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Sometimes I'll reheat some puff pastry wrapped items on a metal pizza tray (one of the ones with regular series of holes punched in it) as it helps with the kee
by Jedd 2y ago
Sometimes I'll reheat some puff pastry wrapped items on a metal pizza tray (one of the ones with regular series of holes punched in it) as it helps with the keeping a crispier texture on the base.
This doesn't mean that my chicken and mushroom puffy has transubstantiated into pizza.
Similarly, cooking potatoes in what you call a roasting tin, or calling the meal a Sunday roast, isn't the definition of roasting any more than it's the definition of Sunday.
The distinction I draw is that roasting involves fire, baking does not.
The rest of the responses in this thread variously assert that the distinction:
- depends on temperature - there's a threshold above which you are now roasting not baking. This probably has roots in the cook by open flame / fire etymology, given that's usually warmer and harder to control accurately. (I will occasionally do a slow cook 'the next day' in my pizza oven using residual heat, and resurrect a small fire for the final smoking & crisping stage - though I am delighted to report that I have never pondered whether I'm then serving baked or roasted food.)
- depends on whether you peel your potatoes, which I'm struggling to reconcile given a) how does this distinction apply for non-potato and/or non-peelable foods, and b) if you peeled only half your potato and then cooked the whole thing - do you now possess a frankenstein potato, half roasted, half baked?
- depends whether the potatoes are cut - evidently once they are cut they can no longer be baked, only roasted. This is obviously at odds with the temperature crowd, and might (or might not) contradict the peeling-defines-state crowd too. They can work it out between themselves.
Anyway, I've had cooked potatoes in all kinds of forms, and I'm quite happy if people have their own local definitions for the two adjectives - so long as they're happy that I have mine.
- sdwr 2y agoRoast potatoes can't be called baked potatoes because baked potatoes are a well-defined product. The name transcends cooking method - a baked potato made in a microwave is still a baked potato.
- Jedd 2y agoThey appear to be so poorly defined that no one here's come up with a strict, exception-free, definition. Or rather, lots of people have come up with definitions, but they're all different.
- OJFord 2y ago> so long as they're happy that I have mine. We're not, because you're being pointlessly tedious about it. Things have names, they can't necessarily be logically explained. Temperature is what I would have said though. Aga for example (long established cast iron range manufacturer) names its ovens like 'simmering oven', 'baking oven', 'roasting oven' on a 3 door, according to their approximate temperature. Roast potatoes would absolutely be produced from the roasting, not baking, oven. The roast potatoes you ate in Cornwall were definitely cooked above a circa 160-180C baking temperature. It's not infallible though, I 'bake' bread at 230C (at least outside the casserole). The main thing is that things have names and the thing called 'baked potato' is not what you ate in Cornwall, it's an entirely different potato thing that also exists.
- Jedd 2y agoWell it's indeed unfortunate that you're so agitated by this. I did mention etymology, and appreciate that you cited a british white goods manufacturer's oven-door-naming system as a counterpoint. I'm wondering if I were to note my tour guide at Hampton Court in 2010 shared my definition, if we could call this a draw? Anyway, good to hear that you believe the distinction is sometimes temperature based, but sometimes not.
- amenhotep 2y agoI think the distinction might come down to basting. If you definitely wouldn't baste the article, then you're baking it, if you do or might baste it, then you're roasting it. Roast potatoes could easily be basted, baked potatoes definitely wouldn't be, basting bread seems absurd but basting a joint is obvious. Regardless I think it should be obvious to all that a terminology that assigns the name "baked beef" to a joint done in a conventional oven is totally insane and nonsense.
- Jedd 2y agoAfter tossing peeled, sliced, sections of potato in some fat / oil before putting them in the oven, I wouldn't add further oil to them - does this mean they're not basted, or they are (by the original covering)? Is beef wellington baked or roasted, by your definition?