Dateline: 1964 on Route 9W Highland, New York.
No drive to the Rondout Estuary in Kingston was tolerable unless our 1961 Plymouth station wagon entered the dirt lot at Johnny's Drive-In somewhere on the stretch from Highland to Port Ewen. As a pimple-faced teen I consistently ordered a Johnny Burger with fries and a chocolate malt. Served in the traditional red plastic weave basket lined with checkerboard wax paper. Heavenly.
I had obligatory rights to the tabletop jukebox. Flip-flip-flip the index of hits by Peter, Paul and Mary, The Kingston Trio, and after a few years The Kinks, Herman's Hermits and the Hollies. Why does "Ferry Cross the Mersey" (Gerry and the Pacemakers) echo to this day?
A professional trombonist with The Goldbrick Horn Band in 1972, the after-gig party was inevitably held at a diner on Broadway, uptown Kingston. And what was my principal role? Flip-flip-flip the jukebox Rolodex. The Allman Brothers Band, Blood Sweat & Tears, and Chicago.
It seemed inevitable then – I could not divorce food and music. But with the Culinary Institute of America just North in Hyde Park and, ironically, just across the Hudson River from the defunct Johnny's Drive-In, perhaps I could find a chef to opine on the topic. And indeed I have. So please understand when I gorge on a Shake Shack cheeseburger I fondly hear music with every delicious bite. Wait, my inner child just asked, how about some Red Hot Chili Peppers with lunch? Why not?
Jonathan Zearfoss is a professor of culinary science at The Culinary Institute of America (CIA) in Hyde Park, New York, and the senior faculty member at the college and in the School of Culinary Science and Nutrition. He chaired the curriculum team that created the CIA’s Culinary Science program and currently teaches Flavor Science and Perception (BPS) and Taste, Palate, and Sensory Perception (MCTH). Chef Zearfoss has taught extensively across the curriculum – from advanced cooking and pastry to gastronomy and product knowledge – and previously served as associate dean for curriculum and instruction, overseeing restaurant education and helping develop the CIA’s advanced cooking curriculum.
He holds a BA in English from William & Mary, where he minored in art history and fine arts, played varsity baseball, and won third place in Fiction (1981) at the William & Mary Writer’s Festival. He also has an MA in liberal studies from SUNY Empire State College.
He was content leader for the second edition of The Techniques of Healthy Cooking and is the author of The Great Chefs of Virginia. Zearfoss was, along with Dr. Debra Zellner, an author of the peer-reviewed paper It tastes as good as it looks! The effect of food presentation on liking for the flavor of food. He has conducted seminars worldwide on healthy cooking, flavor development, global cuisine, menu composition, culinary education, and pairing food with wine and beer. He served for several terms on the board of the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP).
Chef Zearfoss and colleagues played for many years in The Too Many Cooks Blues Band, with events including 15 consecutive chili cookoffs and opening for the Robert Cray Band.
Professor Zearfoss notes, “My cuisine is rooted in the principles of New American cuisine – what is now commonly called farm-to-table. At its core, this approach is traditional: seasonal, local, artisanal, and wild-foraged. It mirrors the way Italians often think about food – start with the best local ingredients, in season, and do as little as possible to them to make them delicious. These principles naturally address concerns about sustainability and local sourcing. They are not trends to me but foundational values, and I have always designed menus around them.
The dining experience is fundamentally multisensory. I was recently reminded, while listening to an interview with Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, that color – like sound – is a wavelength. In flavor science, context matters. Substantial research shows that happier diners like food more (“liking” is, in fact, a technical term), and happiness is shaped by music, visual appearance, lighting, and the overall environment.
Sound, lighting, and visual cues are not neutral backdrops; they actively shape how food is perceived. Appearance demonstrably influences enjoyment: the more attractive a dish, the more it is enjoyed. In restaurant work, function is aesthetic, and aesthetics can also invite experimentation.
Dining rooms have long been conceived as theatrical spaces, places where perception is guided as much by environment as by what is on the plate. Technology now offers intriguing possibilities in this regard. Particularly compelling to me is the potential to customize soundscapes – by table, or even by dish. If that becomes feasible at scale, music and sound could be intentionally paired with food, deepening the sensory experience and reinforcing the idea of dining as a fully integrated experience of the senses.”
I talked with professor Zearfoss about these ideas and more.
