Likes and dislikes ideas

"Lucy_Henley;c-17893149" wrote:
What does “robust” food mean?

Even though I didn't post the comment you are referring to above, I'll take a stab at answering it.

Robustness could refer to either having more fat in the dish, or a rich, rounded flavour that increases all of the basic tastes.

The food types mentioned above were related to the original (and now hopelessly outdated) idea of primary tastes. They were originally four: Salty (pretty obvious).
Bitterness (e.g. orange peel or unsweetened chocolate).
Sweetness (e.g. sugarcane).
Sourness (e.g. lemon juice or vinegar).
Umami was added later (savoury, think something like soy sauce or a tomato).
Once you cover those five main groups, you're left with some foods that don't fit neatly into those containers. Chilli, mint, celery, whipped cream and such. So more groups have been added, and you have things like "Piquancy" (heat / capsaicin), "Coolness" (mint / menthol), "Astringency" (unripe fruit, stewed tea), "Fattiness" (oil / fat) etc.

This is like the gastronomy version of when computer artists went from using 16 colours to 16.7 million colours.

...sorry for the length, I tend to waffle.
Now I want some waffles with ice cream.