Where do you stand on umami?

Talking about truffles yesterday reminds me about how I was once thrown out of a shared flat for grilling Bombay Duck.

In case you are not familiar with Bombay Duck, let me tell you that it has nothing to do with ducks at all. It is a type long fish which is left outside on racks in India to both dry and rot at the same time. I think it is an acquired taste, but I found it delicious to nibble on after it had been dried out even further by being toasted. 

It has such an intense flavour that I think it is probably intended as a seasoning rather than a main course, and if it was ever meant to be grilled at all it would have been done outside, probably next to a railway line in Mumbai. The only other time I have produced such a powerful stench in the kitchen was with a chemistry set when I was a kid, although I bet John could top that.

Over the last few years, the word 'umami' has become quite fashionable in Britain, though the Japanese have known about it for hundreds of years. I think 'umami' is probably a Japanese word, come to think of it. I sound like Bush saying, 'The French have no word for entrepreneur.'

For me, 40 years before I had ever heard of umami, Bombay Duck was a savoury revelation. Some entrepreneur produces what they call umami paste in a tube and it costs a lot of money in Waitrose. When you read the ingredients you find it is basically a mixture of anchovies and tomatoes, so for a fraction of the price you can make your own using anchovy paste and tomato puree.

Then you realise that other nations - Italy in particular - have known about the effect that things like anchovies and tomatoes have on your tastebuds forever, but it takes the Brits or Americans (will you Yanks please stop calling herbs 'erbs!) to claim the discovery by scientific analysis. 

Worcester Sauce - another umami - was a failed attempt to make a classic Indian condiment (in Worcester, I am guessing) when a retired army officer with nothing better to do bottled up some exotic fruits and spices in a basement, tasted it, then gave it up as a bad job, leaving the bottles to mature into the household name that it is today. They say that entrepreneurs thrive on failure, whereas the rest of us give up after falling at the first hurdle.

I know of an Indian man who eats kippers and jam. What's your favourite unusual combination?