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Happy birthday, sartorias.

Food

A Tiny Fruit That Tricks the Tongue
By PATRICK FARRELL and KASSIE BRACKEN

CARRIE DASHOW dropped a large dollop of lemon sorbet into a glass of Guinness, stirred, drank and proclaimed that it tasted like a “chocolate shake.”

Nearby, Yuka Yoneda tilted her head back as her boyfriend, Albert Yuen, drizzled Tabasco sauce onto her tongue. She swallowed and considered the flavor: “Doughnut glaze, hot doughnut glaze!”

They were among 40 or so people who were tasting under the influence of a small red berry called miracle fruit at a rooftop party in Long Island City, Queens, last Friday night. The berry rewires the way the palate perceives sour flavors for an hour or so, rendering lemons as sweet as candy. More

Bitter Ale

Ales of The Times
A Tour of Bitters for the Summer
By ERIC ASIMOV

YOU have to hand it to the British for their engaging skill at understatement. How else to explain their predilection for taking something refreshing and delicious and saddling it with a name like “ordinary”?

Ordinary is the term for the basic British bitter, the ale that has for generations quenched bottomless thirsts in pubs throughout England. Possibly even the British realized that a name like ordinary might cause a few patrons to lay their heads on the bar far too early in the evening, out of sheer boredom. So in their fashion, they ratcheted up the excitement.

A slightly stronger ale was called best bitter or special bitter, a heartier brew was dubbed extra special bitter, or E.S.B.

Can you contain yourself?

It’s not easy, because I am thrilled with bitters. They are beers for drinking, for enjoying several pints over the course of an evening, rather than for carefully paced sipping. They are not meant to impress connoisseurs with their power or creative flavoring. They are meant, as so many British pub-goers understand, to quench thirst pleasurably without getting in the way of conversation.

These days, more extravagant beers get most of the attention, like India Pale Ales, double I.P.A.s and other stronger brews with more flamboyant flavors. But bitters and their restrained brethren are the daily bread of beer drinking.

With warm weather coming, though, bitters are worth looking for to be enjoyed over the long haul of a ballgame or a summer barbecue.

With this in mind, we called the tasting panel to order to sample 25 beers made in the bitters style. Florence Fabricant and I were joined by two guests: Richard Scholz, an owner of Bierkraft in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and Alex Hall, a cask ale consultant and proprietor of gotham-imbiber.com, an excellent New York beer resource. More