Bunsen Burner Barman

In the past few years something called "molecular gastronomy" has become all the rage in the same way that nouveau cuisine of a generation ago taught diners that you can drop a packet on a meal and still come away starving.

Basically, molecular gastronomy is cooking combined with chemistry that translates into dishes that are far too over-prepared. When most people hear the word "Frankenfood" they think of genetically modified crops. I think of a chef with a test tube and an Erlenmeyer flask churning out repellent foamed sauces to go on foodstuffs that resemble nothing meant for the human pallet in either taste or texture.

Not content with ruining people's dinner at a premium price, kitchen sadism has spread to the quiet refuge of the lounge, where there is now something that could be called molecular bartending, of which the Times has a frightening example:

“Take the Super Soda, for example. Really it’s a classic Tom Collins,” (says Tony Conigliari of London's Shochu Lounge), putting in front of me a tall glass of viscous liquid with green bubbles suspended in it. Alongside it is a paper perfume swatch. What he has done, he explains, is re-created the notes of the perfume – Soda by Comme des Garçons – by cooking lemon grass, lime and geranium essence in a vacuum with Tanqueray, lemon juice, sugar and gelling agents, and then stirred in frozen grapes and small pearls that he has made by syringing liquid cinnamon and nutmeg into a calcium base. At least I think that’s what he said. The result is like no Tom Collins I’ve tasted. You smell the perfume swatch and take a sip.

Then dash for the gents before the gag reflex becomes overpowering.

We used to laugh at the Romans with their hummingbird tongues dipped in honey, but 21^st century Britain has definitely done them one up in the decadence stakes. I remember when a cocktail was having a splash of tonic and in your gin and bitters. And if you were really on the cutting edge of depravity you might ask the barman if you could have a piece of ice with it.

If no one was looking, of course.