Why do pre-fabricated foods often taste so bland, or even awful?

[Deathknightish]

Indian food is quite a mess to make, with it requiring you to pull out half your spice shelf together with like 20 other ingredients. I love Indian food, but I barely make it myself more than like once every three months because it takes so much effort.

There are these pre-made indian sauces, from international companies such as Patak's, but oalso domestic brands.
While some of them are okay (I really like this domestic Swedish one called "The sisters <something"), most of them are just bland and tasteless, and also have a weird texture to it, like grainy.

Just because something is pre-made in a fabric, why does it have to taste so weird? Isn't all they do just blend it in a huuuuge pot, cook it and put it in a couple of thousand plastic bags or jars?

One excuse I've heard is that they use low-quality products, but I'm not sure I accept that excuse. Even if I buy ingredients from the cheapest grocery store I still make something far tastier than what they offer. There's nothing wrong with low-price foods, honestly. Most them them are a-okay.

Is it the conservation chemicals that change the taste and texture? But then what about the ones who don't use any conservatives? That's what I like about the Swedish brand which I mentioned earlier. It just has natural ingredients in its sauces, but even then it still doesn't taste as good as home-made or from a restaurant.

[Mihalik]

I take you are in Sweden. Ethnic food is often regionalized for local tastes. Basically they've done a sampling test and apparently Swedish people don't like spicy food and the local palate is more bland.

I live in Spain, and unlike for example Mexican tastes the Spanish do not eat spicy food, at all. Their idea of "spicy" is basically medium strength black pepper. Cayenne, chili, jalapeños etc are not part of the cuisine at all. So all the ethnic food that is meant to be spicy is MASSIVELY toned down.

As I live in Madrid tho, the larger supermarkets stock international products and there are ethnic stores where you can buy the pastes, flakes, spices manufactured for everything from Louisiana markets to Indian markets, and that stuff is often MOST CERTAINLY NOT BLAND.

By the way, look for Aroy D branded pastes. They are pretty decent and are not bland. If you can't get it at your supermarket, it's available on Amazon.

[Deathknightish]

I take you are in Sweden. Ethnic food is often regionalized for local tastes. Basically they've done a sampling test and apparently Swedish people don't like spicy food and the local palate is more bland.

I live in Spain, and unlike for example Mexican tastes the Spanish do not eat spicy food, at all. Their idea of "spicy" is basically medium strength black pepper. Cayenne, chili, jalapeños etc are not part of the cuisine at all. So all the ethnic food that is meant to be spicy is MASSIVELY toned down.

As I live in Madrid tho, the larger supermarkets stock international products and there are ethnic stores where you buy the pastes, flakes, spices manufactured for everything from Louisiana markets to Indian markets, and that stuff is often MOST CERTAINLY NOT BLAND.

Yeah, I agree you on a large level, but I'm not only talking about the spicyness of the food but rather the whole taste of it. For example, I bought this pre-made tandoori sauce, and you could barely taste the tomatoes, the cumin, the garlic or the ginger.

Whenever I visit Indian restaurants I always ask them to spice it up to "their own level"; which always leave me satisfied, but as I said. What I mean here is the general taste which is just... weak.

Edit: Just saw your edit. I'll have a look. Thanks!

[Mihalik]

Yeah, I agree you on a large level, but I'm not only talking about the spicyness of the food but rather the whole taste of it. For example, I bought this pre-made tandoori sauce, and you could barely taste the tomatoes, the cumin, the garlic or the ginger.

Whenever I visit Indian restaurants I always ask them to spice it up to "their own level"; which always leave me satisfied, but as I said. What I mean here is the general taste which is just... weak.

Could be a lack of MSG, tho most probably it's just toned down spices and insufficient salt/acidity. Salt and acidity team up to boost other flavors, which is why everything from Ketchup to basic salad dressing is vinegar based. The acidity can come from various sources, vinegar, lemon, yogurt, the right type of tomato, wine, certain pickled spices etc.

Tho at your local restaurant 90% is just the MSG.

[Deathknightish]

go to stores that cater to the demographic group you want food from... i visit a thai grocery store a few times per month to get stuff the normal grocery stores don't have for cooking...

We have a great one in my city that is as big as a normal grocery store, but I haven't seen any pre-made sauces there. Maybe they do have it though. I'll take another look next time I'm there.

