Umami, Chocolate, and Flavor | Rowan Jacobsen

Dec 4, 2025

36:27

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Episode notes

The Banter

The Guys talk about making vinegar and why you have to take care of your mother.

The Conversation

The Restaurant Guys welcome writer Rowan Jacobsen to discuss the fifth taste: umami. What is umami? Where does it come from? What pairs well with it? And what does breastmilk have to do with it? Get the skinny from Rowan.

The Inside Track

The Guys happily get the inside track on the health benefits of chocolate. Rowan has made quite an impression on chocolate lovers in his book Chocolate Unwrapped.

“Women who I've never seen before walk up to me and say, ‘I think of you every time I eat a piece of chocolate. It's changed my life.’

People love that book because it gives them license to do exactly what they want to do anyway,” Rowan Jacobsen on The Restaurant Guys Podcast 2006

Bio

Rowan Jacobsen is a journalist and author who writes about food, nature and the environment for Harper’s, Scientific American, Smithsonian, The New York Times, and others. He has received awards from the James Beard Foundation and the Society of American Travel Writers. He is the author of nine books, including A Geography of Oysters, Fruitless Fall, and Truffle Hound, which have been named to Best Book of the Year lists by the Washington Post.

He is a Nova Media Fellow, researching the science of sun exposure. His new book, In Defense of Sunlight: The Surprising Science of Sun Exposure, will be published on the Summer Solstice, 2026.

Info

Rowan’s site

https://www.rowanjacobsen.com/

Has an article in

artofeating.com

His book

Chocolate Unwrapped

Paul Wolfert’s vinegar recipe

https://www.claycoyote.com/816-2/

The NJ Wine & Food Festival @ Crystal Springs May 1-3

The Restaurant Guys will be podcasting from there May 2. Come see us!

https://shop.crystalgolfresort.com/collections/14th-annual-new-jersey-wine-food-festival