Preview: The Scent of Water

What is the scent of water like? Fresh? Or sweet? Is its (mostly) clear visual appearance tricking us into believing that there cannot be such a thing as a distinctive smell to it? Christy Spackman was our guest at the Datscha and we spent a delightful afternoon with different probes of water, a cake and organic fertilizer… which certainly is also a kind of water.

Christy Spackman is studying the taste of water, how sensory science shapes consumer perception, and the creation of tastelessness. She is a professor at the Arizona State University and came to Berlin this summer to do research at the ZZF (Leibniz Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung, Potsdam). Since she’s leaving by the end of July, we decided to prepone our talk

Did you know that – quite like wine tasting – water also developes a “head space” if covered for some time with a lid? Or have you ever thought about the sensual qualities of “safe” water.

Our undaunted self-test took us as far as sipping organic fertilizer, one of the strongest (evil) smelling liquids you can fabricate in a garden. Today’s sample was made from comfrey and horsetail… it stank like hell, but the taste? – I won’t tell you know. Wait until the 8th of August: We’ll broadcast “The Scent of Water” on Datscha Radio’s second iteration of Night Gardening with its focus on “Frequencies and Fragrances”, starting at sunset, 8:47 pm.

Please have your glasses of water samples (tap water, mineral waters, healing waters) ready by then, and don’t forget to put a lid on the glass.

This post is also available in: German