permaculture

[Russ Grayson <pacedge@magna.com.au>]

On Monday, June 16, 2003, at 03:56  PM, georg parlow wrote:
> hi russ:
>
> > pigface (Carpobrotus spp: edible part the swollen
> > base of the flower and the triangular leaf - not good eating
>
> tastes differ. the year i spent in oz i was always happy to get to the 
> coast
> for the carpobrotus tucker - i love this sweetish-salty taste. (since 
> this
> was on the south coast of west australia it might have been a different
> species).

Yes, there's more than one species. My experience is with bushfoods 
that, as they have not been selected for good eating qualities, you 
experience different tastes with them, the taste can be variable.

What I should have said was that I was speaking for my own experience 
and generally. I have tasted quite a good specimen picked at Ballina on 
the NSW north coast. Not so the leaf though.

> so rather than discrediting a species with the apparently
> objective statement "IT is no good eating" i would recomment to resort 
> to an
> obviously subjective one, like "I dont like it". tastes are as 
> different as
> people and their changing (nutritional) needs.

Absolutely right.

Taste is such a subjective phenomenon that we must assume that when a 
taste preference is stated that it refers to the particular taste 
preferences of the individual.

...Russ Grayson