Food Science Review

[ryanosaur]

I like my pork cooked realllly well done with a crunchy crust and tender de jour. Beef not as well done but I can eat any beef cooked well or rare. It's beef! YumMY...

Pork. A nice medium, please.
I pull ~123ºF and let it rest.

Of course, if you aren't getting your pork from a clean source, you definitely need to still cook it through, well. *blech

 

[Doodski]

Pork. A nice medium, please.
I pull ~123ºF and let it rest.

Of course, if you aren't getting your pork from a clean source, you definitely need to still cook it through, well. *blech

I have been eating mostly salmon, cod and shrimp for the past ~1 year. I cooked a pork roast ~2 months ago and another a few months ago and it tasted off as in had a musty flavor. But I eat ham a lot still. I just can't eat some foods now because they have a yucky taste and a heavy gross over-filling feeling. Before this I would gobble down pork like there is no tomorrow. I loved (love?) pork. I raised pigs for some years for food and saw how they eat their own poo and roll in the "mud" LoL... I cook it well done but I appreciate med rare for beef all the time.

 

[Ron Texas]

Lessons in Chemistry?

 

[RDoc]

Give it a try, butterfly and check at 45 minutes or leave one of those new fangled thermometers in the breast. Hot and fast, indirect heat is very juicy inside and very crispy outside. One more chicken could rock the under world.
When it comes to taste empirical evidence is the best evidence.

I've had better experiences with whole chicken cooked hot and fast than butterflied (spatchdocked). The whole chicken comes out juicer.

What has worked very well for me is spatchdocked duck cooked low and slow to well done. It rendered out a lot of the fat as well as resulted in very tender meat. If you like rare duck though, this isn't the way to go.

 

[Timcognito]

I've had better experiences with whole chicken cooked hot and fast than butterflied (spatchdocked). The whole chicken comes out juicer.

What has worked very well for me is spatchdocked duck cooked low and slow to well done. It rendered out a lot of the fat as well as resulted in very tender meat. If you like rare duck though, this isn't the way to go.

The technique I use is strictly for the barbecue, where controlling the heat is a challenge. Beside the crispy skin and juicy meat, the fat near the outside renders quickly and the taste of wood smoke peppers the skin. I believe both techniques leave a good tasting bird.
As for Duck, a low temperature sous vied 130 deg-F for many hours followed by rendering in the pan fat side down after scoring and seasoning it and slightly browning the other side. This also allows one to prepare all but pan frying day(s) in advance. Thanks to the wife on the Duck. I'm a lazy cook and have relegated to grilling.

 

[bluefuzz]

I've never rested a steak in my life. That said, I don't think I've ever actually cooked a steak (or a whole chicken for that matter) in my life. It's not that I don't eat meat – I do – but roast meat is a long way down the list of foods I can be bothered to invest time or cognitive energy in. There are lots more tasty things to eat ...

 

[Keith_W]

How to make a creamy Cacio e Pepe using food science.

A traditional Cacio e Pepe is made by adding pasta water to a grated Pecorino and pepper mixture, and mixed to create a thin paste. This paste is then added to spaghetti and tossed to create the sauce. The problem is that temperature control is critical - if it's not hot enough, the cheese does not melt. If it's too hot, the protein coagulates and seizes, separating into clumps of stringy cheese and fat. The temperature range is critical - both hot pasta water and pan need to be kept between 60-70C. Experience or an infrared thermometer is critical to success. Although it is a simple dish, it is technically difficult to execute.

Hence I made a couple of modifications to the recipe. First, I watched Luciano Monosilio's recipe on Italia Squisita:

Watch the "foolproof" version. Note that he added a hydrated cornstarch mixture to the grated Pecorino.

