Last night, I took part in a really bizarre group experiment, with Miracle Fruit.  Have you heard of this?  It’s been popping up in conversations for about the past 6 months or so, so when I was approached by the Elevator 100 Club to take part in a tasting, I was excited to have the opportunity to see what all of the fuss was about!

So what is miracle fruit?  Well, Synsepalum dulcificum is a West African shrub whose small red berries contain a compound conveniently called miraculin. When eaten, the juice of the berry alters the way other foods taste, causing bitter and sour foods to taste sweet.  While the exact cause for this change is unknown, one hypothesis is that miraculin works by distorting the shape of sweetness receptors “so that they become responsive to acids, instead of sugar and other sweet things.”

*The Miracle Fruit

The tasting was held at the Lyons Wier Ortt Gallery (on the corner of 7th Ave & 20th in Chelsea), where we began by eating the berries as a group.  It is said that one individual berry can cause this bizarre taste bud effect for anywhere from a half hour up to 2 hours.   After allowing the miracle fruit to sink in, we explored our tastes with all kinds of interesting foods and original cocktails, including cranberries, lemons, limes, radishes, and tabasco sauce.  If you know me, you know that I can’t handle anything even remotely spicy, so the proof was in the pudding when I was able to take a drink of tabasco sauce, to no effect.   It’s weird though, because you can feel the tingle and you can smell the substance, but the taste itself, is sweet.

*Getting ready to try Tabasco Sauce

The Elevator 100 Club is the brainchild of my friend, Rob Gonzalez, who took the initiative of bringing a great group of people together.  As I mention in the “Story of this Blog,”  New York is filled with fascinating creatures who inspire all of us in big ways and small ways on a daily basis.  The concept of the E100 group is much the same: giving all of these people the opportunity to meet each other and share in unforgettable experiences, such as trying the miracle fruit, together (once a month).  The goal is to invite the type of people you wouldn’t mind getting stuck in an elevator with, hence the name–The Elevator 100.

*Part of The Elevator 100 crew

(Alyson Campbell for Its All Very PR)

Tags: Alyson Campbell, amp3, AMP3 pr, AMP3 Public Relations, It's All Very PR

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 19th, 2008 at 3:08 pm and is filed under connecting the dots, hostessess with the mostessess. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.