World chefs: Teaching students a thing or two about cooking

By Patricia Reaney

Food Aug. 29, 2012 - 06:59AM JST ( 5 )

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FrungyAug. 29, 2012 - 07:26PM JST

Heat oil in a skillet

To what temperature? Should the oil be bubbling? Should it be on fire? Right there, at step 1 this person displays a huge assumption about the cooking skills of your average student. I have no doubt this person is a competent chef, but being a competent chef doesn't make you a good teacher.
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BertieWoosterAug. 29, 2012 - 08:49PM JST

While reading this article, I thought back to my own university days. when I certainly couldn't cook.

It strikes me as odd that nutrition, planning and cooking meals, recognizing a balanced diet are not required study at school. And at the same time, in order to get into university, we had to memorize mountains of useless and extremely boring trivia.

Children should be taught (and shown, yuck!) what goes into junk food and how to prepare and cook basic meals.

It doesn't have to be difficult and it's an essential part of life.
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FrungyAug. 30, 2012 - 01:45PM JST

I'm curious about the two thumbs down above. What exactly did I say that was so incorrect? I remember when I was learning to cook the very first thing my father taught me was the difference that oil temperature makes to the finished dish. Too hot and you burn the onions, a bit lower and you carmelise them for an added sweetness, lower than that an you saute them until they go transparent (but without carmelising them), and even lower and you just heat them slightly and release the flavour while retaining a little crunch.

Understanding something as simple as oil temperature and the difference it makes to the finished dish is an essential skill for starting chefs. Yet this author seems to assume that everyone inherently understands this. As far as I'm concerned that's a basic failing in the author's teaching method.

Get a good cookbook for starting chefs like, "All in the Cooking", and they devote an entire chapter at the beginning of the book to the importance of temperatures, and then are very careful throughout the book to note temperate. These are brilliant old cookbooks, and deserve reprinting. This new cookbook? ... it ignores one of the most fundamental issues in cooking, temperature control. Ask any good chef to "fry you some onions" and he'll give you a withering look and say, "Do you want them sauted, carmelised, burnt.... what temperature!!?", because good chefs understand that temperature is critical in producing good quality food.
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BertieWoosterAug. 30, 2012 - 09:40PM JST

I'm curious about the two thumbs down above.

I wouldn't worry about it too much, Frungy-san.

There is something about the internet that brings out the negative in people.

Temperature is a very important point in cooking. Especially with onions. You can change the flavour totally just by using a different temperature.
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FrungyAug. 31, 2012 - 02:04PM JST

BertieWooster - Thanks for the comment. I used onions as an example because they're such a clear example of why temperature instructions are critical. I was just interested in the thumbs-downs since I didn't understand how any competent cook could disagree with that point.