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Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

modernistcuisine.com

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Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#91

Post by blacklion »

giraffe_lady wrote: post #23
dluan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i hated the era of foam, gel, and sous vide everything. as a home cook, i want the randomness that comes with hand technique, but if im paying for a 2/3 star meal i still also want the randomness and authenticity that comes with hand technique, not to be bored out of my mind or trying to show me some impressive lab grade "consistency". in another 20 years, we'll look back on this like we did mayonnaise and meat aspic…

I mean the things you mentioned are deeply out of style in restaurant cooking right now. So we already do look back on this in a similar way. And they were never that common either. This trend had a short peak and the training, staffing, equipment, r&d costs were all sky high. The backlash was very disproportionate imo; it was never my kind of thing either but you weren't going to run into it unless you were specific…

> Sous vide is still used quietly because it's a very practical technique with good results for certain protein preparations

Problem is, Sous vide is good for certain proteins. For example, I cannot stand chicken breast Sous vide, as it, yes, more tender than "classical" chicken breast, but has very specific unpleasant texture. And now it is everywhere. Last time I had dinner in Indian restaurant which was new to me (this specific venue, not Indian cuisine as whole) and I got chicken breast sous vide in a souse as a carry. Not braised or stewed or simmered in souse. It was BAD.

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#92

Post by wbl »

diego_moita wrote: post #81

This book is just pretentious and expensive bullshit. It is just hype to grab fools' money. If you want to know how much "science-infused" is this cooking just look at any picture of its author. Nathan Myrvhold is obviously overweight, a sure sign that he doesn't understand nutrition or basics of health science. You don't need spherification, sous-vide baths or ultra-speed blenders to make tasty and healthy food. All…

Once I moved to California I understood farm to table.

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#93

Post by igrekel »

cwizou wrote: post #73
hellotheretoday wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chefsteps has been in that direction for a very long time. I was in their community early on, like 2013 or so, and the content they put out then was truly excellent. A paywall was reasonable really; the classes were well researched and informative and I am sure their operation is quite expensive. But over time they became a bit less focused on interesting stuff and more focused on stuff that would play to social medi…

Also followed them pretty much from the start, bought all their classes, pass, but ended up not renewing this year (and probably shouldn't have last year either). They tried to make money with their own sous vide circulator (joule) which had some good pros (very compact and works in tiny depth of water) but at least for me, infuriating cons (no screen/buttons to adjust on the fly, check remaining time, etc, must use…

I went through my third joule and I share the annoyance you feel, what did you ended up using instead? I do value its compact form factor.

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#94

Post by the_sleaze_ »

yumraj wrote: post #42

Most cookbooks seem to optimize for taste. Are there any cookbooks that optimize for nutritional/health value of food with a reasonable emphasis on taste? Not looking to be just pointed to vegan cookbooks.

Moosewood cookbook is a good one.

Alice Waters is controversial in the cooking community, but her cookbooks are probably good, especially Simple Food

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#95

Post by legitster »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #90
cwizou wrote: post #30

The good thing about Modernist Cuisine is that it goes deep into some niche topics (gelling and hydrocolloids, food safety, etc etc), so if you like that kind of thing (and crazy photography of sliced in half stuff), it's great. In terms of recipes, some have mentioned it but it's barely practical, even if you like spending hours reproducing recipes from Michelin stars restaurant books. There are a few gems, like the…

> The at home version is a lot more practical but is also a bit dated at this point imo. The mac and cheese with sodium citrate is a good example of what to expect. That recipe is an absolute banger, so are you saying that the rest of the book is full of great recipes as well?

+1, Sodium citrate is 100% a pantry staple for me now.

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#96

Post by quesera »

kjellsbells wrote: post #19

I dont understand the hate for this book. A very smart and wealthy man spent a lot of coin geeking out on a passion. Doesnt seem very different from Jay Leno and his garage or Tom Hanks and his typewriters. Compared to the ketamine and influence that our current billionaires spend their money on, it seems pretty harmless.

Myrvhold has a bad rep in the tech industry due to Innovation Ventures.

But re: Modernist Cuisine, I've always puzzled over the COGS and ROI math. Despite the high price, he might actually be selling at cost. A lot of effort went into these books. The photography was surely expensive to create, and definitely to print. The books must be very low-volume sales, you have to account for the wholesale price to bookstores, and add some required margin for the publisher... I wonder if they are above water for Myrvhold at all. Not that he needs them to be, obviously.

I also wonder about Don Knuth, and some of the TASCHEN specimen titles. Publishing is a tough business!

