Category: From My Kitchen

Master 50 Simple Concepts to Enjoy a Lifetime of Success in the Kitchen (Cook’s Illustrated Cookbooks) 

Unlock a lifetime of successful cooking with this groundbreaking new volume from the editors of Cook’s Illustrated, the magazine that put food science on the map. Organized around 50 core principles our test cooks use to develop foolproof recipes, The Science of Good Cooking is a radical new approach to teaching the fundamentals of the kitchen. Fifty unique experiments from the test kitchen bring the science to life, and more than 400 landmark Cook’s Illustrated recipes (such as Old-Fashioned Burgers, Classic Mashed Potatoes, and Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies) illustrate each of the basic principles at work. These experiments range from simple to playful to innovative – showing you why you should fold (versus stir) batter for chewy brownies, why you whip egg whites with sugar, and why the simple addition of salt can make meat juicy. A lifetime of experience isn’t the prerequisite for becoming a good cook; knowledge is. Think of this as an owner’s manual for your kitchen.

Let me start with my humble opinion, you are going to love this book! After my hubby bought this book for me, we both took a quick look through it. Just that quick I found a recipe for shrimp that has become my “go to” for a quick weeknight meal. If you’ve never been able to get a pie crust to come out right, try the Foolproof Pie Crust in the back of the book. I tell you, it works for both myself and my friends. What makes for interesting reading is the explanation of “Why” it works.

Pokin
5.0 out of 5 stars A must-read to improve the results of your food!
Reviewed in the United States on September 22, 2012 Verified Purchase
Having relied on Cooks Illustrated recommendations for many of my favourite kitchen tools, buying this book was a no brainer. Needless to say I had high expectations going in, and this book did not disappoint.

I'm an avid cook, and while I've had great success with certain types of food, I've been frustrated by inconsistent results in others. (I can't seem to get a consistently moist pot-roast -- reason: my cooking temperature was probably too high; wrong cut of meat + oven braising is better than stovetop since it heats more evenly in more directions)

The Science of Good Cooking breaks down why food cooks a certain way, and which techniques are best for what purpose. The book is organized into 50 concepts with recipes reinforcing each concept. There's a section called "why this works" following each recipe, which breaks down the science behind each step -- for instance why use a certain type of marinade, cooking technique, take extra steps, etc to achieve a desired outcome. It's nice that it's not just a list of recipes.

Experiments back each concept. Meats were weighed, measured, smashed to determine tenderness, and moisture loss. They came up with a range of ideal resting times for various meats based on actually measuring the amount of juices lost at various times, and they sent food to the science lab to analyze their structure. They even stuck bones on mashed potatoes to test out whether keeping bones on makes food taste better. This book debunked some assumptions I had (acid does not actually make food more tender), and helped me understand other ones better - why salt directly applied on skin makes it more crispy, but if you brined the skin you'd get a different outcome. I also learned that the direction you cut your onion affects its taste - obvious in retrospect, but I never thought about that!

I was disappointed I couldn't see a table of contents before purchase, so here are the 50 concepts you will find within the book -

1. Gentle Heat Prevents Overcooking
2. High Heat Develops Flavor
3. Resting Meat Maximizes Juiciness
4. Hot Food Keeps Cooking
5. Some Proteins Are Best Cooked Twice
6. Slow Heating Makes Meat Tender
7. Cook Tough Cuts Beyond Well Done
8. Tough Cuts Like a Covered Pot
9. A Covered Pot Doesn't Need Liquid
10. Bones Add Flavor, Fat, and Juiciness
11. Brining Maximizes Juiciness in Lean Meats
12. Salt Makes Meat Juicy and Skin Crisp
13. Salty Marinades work best
14. Grind Meat at Home for Tender Burgers
15. A Panade Keeps Ground Meat Tender
16. Create Layers for a Breading That Sticks
17. Good Frying is All About Oil Temperature
18. Fat Makes Eggs Tender
19. Gentle Heat Guarantees Smooth Custards
20. Starch Keeps Eggs from Curdling
21. Whipped Egg Whites Need Stabilizers
22. Starch Helps Cheese Melt Nicely
23. Salting Vegetables Removes Liquid
24. Green Vegetables Like it Hot -- Then Cold
25. All Potatoes Are Not Created Equal
26. Potato Starches Can Be Controlled
27. Precooking Makes Vegetables Firmer
28. Don't Soak Beans -- Brine 'Em
29. Baking Soda Makes Beans and Grains Soft
30. Rinsing (Not Soaking) Makes Rice Fluffy
31. Slicing Changes Garlic and Onion Flavor
32. Chile Heat Resides in Pith and Seeds
33. Bloom Spices to Boost Their Flavor
34. Not All Herbs Are for Cooking
35. Glutamates, Nucleotides Add Meaty Flavor
36. Emulsifiers Make Smooth Sauces
37. Speed Evaporation When Cooking Wine
38. More Water Makes Chewier Bread
39. Rest Dough to Trim Kneading Time
40. Time Builds Flavor in Bread
41. Gentle Folding Stops Tough Quick Breads
42. Two Leaveners Are Often Better Than One
43. Layers of Butter Makes Flaky Pastry
44. Vodka Makes Pie Dough Easy
45. Less Protein Makes Tender Cakes, Cookies
46. Creaming Butter Helps Cakes Rise
47. Reverse Cream for Delicate Cakes
48. Sugar Changes Texture (and Sweetness)
49. Sugar and Time Makes Fruit Juicer
50. Cocoa Powder Delivers Big Flavor

