of garlic mujdei, which could be felt from a distance.... While eating you feel nothing but garlic. "That's how it's prepared here" was the answer. But this is nothing. I have a whole photo archive of smoked sausages and salamis that are as black as ebonite, there is no meat flavor in the mouth anymore. Everything is smoked wood. We don't have raw-dried products, because we don't master the time-maturing technique (and we don't have time to waste either...), which is why we smoke and salt. Everything we eat is salted and smoked. After getting used to that amount of salt and smoke, we go to level two: more salty and smoky... This is how I came to find that, over time, many of us no longer appreciate the refinement of some French, Italian semi-prepared foods, because they have very subtle and elegant perfumes and aromas, which is why, when we don't feel anything (having our papillae altered by the salt smoke we are used to), we refuse them. The dialogue on this topic is long and I look forward to anyone who is interested in our courses to give you as much knowledge as possible on how to appreciate a product
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