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#97

Post by cwizou »

igrekel wrote: post #93
cwizou wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also followed them pretty much from the start, bought all their classes, pass, but ended up not renewing this year (and probably shouldn't have last year either). They tried to make money with their own sous vide circulator (joule) which had some good pros (very compact and works in tiny depth of water) but at least for me, infuriating cons (no screen/buttons to adjust on the fly, check remaining time, etc, must use…

I went through my third joule and I share the annoyance you feel, what did you ended up using instead? I do value its compact form factor.

It's a bit orthogonal but what I ended up doing is buying a dedicated polycarbonate sous vide bath (basically a rectangular container) so that I don't have to constantly mess with grabbing out my pressure cooker (which I used previously). I leave it on the counter of my kitchen as I sous vide 2/3 times a week. Some have lids, or you can get some balls to limit evaporation (I went with that solution).

I did have a Sansaire model from a previous Kickstarter that I reused for a while, but ended up replacing it with a bargain bin "KitchenBoss" from Amazon with no connectivity, just buttons and a screen but with a high wattage (1100W). At the time I wanted to get an Anova but that was out of stock.

I did have a bunch of other circulators including one I bought in 2012 that was basically a laboratory pid. The most important thing in my opinion is preheating speed, which is directly connected to how many watts it uses. Most compact models (including Anova's smaller models) have a lower wattage so, unless you don't care about time, I would definitely avoid those. I would go for a dedicated bath and a high wattage model. Anova is likely the best option but I find the basic KitchenBoss (no app) perfectly fine too.

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#98

Post by nortonham »

tptacek wrote: post #56
scarby2 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sous vide is still used quietly because it's a very practical technique with good results for certain protein preparations, and there are plenty of other useful bits of craft through the book. Similarly I guess mayo didn't exactly disappear from american cooking. I was reading the first part of your response and my mind was immediately going "but sous-vide is everywhere" It's one of those things that's just really…

Circulator eggs never made a whole lot of sense, because you already have a reference temperature to work from and so cooking any number of them is just a matter of setting a timer (do what the Ideas in Food people do and steam them). I can't remember the last time I circulated a steak. But we did a rib roast for Christmas, and I did that in the circulator, in advance, "for insurance purposes", and then cooked it off…

>Circulator eggs never made a whole lot of sense,

They make a great deal of sense in professional kitchens. If you're expecting to do hundreds of brunch covers, or a giant breakfast buffet, poaching eggs sous vide ahead of time is a game changer

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#99

Post by hellotheretoday »

cwizou wrote: post #73
hellotheretoday wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chefsteps has been in that direction for a very long time. I was in their community early on, like 2013 or so, and the content they put out then was truly excellent. A paywall was reasonable really; the classes were well researched and informative and I am sure their operation is quite expensive. But over time they became a bit less focused on interesting stuff and more focused on stuff that would play to social medi…

Also followed them pretty much from the start, bought all their classes, pass, but ended up not renewing this year (and probably shouldn't have last year either). They tried to make money with their own sous vide circulator (joule) which had some good pros (very compact and works in tiny depth of water) but at least for me, infuriating cons (no screen/buttons to adjust on the fly, check remaining time, etc, must use…

I never got a joule because I couldn’t fathom why they would build a device without physical controls. It seemed like such a hostile decision imo bc even back then I had cheaper “smart” devices like lightbulbs where the apps were quickly abandoned and then delisted/no longer working after 3-4 years and several iOS updates. I had some confidence Chefsteps wouldn’t do that (and tbf they didn’t) but why risk it? If they hadn’t been successful, purchased by breville, etc, would that have come to pass?

The control freak is really what gets me. It does look like a very well made piece of kit tbf. And the feature set is quite nice, there are comparable devices for 1/3rd the cost like https://www.sunpentown.com/product/sr-658rt/ . Also I already mentioned this but given the extremely high price of the control freak I would expect more than a 1 year warranty

Re: Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking

#100

Post by linsomniac »

chongli wrote: post #63
tptacek wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is a great product, for what it's worth.

Yes. I have one and I love it! Everyone I recommend it to balks at the price however.

I get that, I spent a long time obsessing over the $100 ThermaPen One, because the $15 ones I had were "good enough". But, I'll tell you, it's quite a nice luxury for someone who cooks all the time. It just has all the rough edges removed: it's super fast, the display rotates, it does auto on/off, and the support has been superb. In this situation, I had to return it twice over the last year because of what turned out to be a design flaw where the case was cracking (apparently for no good reason, not like I was overheating it).

I try to manually do the time@temp safety thing, but admittedly I usually overcook it just to be safe. So, I could see the combustion.inc being a game changer for grilling especially, and I already get rave reviews. I'm going to pick one up, and possibly also one of their grill thermometers.

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