8 ms·

Great article. I wouldn't say I'm great, but a lot of my cooking doesn't follow any recipe very closely. I'm dead certain that when some recipe says "1/2 tsp o

Great article. I wouldn't say I'm great, but a lot of my cooking doesn't follow any recipe very closely. I'm dead certain that when some recipe says "1/2 tsp of pepper" the chef who wrote it never measured it until asked to write it down. Then he or she tried it once or twice just to check that it really worked with 1/2 tsp. Then went back to just throwing some in. I think it's actually more fun that the food isn't the same each time. Maybe in a restaurant people really expect it to be, but at home? Nah. It's a human activity.

culopatin 3y ago
And then there is me who thinks of a recipe as a formula for a drug and then gets disappointed when it doesn’t work out
- throwanem 3y ago
  Baking has that kind of precision to it, but cooking mostly doesn't.
  - ofrzeta 3y ago
    Has it, though? Factors like temperature and humidity influence the outcome of baking however often are not included in recipes. To be fair an approximate temperature for proving is sometimes given.
  - TeMPOraL 3y ago
    I wish ovens had that kind of precision, though. From observation, what you get in a household oven is a bang-bang controller flipping a heater on and off, trying to keep the temperature within a rather wide window around the set point, as measured at location that is not close to the food you're baking. Between humidity of the product, humidity of the environment, and built-in "eco features" in the oven, this will make the baking process be all over the place. Oh, and the timers that come built into the ovens and induction stoves? They tend to go slow or fast around a minute over ten minutes, or worse. Whatever baking has, it's not precision. Even your basic DIY overflow soldering oven is better, because it at least gives you control over temperature curve and visibility into the process. I'm yet to see a household oven that tells you what the current temperature inside it is.
    - balfirevic 3y ago
      > I wish ovens had that kind of precision, though. Anova Precision Oven does! [0] As a bonus, it's appropriately sized for cooking for 1-3 people and heats up much faster then any "normal" oven I've ever had. [0] - https://anovaculinary.com/products/anova-precision-oven https://anovaculinary.com/products/anova-precision-oven
      - TeMPOraL 3y ago
        I wish I knew about it a year ago, maybe I could've convinced my wife to get one. I'll keep an eye on this brand from now on, as well as the keywords they use, for the next time I'm searching for an oven (or kitchen appliances in general).
      - papertokyo 3y ago
        Have you tried the sous vide mode? That seems novel.
        balfirevic 3y ago
        I have, it seems to work as it should. You put food in, it comes out uniformly heated to the specified temperature :-) I can't compare it to a traditional immersion circulator, as I've never used those.
    - AlbertCory 3y ago
      For pizza, I have a pizza steel (I know, way overpriced for a sheet of metal) and preheat the oven for a LONG time, then use an IR thermometer to check its temperature. But you're right, oven temp controls are crap.
balfirevic 3y ago
> I'm dead certain that when some recipe says "1/2 tsp of pepper" the chef who wrote it never measured it until asked to write it down. Yeah, there isn't a correct amount of pepper anyway. You might like it more or less peppery. Not all ingredients are flexible like this, but many are.
- Scoundreller 3y ago
  And measuring flakes or grinds of something by volume will yield varying amounts depending on how it's milled or broken down. How hydrated it is. How packed it got during shipping. One could measure by weight, but again, moisture will impact this. The genetics aren't well controlled, so the potency per unit weight varies, along with flavour profile. Some chemicals evaporate quickly, others slowly, and that can also change depending on humidity and temperature. Pepper isn't 1 chemical. What grinds my gears is when someone says a recipe has too many flavours, ignoring that they've added hundreds of flavours via 1 ingredient.

culopatin 3y ago

And then there is me who thinks of a recipe as a formula for a drug and then gets disappointed when it doesn’t work out

throwanem 3y ago
Baking has that kind of precision to it, but cooking mostly doesn't.
- ofrzeta 3y ago
  Has it, though? Factors like temperature and humidity influence the outcome of baking however often are not included in recipes. To be fair an approximate temperature for proving is sometimes given.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  I wish ovens had that kind of precision, though. From observation, what you get in a household oven is a bang-bang controller flipping a heater on and off, trying to keep the temperature within a rather wide window around the set point, as measured at location that is not close to the food you're baking. Between humidity of the product, humidity of the environment, and built-in "eco features" in the oven, this will make the baking process be all over the place. Oh, and the timers that come built into the ovens and induction stoves? They tend to go slow or fast around a minute over ten minutes, or worse. Whatever baking has, it's not precision. Even your basic DIY overflow soldering oven is better, because it at least gives you control over temperature curve and visibility into the process. I'm yet to see a household oven that tells you what the current temperature inside it is.
  - balfirevic 3y ago
    > I wish ovens had that kind of precision, though. Anova Precision Oven does! [0] As a bonus, it's appropriately sized for cooking for 1-3 people and heats up much faster then any "normal" oven I've ever had. [0] - https://anovaculinary.com/products/anova-precision-oven https://anovaculinary.com/products/anova-precision-oven
    - TeMPOraL 3y ago
      I wish I knew about it a year ago, maybe I could've convinced my wife to get one. I'll keep an eye on this brand from now on, as well as the keywords they use, for the next time I'm searching for an oven (or kitchen appliances in general).
    - papertokyo 3y ago
      Have you tried the sous vide mode? That seems novel.
      - balfirevic 3y ago
        I have, it seems to work as it should. You put food in, it comes out uniformly heated to the specified temperature :-) I can't compare it to a traditional immersion circulator, as I've never used those.
  - AlbertCory 3y ago
    For pizza, I have a pizza steel (I know, way overpriced for a sheet of metal) and preheat the oven for a LONG time, then use an IR thermometer to check its temperature. But you're right, oven temp controls are crap.

balfirevic 3y ago

> I'm dead certain that when some recipe says "1/2 tsp of pepper" the chef who wrote it never measured it until asked to write it down. Yeah, there isn't a correct amount of pepper anyway. You might like it more or less peppery. Not all ingredients are flexible like this, but many are.

Scoundreller 3y ago
And measuring flakes or grinds of something by volume will yield varying amounts depending on how it's milled or broken down. How hydrated it is. How packed it got during shipping. One could measure by weight, but again, moisture will impact this. The genetics aren't well controlled, so the potency per unit weight varies, along with flavour profile. Some chemicals evaporate quickly, others slowly, and that can also change depending on humidity and temperature. Pepper isn't 1 chemical. What grinds my gears is when someone says a recipe has too many flavours, ignoring that they've added hundreds of flavours via 1 ingredient.