In TNG, Picard says that the Federation has evolved past a need for money. Indeed, we never see any.
In DS9 though, Quark talks a lot about bar tabs and costs. Surely O’Brien and Bashir don’t get free drinks, so how do they pay? I’d assume that any Ferengi worth his lobes won’t accept anything that can be replicated, so do Federation officers get a stipend of tradeable “value” when interacting with cultures that still expect payment?
I think there’s also a reference to Quark paying rent to Sisko for running the bar. Presumably that’s denominated in latinum. I wonder where it goes? Maybe the secret “Garak black ops” fund.
That’s something I hadn’t considered about replicated food. As a gardener, I can attest that the dirt it’s grown in can have a pretty big impact on taste. It could be that.
Could also be, like, you order your replicated tomato, and they’re giving you Tomato variety number 7, as is standard for replicators, and you just don’t care for that variety. Kinda like how banana candy doesn’t taste like bananas, because it actually tastes like a variety of banana you can’t get anymore, so no one thinks it tastes real anymore.
