If you’re a meat eater, it’s impossible not to have noticed that the chicken breast you’re eating looks different from the steak across the table. But why do different meats have different colors when they are all muscle tissue? Why is a chicken leg darker than the breast? How do these differences [...]

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Whipped cream, though not the luxury it was a couple centuries ago, is still placed on countless desserts, adding a light, but rich flavor. How does “simple physical agitation…transform a luscious but unmanageable liquid into an equally luscious but shapeable ’solid’?” Harold McGee, On Food and Cooking.
Whipped cream begins with a cream that is [...]

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From my recent forays into cooking, I frequently have come across recipes asking me to brown a food. I also remember Alton Brown mentioning it on his show, Good Eats, when discussing stews. He made sure to brown the outside of his short ribs in a skillet before braising them in the oven. [...]

Posted in Food Science, Techniques 4 Comments »

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I was reading through Harold McGee’s On Food and Cooking yesterday and found his discussion of milk, lactose, and osteoporosis interesting.
Milk is one of the few foods that is actually supposed to be a food, so it is unsurprising that milk contains many nutrients. All milk is primarily made of [...]

Posted in Food Science, Health 4 Comments »