Eat. Smell. Love.

I recently have observed that my nose is becoming very trained for food's smells. I developed this new skill within just a week time. I keep on amazing myself with directly recognizing the ingredients by having only access to the smell of the given dish.

It started with me going to the printing house to get my new business card.

Suddenly, I have smelled something unusually familiar related to food. It overcame the blue smelling black ink, the Cool Water of the designer working with me and the menthol smelling breath of the secretary who had a bad cold.

Sometimes olfactory memories just swiftly greet my nose and run directly up to my brain, quickly finding their own datasheet among the thousands of organised smells in my mind. I usually know immediately which memory I recall by that particular scent.

Strangely enough, this time, it took me a few minutes to find out when was the last time I smelled this before.

I did find it weird when I realized that I smell grated (!) potato in the middle of a printing house. I actually messed up my business card's design, that much I was focused on the odor itself.

I had no idea why my nose is insisting on grated potato and not just peeled ones for example, but as usual, my nose was right. The scent came from outside, just next to the printing house a women prepared a dish with grated potato and I could see the end result when passing by her shop with my freshly printed cards.

The other time, I passed to the toilet in my apartment, when the combination of cooked cabbage with tomato sauce was tickling my whole nasal system from inside. It was certainly not me preparing any dish with those ingredients, and neither did I have them at all in my fridge. Just a few hours later, my 3rd (!) neighbor brought me some taster from his choux a la tomate... that he - according to his testimony - prepared next to closed doors.

Just yesterday, I was going up the stairs and smelled Fois gras aux pomme, and get confirmed that the restaurant nearby had it as today's special. I even smelled the color of the apple that they have used for this plate. I knew directly that it cannot be a green apple ( too harsh, too sour and very crackling ) or a red one ( which is of some sweetness, more clean and somewhat woody ) and that it is possibly a yellow apple, with the earthy, soft, very matt characteristics.

This last experience made me remember Jean Claude Ellena, who used to tell me how he was able to tell if a lavender oil has been distilled in a glass, copper or other metal container just by smell of it. I think I am on the right track...

and I think I am more into food than Jean Claude, too.