It’s been a long time brewing but NYC finally has it’s first Food and Drink Museum. It’s equally as shocking that it took so long for it to get one. A museum dedicated to flavors and the history of food when it seems to be that where and how food is sourced has become the biggest dining question. Pesticide free, no antibiotics or added hormones, GMOs, the list continues to grow but lets face it…the discussion has started and it’s not going away. MOFAD is here to open our eyes and noses to reality of food and how things we eat and love have come to be.
Nestled on Bayard Street in Brooklyn, you find MOFAD, an interactive food and drink museum. Now, as a self-proclaimed “food snob” (because the title foodie is getting too mainstream for me), I was more than excited to be able to visit this place.
I’ll let you know a few things right off the bat:
- It’s small but that doesn’t make it any less informative
- It has an open air design which gives it a playful vibe.
- Strap on your seatbelt because this is just the beginning.
You pay the steep fee of $10, hang your coat on the coat rack in the front, and start to step into your experience. First, we watch a short video on flavors and your sensory nerves. A bunch load of scientific facts about your tongue how it connects to the brain and yadda yadda – I was never a science buff. But the most interesting fact I found out was that WE HAVE 10,000 taste buds. Sigh, I’ve got a lot more eating to do.
Then the real fun begins. We learn about the origin of the first manufactured flavor, which was vanilla called vanillin. The How scientists found how to re-create one of the active components of vanilla, bottled it up, and started selling it on the shelves. Oh and remember those white candy dispensers from when you were kid? The ones that you put in a quarter turn the silver turnstile and out comes a sweet surprise. Well, MOFAD has those as well, except you’re tasting isolated flavors. So you can taste the imitation vanillin and right after taste real vanilla and note the difference in flavors.
As you move around the room, the inner child in you is jumping for joy when you see the interactive stations.
The best part of the exhibit is the smell and flavor tests. These stations are set up with options of tastes that you can smell and see if that’s really what it smells like – but it wouldn’t be exciting if the didn’t test your knowledge. The first station acts as a warm up for you to smell flavors such as cola or strawberries.
The next station has many options like butter, popcorn, whiskey, strawberry, banana, and the list goes on. Tis station allows you to mix flavors together to create a familiar smell. So pressing butter and popcorn will bring you back to the movie theaters.
Lastly, they set up a smelling station that testing your familiarity of artificial and natural flavors. For example, testing if you can guess which smell in artificial lemon and real lemon. The guide told us that many people get these questions wrong because we may match these artificial scents with candies or other things we may have eaten in our childhood. I had a little too much fun at this part – just call me the trivia queen **hair flip**.
As all grown 25 year olds do, when confronted with markers and construction paper, I wrote down my favorite and least favorite flavors. My favorite is ANYTHING spicy and least favorite is oatmeal. And yes I know, oatmeal is not a flavor but it is texturally appalling to me.
At the end of the exhibit, you have a chance to sit in a new Infiniti and go on a journey to one of four US cities to see some chefs cook up some amazing dishes–a really intriguing interactive bonus.
MOFAD has big goals for the future and I fully support the cause. This definitely won’t be my last time at this disco. I highly recommend the food education especially now where we are trying to stay away from artificial foods. I give the museum my two thumbs up and encourage anyone in NYC to make time to visit.
As for what smelled or tasted the best? You’ll have to take a trip out to NYC to reach your own consensus of what flavors resonate with you. ;)
What to eat in the area? I went for an aperitif at Surf Bar (which by the way has sand as a carpet!) and enjoyed an amazing Duck Confit Ramen at Baoburg that was worthy of praise to the ancient Thai culinary masters.
Anywhere you want me to visit? Feel free to email me at francesca@coutureinthesuburbs.com.
