Tag kitchen physics

TGIF: Food related “Periodic videos”

I believe most chemists are familiar with the “periodic videos” from the University of Nottingham, covering all the known chemical elements. The series features professor Martyn Poliakoff who’s grey hair is really worthy of a professor! They have now covered…

Soda fountain science explained

Picture by Michael Murphy (CC-BY-SA) The soda fountain (Diet Coke + Mentos) has been around the net for quite a while with some spectacular videos available, and it has even made it into a news paper cartoon. People go crazy…

Hydrocolloid recipe collection v.2

Texture – A hydrocolloid recipe collection It’s a pleasure for me to announce that an updated version of the hydrocolloid recipe collection is available for free download as a pdf file (73 pages, 1.8 Mb). What’s new? Several new recipes…

10 elements of basic kitchen knowledge

Salt in oil. According to Pierre Gagnaire, this is Hervé This’ main discovery. It allows him to sprinkle salt on dishes without the salt dissolving in water from the dish. Thereby the “crunch” of the salt is retained. Rob Mifsud,…

Ice cubes and air bubbles

Ice cubes are used both to cool drinks, but also to significantly impact the flavour of certain drinks. No matter your motivation, you should never use “old” ice cubes which have been sitting in your freezer for a while. Why?…

Carbonated fruit the iSi way

I blogged about carbonated strawberries some while ago. Those were made using dry ice which unfortunately is not always easy to get hold of. Last week however I bought a iSi Gourmet Whipper – one of those Ferran Adria uses…

Simple temperature calculations

Although I recommend the use of a thermometer, sometimes it’s convenient to know how you can also manage without. If you mix water at two different (but known) temperatures, you can easily calculate the temperature after mixing. Just multiply the…

Cooking fish in cooling water

I have previously written about how you can cook a perfect steak with a simple DIY sous vide technique. Of course low temperature cooking applies equally well to fish with the only difference that the temperature can be turned down…