Crab salad is a girlishly pretty mosaic of tiny crab molecules, dots of avocado purée and transparent squares of kohlrabi – subtle and pungent but gone too soon.
With the chicken adequately marinaded, there will be a subtle yet pungent kick of flavor embedded into the meat.
To showcase their pungent though subtle and elusive flavor, Mr. Tardi combines fresh white truffles with very simple dishes offered as daily specials, like quail egg crostino, fonduta ravioli, risotto of fresh porcini mushrooms, and pan-roasted breast of pheasant with braised cabbage.
Different woods impart different flavors: sugar maple is sweet, ash is subtler and hickory is pungent.
Though the basic ingredients are similar — lemongrass, garlic, ginger, fish sauce — Khmer cooking is subtler and lighter, employing less chili, pungent herbs and coconut milk.
There's a firm bitterness, but it isn't the overwhelming punch that the pungent aroma might suggest, and there's a subtle sweetness that lingers on the tongue just until the warmth of the brew's 10% alcohol content overtakes it.
Not to mention two or three different kinds of whole grilled fish and Taramasalata (a carp roe spread popularly served with a hot pita that we had almost everywhere we went. It varied from very pungent, thick, and sort of coarse, to extremely subtle, airy, and almost creamy, which is what this one was like, and what I prefer).
Mache Salad With Yogurt Dressing: The mild, subtle mâche, also known as lamb's lettuce, contrasts nicely with the sharp, pungent garlic-spiked yogurt.
Rather than exhibiting the pungent fruit flavors more typical in New Zealand sauvignon blancs, these were subtle, nuanced wines with an emphasis on citrus, herbal and mineral flavors.
I prefer Samuel Johnson's more pungent and accurate definitions of disingenuous in his imposing 1755 dictionary, "meanly artful, viciously subtle".