My addition was Sodium Citrate. Both cornstarch and citrate work to stabilize the mixture. Cornstarch consists of amylopectin and amylose. When heated in water, both proteins unravel and form a gel network which thickens plain water. When cheese is added to the cornstarch slurry, the gel networks interferes with the proteins in the cheese and prevent them from clumping. Citrate works by chelating Calcium ions in the cheese, which again stops the cheese from seizing and makes the mixture smoother. You can use Citrate salts to make Mac and Cheese with ANY cheese, not just the "American cheese" that is typically used (which already has Citrate salts in it).

To make the Cacio e Pepe:

- Grate 160g Pecorino cheese. Set some aside for garnish.
- Toast 5-10g black pepper and grind finely.
- Boil 200g water with 10g cornstarch until the cornstarch dissolves.
- Add 10g Sodium Citrate and stir to dissolve.
- Add 10g EVOO and the cheese mixture and ground pepper. Blend with a hand blender. Taste and add a pinch of salt to your taste. Set aside.
- Cook 250g spaghetti, transferring into a pan 2 minutes short of recommended cooking time. Add pasta water to the pan and keep cooking to create an extra starchy "sauce".
- Remove from the heat. Add all the cheese sauce and toss. Serve immediately with more Pecorino on top and an extra grind of pepper.

Result:

 

[Pareto Pragmatic]

The temperature range is critical - both hot pasta water and pan need to be kept between 60-70C.

IIRC, the original "alfredo" is mixed on a plate or platter, not in the pan. Given that target temp, I can see why that works, though I have never tried it. Pasta cools, plate heats, gives you time to work everything together. I learned a similar way of doing things for pasta sauces, off heat, when camping.

Me? I like to live life on the edge, no safety nets for me!

More seriously though, cheats are good, I have and will use them at times for classic dishes. But if you can make this dish classically, you will have developed some mad pasta skills. My tips would be use good pasta (bronze die cut with some texture) and cook the pasta a bit longer than if you were doing a red sauce (where many people will cook it an additional minute or so in the sauce.) Only time and practice will get you to the point of knowing when to go 30 seconds longer or cut the time 30 seconds.

Pasta is so simple, so easy to make, but surprisingly difficult to master. Not that I claim to have mastered it, but I do ok.

 

[Keith_W]

You will see from the photo that I was using Martelli pasta. I have been trying different pasta brands available in Australia, and I like Martelli the best. The pasta is so al dente that it is almost like meat with its chewiness. The other pasta I like is Rustichella d'Abruzzo - they make more pasta varieties than Martelli. I also like Rummo and Divella - half the price of Martelli and Rustichella and you can achieve most of the texture of the more expensive brands by undercooking them a little.

And BTW, Italians are hilarious when their recipes are modified

 

[Pareto Pragmatic]

And BTW, Italians are hilarious when their recipes are modified

Italians reacting to US based "Italian" restaurants is a perennial favorite of mine on YouTube.

I appreciate the traditional ways, and done right the results are fantastic. But I do tend to take a more pragmatic approach, if it works it works, most of the time. But then I have done a lot to develop my skills in the kitchen over many years, so I do have the option of going either way with just about everything. Mostly "faster, easier" wins out.

 

[ryanosaur]

Italians reacting to US based "Italian" restaurants is a perennial favorite of mine on YouTube.

I appreciate the traditional ways, and done right the results are fantastic. But I do tend to take a more pragmatic approach, if it works it works, most of the time. But then I have done a lot to develop my skills in the kitchen over many years, so I do have the option of going either way with just about everything. Mostly "faster, easier" wins out.

There is an area near where I grew up that was heavily settled by Italians. The restaurants in that neighborhood are all relatively good to even great and all the menus read alike as a what’s what of Italian-American cuisine.
Juxtaposing those earlier experiences with going to a real Italian restaurant is kind of crazy. One does not prepare you for the other.

 

[EERecordist]

I am going to add new scientific directions to this topic, individual diet.

We each have a genome which enables metabolic cascades. And we each have a digestive biome. So the individual diet recommendations beyond basic are snake oil.