When eating a meal, what is considered the best way to savour the flavour of a complete meal?
For instance if you're eating a salad with steak and potatoes, do you eat a mouthful combining each element or do you each constituent part separately?

Normally separately for me, i'd find mixing steak and potatoes a bit weird.

The steak and potatoes was just an example, in general terms do you combine mouthfuls of different items or always eat one at a time.

In general, i like a bit of everything on one fork.

I do a bit of both tbh - taste everything separately & then a small bit of each together - guess it depends on the meal too.


My hubby always used to comment / shout at the kids 'picking & choosing' their food - he's the same!

I'll normally eat each dish separately until I get to the last couple bites. I don't usually mix salad, but it would depend on what type of salad it is.

On this subject, it really annoys me on the Masterchef programs when they put everything on one fork. I think in that type of program they should at least taste each element separately first to be able to judge that particular dish and if they feel the need to make sure the flavours match, then put them all on one fork. There are a lot of dishes that compliment each other but they don't taste very nice if put together, certain types of salads would be a good example.

If it's a good combo (like sausage, mash and gravy) I like them all together on my forkful.

I think eating forkfuls of just mash and then separate forkfuls of sausage would be considerably less enjoyable.

For Masterchef though, I agree they should try each element individually and then the combination.

I would have thought you would mix food from time to time.

(eg curry and rice, or spag and bol)

you certainly would with a pudding. you wouldn't have a spoonful of crumble, and then another spoonful of custard or cream.

A bit of everything for me.

I'm a combo eater - what's wrong with steak and potato together on the same fork? Isn't that the whole point of preparing meals with side dishes that complement the main?

My flatmate is a one-part-at-a-time eater, saving the best (in his opinion, the meat) till last. He's an even slower eater than me too, so his meat is stone cold by the time he gets to it...rather a waste, if you ask me.

Eh? If they work well together, they should taste good whether the separate elements are tasted separately or together

I always eat each element separately.

Depends if it's 'mixy' food or not. So curry & rice, pasta & sauce, mince & tatties etc, i'll just have random(ish) forkfuls.

Something like a roast dinner, cooked breakfast etc, where the individual elements are distinct, I'll tend to eat one thing at a time, but rotate around. It takes too long to cut up a bit of meat, a bit of potato and a bit of veg small enough to all fit in my mouth at once, and i like hot food to be hot, so I'll go meat, potato, veg (or something similar)

I eat is all separate. I cannot mix things together it goes against my OCDness

One of my favs


I would have thought this would be a must to mix

I depends on the meal. If i'm having steak, chips, onions and mushrooms I would eat the them separately. But, if I was having bacon and egg i'd have a bit of each on the fork

I like a bit of everything in a mouthful. My fork is normally laden with it all.

I don't tend to have anything on my plate that I don't like eating, so If there are five different components to my meal, I'll mix and match with each forkful with three or so different things, in any combination on the fork.

Separately for me.

I tend to eat the stuff I like least first (so usually the salad or veggies) then I alternate the other things on the plate. So I might have two forkfuls of salad, 1 forfulful mash and then 1 slice of steak and repeat.

With things all mixed up [like stir-fries and spag bol etc] then obviously I eat all together.

I've never really given it much thought but yep this is what I do.

No. Bit of bacon, then sausage, then beans (can't stand squashed beans), then mushrooms and so on. Egg is a dip until the yolk is gone

If it's a good steak I wouldn't want to eat it with something else in the same mouthful.

I always mix everything, unless there is something on the plate I don't like that much. In that case, I'd eat what I don't like first, and would save the best for last

I start with the things I like the least first.

My uncle, say for example he's having a roast chicken dinner for tea, he has potatoes, veg and chicken on his plate.
He eats all the potatoes, then all the veg, then all the chicken,

weirdo

I agree. However, on shows like MasterChef, when you mix them together with the other elements on the plate it is no longer a single dish because it then takes on the flavours and spices of the other elements. Basically, if I wanted to make that side dish with a different meal, I would want to know what it tastes like on its own without being combined with other foods. By tasting them all together they may as well have a casserole. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but I know what I mean. LOL