[dextersmith]

Indian food is quite a mess to make, with it requiring you to pull out half your spice shelf together with like 20 other ingredients. I love Indian food, but I barely make it myself more than like once every three months because it takes so much effort.

I feel the same way making kfc. The next time you pull out the spices, just mix 4x as much and store it for next time.

[breadisfunny]

i think the description of them answers the question. because they are pre made pieces of crap. your better off making it yourself. yes it's more difficult but its also more rewarding and delicious and sometimes less expensive.

[Dhrizzle]

Partly it will be the cooking process needed to ensure it stays preserved in the jars.
Mostly though it will be trying to cater to as broad a palate as possible. This means they'll want to keep it quite bland so no-one will be completely put off by a particular flavour they dislike. It isn't just pre-made foods that have this problem, I subscribed to one of those cook-it-yourself delivery services when they had a few months on offer and they really didn't give enough spices to properly flavour the food (though the bigger issue with those services is everything coming in it's own plastic packaging, even if it's just a teaspoon of cumin or single clove of garlic.

[smityx]

That's what things like Frank's or Sriracha exists for.

[shadowmouse]

No advertisement intended, but I'm quite fond of the Pakistani brand "Freshmate" because they do a wide range of pretty decent retort pouch packaged stuff. I think that the retort pouches are better for flavor than frozen or canned.

[Zantos]

For the same reason Any pre-fabricated food tastes bland or bad. It has to survive the shelf. You will always get better flavor from making something fresh. They have to add things like preservatives and remove some things that simply wouldn't last long enough to be worth it. It could also be that some things just don't taste as good when defrosted / heated up again. Then you have the fact that they use low quality ingredients to help reduce cost.

That really is all there is too it. Its just crap when compared to anything made fresh.

[Egomaniac]

Indian food is quite a mess to make, with it requiring you to pull out half your spice shelf together with like 20 other ingredients. I love Indian food, but I barely make it myself more than like once every three months because it takes so much effort.

There are these pre-made indian sauces, from international companies such as Patak's, but oalso domestic brands.
While some of them are okay (I really like this domestic Swedish one called "The sisters <something"), most of them are just bland and tasteless, and also have a weird texture to it, like grainy.

Just because something is pre-made in a fabric, why does it have to taste so weird? Isn't all they do just blend it in a huuuuge pot, cook it and put it in a couple of thousand plastic bags or jars?

One excuse I've heard is that they use low-quality products, but I'm not sure I accept that excuse. Even if I buy ingredients from the cheapest grocery store I still make something far tastier than what they offer. There's nothing wrong with low-price foods, honestly. Most them them are a-okay.

Is it the conservation chemicals that change the taste and texture? But then what about the ones who don't use any conservatives? That's what I like about the Swedish brand which I mentioned earlier. It just has natural ingredients in its sauces, but even then it still doesn't taste as good as home-made or from a restaurant.

there's a few reasons I can think of...a couple that youve mentioned...namely cheap ingredients and preservatives....but that's not everything.

Another one is that by the time you get it....it isn't exactly "fresh" anymore. Even with most of the brands that do not use chemical preservatives...there's usually something in there to keep it "fresh-ish"

But one of the biggest things is probably that it is designed for mass-market appeal. With pretty much any kind of foreign food...that tends to mean it's going to play it safe when it comes to the level of spices involved.

[Kokolums]

People actually lose taste buds as they age. Kids have 10,000 working taste buds. Older adults have around 5000. That will make things taste a lot more bland. Also, if you eat a lot of hot food and drink a lot of hot drinks (temperature-wise), you could be scalding your tongue a little bit and destroying taste buds. It takes a few days to regrow new ones, but if you keep scalding your tongue over and over, you may just be operating with less taste buds than normal. Lots of hot coffee every morning scalding your tongue will ruin your ability to taste until you stop it.

We would first need to know:

1. how old you are
2. are you scalding your tongue often?

[breadisfunny]

People actually lose taste buds as they age. Kids have 10,000 working taste buds. Older adults have around 5000. That will make things taste a lot more bland. Also, if you eat a lot of hot food and drink a lot of hot drinks (temperature-wise), you could be scalding your tongue a little bit and destroying taste buds. It takes a few days to regrow new ones, but if you keep scalding your tongue over and over, you may just be operating with less taste buds than normal. Lots of hot coffee every morning scalding your tongue will ruin your ability to taste until you stop it.

We would first need to know:

1. how old you are
2. are you scalding your tongue often?

you can't make me stop eating spicy peppers.