I’m new to DIY, and unfortunately, I don’t have very well developed taste buds. Two things that come to mind are vanilla custard recipes having what tastes to me as a "black pepper"aftertaste, and a blue raspberry (single flavor ingredient) that has what I think of as oily taste.
The problem comes in that I don’t really know how to express what I’m tasting, and a lot o of flavors don’t taste the same to me, as they do to others. For example, any type of cantaloupe or watermelon, Taste like cucumber to me.
Is this an issue that taste training of some sort or experience help? Or is my taste palette to screwed up to be any good at this?
Quite a few people get that pepper taste from certain flavorings. TFA Vanilla Bean Ice Cream is the first one that comes to mind. There are others but my mind is drawing a blank on which other ones have been brought up. Some people can drop the percentages and that taste goes away, while others can’t use those flavorings at all.
As far as watermelon tasting like cucumber, that’s a new one to me.
@RickCressler You’re actually explaining it pretty good. I know when I first started out, I bought a crap ton of CAP flavors, didn’t know what I wanted to mix, picked out flavors I thought I liked. Shortly thereafter I found that I kept getting an “off note” from CAP Vanilla Custard, French Vanilla and a few others. Hated it, because I LOVE Custards, and Vanilla, but was just something with those CAP (Capella) flavors for me, and not everyone else. I started buying more, and different brands, and found others I could use. I am ACTUALLY currently RE-TESTING the CAP flavors (with new fresh bottles, not my years old bottles) to see if my tastes have changed.
Everyone’s tastes are different, so I may get NO black pepper from TPA Vanilla Bean Ice Cream, but you might. It’s all about nailing down what tastes good to YOU. Granted, there ARE some Super Sucky Flavors that everyone agrees are terrible, but those will be the exception, not the rule.
What WILL help out everyone on ELR to answer your question better, is to list the specific manufacturer / brand of the flavor, and the exact flavor name. Your taste may never change, but your mixing, taste testing, and verbalizing skills WILL improve. Remember that a blueberry from ONE brand can and will be VERY different from a different blueberry brand, so giving us the brand, like Capella, The Flavors Apprentice, Flavorah, FlavorArt, Inawera helps us out a lot to help you back.
@RickCressler Like @NChris was eluding to, even a WINNING flavor can be wrecked by mixing it too high of a percentage, OR, not letting it steep long enough. I have recipes that are custard and creme heavy, and when fresh mixed, taste terrible, but after a month or longer of steeping they are completely different.
Thanks everyone! I really didn’t expect Abby replies so quickly.
I’ve made a few batches of the vanilla custard from a recipe found here. The first few times were better than this last batch (probably because I had mixed it before and loved it, so I made 4804mm of it! Lol) but I did mix this batch buy volume rather than drips. The first batches were bottled, then bathed in warm water and shaken periodically for about an hour. Two weeks steep on top of that seemed to make the flavors less harsh, but better blended. This batch is MUCH stronger on the peppery taste (I’m assuming that the drop method being less accurate, but a nightmare to count enough drips for 480ml! Changed the measurements)
After dinner, I’ll post the ingredients list, or would it be appropriate to just post the recipe that I used? I don’t want anyone to think I’m saying that their recipe has too much it to little and upset anyone.
@RickCressler The devil IS in the details. If you’re mixing by drops, or volume, you should seriously consider mixing by weight. Scales are very good and cheap now, and it makes mixing MUCH easier, cleaner, faster, and more accurate.
Again, don’t ever hesitate to give us details. Like the exact recipe, the percentage of flavors you used, the exact brand and flavors you used, how long you steeped it, because it REALLY helps people out, so they can better help YOU out.
Everyone would be quick to tell ya to measure by weight and buy a scale but if your not in the financial situation to do so then syringes do the next best thing.
If you’re making big batches of juice, it’s always a good idea to steep and store your liquids without the nic (it extends the BB date and doesn’t turn your juice in a dark brown mess) and just add it when you’re going to use it (in smaller bottles). If you do it that way, you also won’t ruin a big batch with bad nic and it’ll be easy to see if it’s the nic at all.
I would address this possiblity first before u waste time or $. One small batch of a snv sf, fruits work the best, w/ nic and one w/o will let u know if it is the nic.
CHris, that might be the culprit! My Mic was bought almost a year ago, but kept in the freezer. I’ll try to get the recipe her ina few moments, but both of the mentioned capella flavors are in it.
I used syringes to volume measure except the vg which was measured out of a 100ml graduated cylinder (I used to own a casting company and had unused ones left over from measuring an alox bullet lube, so I thought that until I gathered equipment for weight measurement, I’d do volume). The recipe, when calculated for 480ml, came out pretty easy to do by volume measurements, but as previously stated, the first batches were experiments andI dripped the measurements
The recipe that I used was for 240ml and doubled.
Nic juice 50 mg 50/50 pg/vg 14.40
(I had 100mg 100%pg so I used half the measurement)
Vg 182.40
Flavorings
TPA Bavarian cream 4.80
CAP New York cheesecake v2 2.40 (used v1 instead)
TPA sucralose 2.40
CAP vanilla cupcake v2 4.80 (used somev2 and v1)
TPA vanilla custard 9.60
CAP vanilla custard v2 7.20 (used some v1 her as well)
TPA VANILLA SWIRL 12.00
Measurements are on ml
It’s been warm waterbathed and shaken periodically for an hour. Currently steeped two days.
The nic juice was older, and I also used up some old flavorings of about the same age. nic was in the freezer, but the flavorings were just in a cool, dark cardboard box.
I would eliminate the nic first. If that doesn’t bring any results, I would turn to the TPA Vanilla Swirl and TPA Vanilla Custard. I remember reading a thread a while back where someone was having an issue with pepper tasting whenever they used any TPA flavoring with vanilla in it.
I have the peppery taste from VBIC but I do love and abuse Vanilla Swirl with no issues
Actually, if you start using it at higher %, you get more of a vanilla pudding flavor (still a bit too airy to be a real pudding but the flavor is there)