I decided that I needed to sort this blind testing debate out once and for all. Therefore, this morning, I undertook the following test:
I prepared two slices of bread. I used vernier callipers to ensure that the thickness of each slice, in each of the four corners, was 1.20cm. The bread used was Sainsbury's seeded granary. It took seventeen slices to get them accurate, but they were from the same loaf. The slices were toasted for 74 seconds on one side. The grill used was an electric AEG, with the standard grill-pan. Electricity was Ecotricity. Onto these slices I placed cheese of 4mm thickness. It was Sainsbury's Taste the Difference Davistow Cheddar, placed completely evenly. I then toasted the cheese for 58 seconds. The crusts were cut off to ensure that there was no texture pattern difference between the slices. Finally I spread sauce onto each slice. On one slice I used Heinz Tomato Ketchup; the other slice was Daddies brown sauce. I used a solid silver knife, rinsing with filtered water between sauces. For convenience, I shall refer to the resulting cheese on toast with sauce as "CoTwS" I then blindfolded the wife (who had not seen any of the preparation or the resulting CoTwS), and placed a slice in each of her hands. She had earlier used a random number generator to prepare a pattern of how she would feed the CoTwS to me. I then blindfolded myself. (It was important that this would be double-blind, as I know that the wife has a curious aversion to ketchup, and may influence the results by emitting negative vibes as I took a bite.) The wife fed me the slices in the predetermined order, and I called out "Brown" or "Red" to the neighbour, whom we'd had to enlist as we were both blindfold. From the unsighted safety of the hall, she wrote them down. I am happy to report that I managed to get the right sauce in each case except one. The one I got wrong was towards the end, and I suspect that I was getting a bit CoTwS-ed out by this stage. However, I am still not sure which I found more satisfying. I definitely felt there was more zing with the Daddies, but could I live with it? The ketchup is definitely sweeter and more rounded. There seemed to be a pizzoid synergy between the CoTwS with tomato; it seemed classically right, whereas the brown sauce was an aggressive teenager, knuckling in with its astringency. I am fortunate in that I can have two sauces in my house. Lesser mortals, those who don't have such sensitivity to the difference between sauces, have to make a choice. On balance I'd go for the ketchup, but could I live with Daddies? Sure; I'd have just the occasional hankering for the balance of the ketchup. Adam -- adamslim SB3 into Derek Shek d2, Shanling CDT-100, Rotel RT-990BX, Esoteric Audio Research 859, Living Voice Auditorium IIs, Nordost cables ------------------------------------------------------------------------ adamslim's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7355 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=29912 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