Joe Caplan: Have you ever noticed certain cooking techniques producing sounds that remind you of musical elements – like the rhythm of chopping, the sizzle as percussion, or the whistle of a pressure cooker as melody?
Professor Jonathan Zearfoss: Yes – very much so. The sounds of cooking often strike me as musical. Certain techniques naturally generate rhythm: chopping, stirring, or the percussive placement of food onto a hot surface. But what stands out to me most is the human voice during service.
In a professional kitchen, what we often refer to as the echo system – the chef calling out orders and the cooks responding – has a cadence that is deeply reminiscent of work songs and, in some ways, military marches. There is call and response, shared tempo, and collective synchronization. It is entirely functional, yet unmistakably rhythmic and communal in a way that feels ancient.
I once saw a comedy sketch – I thought it was Benny Hill, maybe Monty Python or Carol Burnett, but I haven't been able to track it down – where each food at a brunch was played as an instrument: the soft‑boiled egg became a triangle; the buttering of toast became a rhythm instrument, almost like a washboard. That sketch captures the idea perfectly: the kitchen is an orchestra of tools, surfaces, machines, and voices, all producing sound that informs pace and mood as much as any metronome would.
JC: Do you think certain cuisines have an inherent “tempo” or mood that could translate to musical genres – for example, is French cuisine jazz while street food is punk rock?
JZ: There is a substantial body of research demonstrating that when music is perceived as congruent with food, it enhances the dining experience. Conversely, music that diners experience as incongruent does not increase liking – and may even detract from it. What matters most is not the genre itself, but the diner’s perception of fit between the music and the food.
I became aware of this issue very early on. The first formal experiment I ever conducted, in eighth grade, involved playing different genres of music to observe their effects on the growth of pea plants. What I learned was less about plants and more about the bias of the researcher – the ease with which outcomes can be shaped by adjusting controls – and about the broadness of the term genre itself. “Rock music,” for example, can encompass everything from the Eagles to Metallica, which are experienced very differently despite sharing a label.
So yes, I do think certain cuisines can be associated with particular tempos or moods, but those associations are contextual rather than absolute. Jazz paired with French cuisine in New Orleans is a good example: the fit feels natural because it aligns with cultural history and diners’ expectations. Academic research also shows that increased musical tempo leads people to eat faster and consume more calories – something that can benefit restaurants financially, but that also underscores how powerfully sound shapes behavior.
That distinction matters. A jazz brunch might be best served by Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli, while a New Orleans jazz brunch may feel far more authentic with something like the Meters. In each case, it’s not simply “jazz” that matters, but the specific musical expression that resonates with the cuisine, the place, and the moment.
JC: When you taste a dish you’ve created, does it ever evoke a specific song or sonic quality in your mind?
JZ: For me, it is less that entire dishes evoke specific songs and more that individual ingredients evoke sonic qualities.
I have spoken with several colleagues about the idea of a sensorium – almost a circular room in which visuals, sounds, aromas, and other stimuli are projected simultaneously. The question is whether we can intentionally recreate the full, multisensorial experience of food rather than encountering it accidentally. That kind of multisensorial design interests me far more than simple one-to-one pairings.
JC: Do you ever structure a tasting menu the way a musician might build a set list – thinking about pacing, contrast, and emotional arc?
JZ: I have spent some years studying the structure of different art forms and have come to the conclusion that humans – particularly in Western cultures – are conditioned to respond to certain narrative and emotional arcs.
There is a clear overlap between symphonic form and the three-part structure typical of dramatic works, especially plays. That structure can be further subdivided into nine parts, which appear not only in theater but also in films, comedy routines, and even baseball games.
I often draw parallels between tasting menus, musical setlists, and the internal structure of songs themselves. One contemporary example I use in presentations is the Allman Brothers’ live rendition of “You Don’t Love Me” from At Fillmore East. The way tension is built, released, and reintroduced closely mirrors how a well-designed menu unfolds over time.
JC: If you were to translate your signature dish into a sound or musical composition, what would it be and why?
JZ: Professional chefs do not really have signature dishes. That said, early in my work with healthy cooking, “traditionalists” often claimed that desserts – within a healthy cooking context – could not be both healthy and delicious. In response, I created a dessert called Three Pieces in the Form of a Pear.
The title comes from a 1903 composition by Erik Satie (trois morceaux en forme de poire), written partly as a response to Claude Debussy’s criticism that Satie’s music lacked form. The French wordplay* involved was not especially flattering. I chose the name deliberately – as a rebuttal to those who insisted that healthy desserts could not also be delicious.