The only thing I would have loved was a trouble shooting / Q&A section - e.g. How do you keep meat from cooling too much when you rest it?

Overall a great book if you want to improve your cooking technique, and also if you just want to learn more about why things behave the way they do!

Update: Looks like "Look inside" is now available for this book so there's finally a table of contents! 🙂 Since I've been cooking with the new concepts in mind, I'm happy with how my meat dishes (especially the stews) are turning out. I also tried using vodka instead of water to make pie crust (with the tip of putting a heated pan under the pie pan) and the pie crust turned out flaky and delicious as promised.

Maggie S
4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Reference
Reviewed in the United States on December 13, 2016 Verified Purchase
I have four shelves of cookbooks in my kitchen with classics such as Julia Child's originals all the way to glossy offerings from 3-star Michelin restaurants. Despite this, one can be an excellent cook using only two cookbooks: "Cooks Science" and the "Joy of Cooking". Cooks Science is comprehensive and the discussions help make you a better more informed cook than the usual recipe-oriented fare. I give it four and not five stars only because some of the recipes seem to be "tacked onto" the broader technical discussions rather than drawing upon them. For example, a discussion about the importance of slow cooking pork is followed by several recipes that seem to ignore that counsel. It's not an exhaustive cookbook like Joy of Cooking, but does offer recipes in most areas and manages to hit most of the biggies. Still, these seem to be a minor quibbles with an othewise excellent text.

J. Boyd
5.0 out of 5 stars Choose your own adventure -- Excellence in Ebook format!
Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2014 Verified Purchase
This is a fantastic cookbook. It's also a wonderfully entertaining education on the hows and whys - the science - of cooking. Every recipe I've tried has turned out well - and has taught me something. I own a hard-cover copy, and it has a place of honor on my kitchen bookshelf.

Then I bought the Kindle edition. Whoever formatted this book for Kindle has done a superlative job. The formatting actually enhances the reading experience.

For example - you are reading an early chapter entitled The Science of the Senses. In the first section (The Five Tastes) there's an interesting discussion of the fifth "taste," umami flavor. You can just read this and go on to the next section on How Taste Works. Or, if you want to understand umami a little more, you can follow the links in that first section to an in-depth discussion of glutamate and nucleotide levels in foods. This is Concept 35 - a section that is more than half-way through the book and yet meshes perfectly with what you read in that introductory chapter. The Concept ends with three recipes specifically engineered to show the best use of glutamate and nucleotides to produce rich meaty flavors -- AND with links to two additional recipes from yet another section of the book that also illustrate techniques associated with enhancing meaty flavors. It's a seamless reading experience that has you wandering through all different parts of this book.

When I first did this, I became a little alarmed. How was I ever going to find the recipes again? Have no fear. There is a complete and interactive table of contents. You can readily navigate to each of the "Science of.." chapters, or pick out one of the 50 Concepts and go directly there. In addition, there is a specific page of links that just lists all the recipes. So if you want to cook - hey, it works as a cookbook!

The Ebook version of The Science of Good Cooking reminds me of those "Choose your Own Adventure" stories - each time you dip in, you can follow a different path through. Kudos to the editors at America's Test Kitchen.

Edited to add:
The images in the book were clear, dark enough, and large enough be viewed very easily on my Kindle paperwhite. Tables were always correctly formatted, and fit the pages. The whole thing looked amazingly NICE and professional. Would that other ebooks looked so good!
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