The somewhat wayward French composer Erik Satie was often criticized that his compositions would have no form. So, he collected some pieces into a suite for four-handed piano and put them in the shape of a pear. It should not be forgotten that the French word “poire” doesn't just mean “pear,” but also “idiot.” It also fits his humor that the work consists of seven movements – not three.
JC: Have you experimented with using music to influence diners’ perception of flavor – like playing specific songs to enhance sweet, savory, or spicy notes?
JZ: Years ago we created a series of diagrams based on my ideas, attempting to map basic tastes onto a musical scale. In these diagrams, sweetness was represented as higher notes, while salty and bitter were associated with lower, bass notes. Gary Allen deserves full credit for the drawings themselves; they were his work, based on my conceptual framework.
What was striking is that this representation closely matched how sensory panelists, in more recent peer-reviewed research, independently correlated basic tastes – sweet, salty, and bitter—with pitch.
JC: Has a song or genre ever directly inspired a dish you’ve created? What was the connection?
JZ: My training comes from the early days of what was known as New American cuisine – late 1970s into the early 1980s – and much of that training took place in the American South, specifically Virginia. As a result, my flavor sensibilities are grounded in local ingredients, farm-to-table cooking, artisanal products, and seasonal wild foods.
Naturally, this connects to American music, particularly blues and Americana. Many blues songs reference food, sometimes literally and sometimes metaphorically referencing aspects of sexuality. Americana, more broadly, is rich with songs about food and place. One song I particularly love is Guy Clark’s “Homegrown Tomatoes.” I would love to use that in a tomato-themed menu, though maybe Chilled Yellow Taxi Tomato Soup would be matched with Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi.”
In my mind, culinary traditions and musical traditions are inseparable: local food, local music, and a shared cultural stage shaped by jazz, blues, and American roots music.
JC: Do you curate playlists for different stages of cooking – prep work versus plating, for instance? How do those differ?
JZ: At the Culinary Institute of America, music is generally not played during professional cooking. Clear communication – especially around safety – is essential. Cooks need to hear warnings about knives, hot liquids, and movement in tight spaces.
That said, I have curated playlists extensively for special events, particularly collaborations (Global Village, Melting Pot) with Michael Weiss, the CIA’s former wine instructor. Together, we designed immersive food, wine, and music experiences.
One such event was called Liquid Bridges, based on the concept of cooking with the same beverage being served, thereby creating a natural bridge between food and drink. We embraced the theme fully, even in our attire, and curated playlists centered on songs about bridges, roads, and travel.
JC: If you could collaborate with any musician to create a synchronized food-and-music experience, who would it be, and what would you create together?
JZ: So many possible answers to this question. I think the answer depends on context. Years ago, in the 1980s, I attended a barbecue dinner in Kansas City. Each course highlighted a regional style of barbecue, paired with the blues of that region. It worked perfectly for that kind of food. I’m still partial to the kind of instrumental magic the later Allman Brothers Band continued to weave. I haven’t really thought of a structured jam-band vibe as dinner music, but I’d happily put on the Beats and ruminate on it.
I was fortunate to be part of the Too Many Cooks Blues Band, composed largely of CIA chef-instructors. We once opened for Robert Cray, who has written several songs about food.
The condition was that we would cook dinner for him. I prepared smoked, roasted duck legs with cabbage slaw and a mustard vinaigrette. He referred to the duck as “bangin,’” which I took as a strong endorsement.
JC: Have you considered how silence or ambient sound in a restaurant affects how people taste food differently than when music is playing?
JZ: Many contemporary restaurants are now investing in sound-dampening technologies because overall noise levels have become overwhelming for many diners. Sound tolerance varies widely, and excessive noise can interfere with perception just as aroma can.
I once had an exceptional meal at a very important restaurant, seated at what was likely the best table in the room – except that it was directly next to an enormous floral arrangement. The aroma dominated the experience in unintended ways. Sound can function similarly.
One of the most influential studies on auditory perception was conducted by Charles Spence (Zampini and Spence, 2004). In this work, the sound of crunching was altered while participants ate potato chips. Louder crunch led diners to perceive the chips as fresher and crisper. If you cannot hear yourself chew, it arguably alters how you perceive the food.
JC: Would you ever design a “listening menu” where each course is meant to be experienced with a specific song or soundscape?
JZ: Yes, absolutely. In events such as the Global Village, Melting Pot, and Mediterranean wine pairing menus I created with Michael Weiss, we curated specific songs and timed service so that food and wine arrived precisely as each piece of music began.
I would love to take this further by commissioning or creating instrumental music specifically designed to accompany a menu, and then designing dishes to align exactly with that music. It would be a fully synchronized, multisensory experience. A note to myself: it is something I should pursue upon retirement!
Jonathan A. Zearfoss, MA, CEC, CCE, CCP, CHE
Professor – School of Culinary Science and Nutrition
jonathan.zearfoss@culinary.edu
References:
• “Music, Math, Movies, and Menus,” presentation on theory of menu composition, first residency of Master of Culinary Arts, Culinary Institute of America, Hyde Park, NY, September 21, 2023
• “Implications of Patterns in Entertainment on Tasting Menu Design,” Circus of the Senses: A Symposium on Food & the Humanities, The Culinary Institute of America, Hyde Park, NY, March 19, 2018
• “A Taste of Culinary Science,” Ten-part animated series on Culinary Science Topics. CIA, Animation Kitchen, written with Dr. Mark Krasnow, produced 2014-5
• Zellner, D. A., Loss, C. R., Zearfoss, J., & Remolina, S. (2014). It tastes as good as it looks! The effect of food presentation on liking for the flavor of food☆. Appetite, 77, 31–35. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2014.02.009
• Zearfoss, J. (September, 2014). Culinary Science Degree Delves into Flavor. FSR Magazine. No. 13. p.80.
• “Robert Cray Band and Too Many Cooks” Free Concert and Dinner with the Band, Culinary Institute of America, Hyde Park, NY, February 27, 2010.
• “Chef’s Jam,” Benefit Concert, with Marc Vetri, David Joachim, and others, International Association of Culinary Professionals, 30th Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA, April 17, 2008
• “Flavors and Pairing in the Brewpub Kitchen,” with Ken Turow, National Brewpub Conference and Trade Show, Portland, ME, October 22, 2000
• “Aphrodisiacs: Food Sensuality and Pleasure,” Lecture, International Association of Culinary Professionals, 19th Annual Conference, Chicago, IL, April 17, 1997
• “The Melting Pot: One Nation Many Cultures,” Lecture, Tasting, and Luncheon, with Michael Weiss, Cakebread Cellars’ 10th Annual American Harvest Workshop Anniversary and Reunion, Rutherford, CA, Sept. 7,8, 1996
• “Food & Wine Pairing--A Vintage Tour of American Culinary History,” with Michael Weiss, and “There’s Money in Mediterranean Cooking Methods,” and “Create Delicious & Healthy Dishes for a Healthy Profit,” NRA Educational Foundation, NRA Show--Chicago, IL, May 18-19, 1996
• “The Literary Gourmet,” Lecture, Marist College’s Center for Lifetime Studies, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY, May 7, 1996
• Menu and Recipes for Grand Banquet and “Putting on a Successful Beer Dinner,” with Ken Turow and Bill Woodring, The Boston Brew-In: Charting the Course, Institute for Brewing Studies, National Craft-Brewers Conference and Trade Show, Boston, MA, April 27-30, 1996
• “One Nation: Many Cultures,” with Michael Weiss, Albany Wine Festival, February 4, 1996
• “Food and Wine Pairing in the Global Village,” with Michael Weiss, and “Garnishing Results Through Attractive Food Presentation,” NRA Educational Foundation, NRA Show--Chicago, IL, May 20 and 21, 1995
• “A Dinner at the Global Village,” with Michael Weiss, Dinner, wine, music and commentary, St. Andrew’s Cafe, February 23, 1995
• “Ethnic Explosion,” with Michael Weiss, Albany Wine Festival, February 5, 1995
• “A Tasteful Dinner of Aphrodisiacs,” St. Andrew's Cafe, Feb. 14, 1991, Feb. 13-14, 1992, and Feb. 12-14,1993 and “Cupid Returns,” Feb. 14, 1994, February 14, 1995, February 14, 1996, February 13, 1997
• “Saints Versus Sinners--A Perspective of Healthy Cuisine with Wines to Match,” with Michael Weiss, Albany Wine Festival, February 7, 1993
• Guest Lecturer, “Blues: An American Art Form,” for Prof. Jodi Braxton, Black Literature, English Dept., College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA, May 1984
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