The Art of Pre-Cooking: Unlocking Flavors and Techniques

There are as many ways to manipulate an ingredient prior to cooking as there are cuisines aside from basic steps like peeling, chopping, cutting, and slicing. A cook might blanch an ingredient in boiling water or take a more elaborate step like brining or marination, often it's these extra steps that distinguish one recipe from another. The techniques of blanching, brining, and marinating are common to nearly all cuisines, which is actually a bit surprising and suggests they share a common and important purpose.

These techniques have been used for centuries to preserve food and enhance its flavor and texture. Today, we enjoy the modern convenience of reliable refrigeration and freezing, which has made earlier approaches to preservation obsolete. However, thankfully, not irrelevant. The unique flavor and texture of foods transformed by these old-fashioned techniques remains incredibly appealing. All of these approaches can be combined with sous vide cooking as a pre-treatment prior to the cooking step.

Some of these approaches are simple like pre-blanching or pre-searing your ingredients before cooking them. Why might you want to do this? Well, blanching plant foods in water at a rolling boil will rapidly eliminate harmful bacteria lurking on the surface, which is where most if not all bacteria will be found in our food. Blanching also destroys enzymes within the plant tissue that can sometimes degrade the flavor and appearance of produce when it cooks at a lower temperature. Taking this step isn't always necessary or even desirable but when prepping some plant foods, a preliminary blanching step is essential.

Meats and seafood can also be blanched before cooking sous vide to decrease any risk posed by harmful bacteria on their surface. However, the same degree of food safety can be had by searing them before cooking, and for most meats and seafood, pre-searing is our preference. Why? Because the intense heat of searing also triggers a complex cascade of chemical reactions that generate an attractive appearance together with many of the flavors we like in traditionally cooked foods. Surface temperatures well above the boiling point of water are required to get the so-called Maillard reaction started but the flavor generation will continue during the low temperature sous vide cooking step.

Pre-searing can thus add depth to the flavor of soused cooked meats and seafood. Brining is all about salting our food most often a cut of meat or seafood, other flavorful ingredients can be added to a brine but salt is the key ingredient. Its ability to improve juiciness, enhance flavor, and alter the texture of food is almost magical. The definition of a marinade is more difficult to pin down this is because so many kinds of ingredients can be used that act on food in myriad ways.

A marinade might swell the food with moisture or do just the opposite and draw water out through osmosis. Some will tenderize tough foods by loosening the structure of the food itself or even go so far as to undo the structure of the food in a way that is analogous to cooking with heat. Historically, most marinades were used to forSTALL spoilage as well as to add flavor. So far, we've only discussed pre-treatments that require submerging an ingredient in a liquid but these are only one set of a nearly endless list of possibilities.

Smoking, for example, is a subtle combination of heating and with a gaseous marinade added to the mix. We mention it here because smoking in combination with sous vide cooking can be thought of as a kind of pre-treatment or like searing it can be done after the soused cooking step. There are pros and cons to whether you do the smoking step first or last, and we'll touch on these in one of the next lectures but there's no question that soused cooking and smoking were made to go together.

One of the virtues of soused cooking is its flexibility. Often pairing sous vide cooking with traditional culinary techniques like brines, marinades, or smoking is the easiest way to enjoy meals that you love more often.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthere are as many ways to manipulate an ingredient prior to cooking as there are Cuisines aside from basic steps like peeling chopping cutting and slicing a cook might blanch an ingredient in boiling water or take a more elaborate step like brining or marination often it's these extra steps that distinguish one recipe from another the techniques of blanching brining and marination are common to nearly all Cuisines that's actually a bit surprising and suggest they share a common and important purpose and they do each has an ability to slow the spoilage of food today we enjoy the modern convenience of reliable refrigeration and freezing these technologies have made earlier approaches to preservation obsolete but thankfully not irrelevant the unique flavor and texture of foods transformed by these old-fashioned techniques remains incredibly appealing and all of these approaches can be combined with soused often as a pre-treatment prior to the cooking step some of these approaches are simple like pre- blanching or pre-searing your ingredients before cooking them SUV why might you want to do this well blanching plant Foods in water at a rolling boil will rapidly eliminate harmful bacteria lurking on the surface which is where most if not all bacteria will be found in our food blanching also destroys enzymes within the plant tissue that can sometimes degrade the flavor and appearance of produce when it Cooks at a lower temperature taking this step isn't always necessary or even desirable but when prepping some plant Foods a preliminary blanching step is essential Meats and Seafood can also be blanched before cooking sousi to decrease any risk posed by harmful bacteria on their surface but the same degree of food safety can be had by searing them before cooking and for most Meats and Seafood pre-searing is our preference why because the intense heat of searing also triggers a complex Cascade of chemical reactions that generate an attractive appearance together with many of the flavors we like in traditionally cooked Foods surface temperatures well above the boiling point of water are required to get the so-called Meer reaction started but the flavor generation will continue during the low temperature sousi cooking step pre-searing can thus add depth to the flavor of soused cooked meats and seafood brinds and marinades are two other very common pre-treatments brining is all about salting our food most often a cut of meat or seafood other flavorful ingredients can be added to a brine but salt is the key ingredient its ability to improve juiciness enhance flavor and alter the texture of food is almost magical the definition of a marinade is more difficult to pin down this is because so many kinds of ingredients can be used that act on food in Myriad of ways a marinade might swell the food with moisture or do just the opposite and draw water out through osmosis some will tenderize tough Foods by loosening the structure of the food itself or even go so far as to undo the structure of the food in a way that is analogous to cooking with heat and historically most marinades were used to Forstall spoilage as well as to add flavor so far we've only discussed pre-treatments that require submerging an ingredient in a liquid but these are only one set of a nearly endless list of possibilities smoking for example is a subtle combination of heating and with a gaseous marinade added to the mix we mention it here because smoking in combination with Sous cooking can be thought of as a kind of pre-treatment or like searing it can be done after the soused cooking step there are pros and cons to whether you do the smoking step first or last and we'll touch on these in one of the next lectures but there's no question that soused cooking and smoking were made to go together one of the virtues of soused cooking is its flexibility often pairing sousi cooking with traditional culinary techniques like brinds marinades or smoking is the easiest way to enjoy meals that you love more oftenthere are as many ways to manipulate an ingredient prior to cooking as there are Cuisines aside from basic steps like peeling chopping cutting and slicing a cook might blanch an ingredient in boiling water or take a more elaborate step like brining or marination often it's these extra steps that distinguish one recipe from another the techniques of blanching brining and marination are common to nearly all Cuisines that's actually a bit surprising and suggest they share a common and important purpose and they do each has an ability to slow the spoilage of food today we enjoy the modern convenience of reliable refrigeration and freezing these technologies have made earlier approaches to preservation obsolete but thankfully not irrelevant the unique flavor and texture of foods transformed by these old-fashioned techniques remains incredibly appealing and all of these approaches can be combined with soused often as a pre-treatment prior to the cooking step some of these approaches are simple like pre- blanching or pre-searing your ingredients before cooking them SUV why might you want to do this well blanching plant Foods in water at a rolling boil will rapidly eliminate harmful bacteria lurking on the surface which is where most if not all bacteria will be found in our food blanching also destroys enzymes within the plant tissue that can sometimes degrade the flavor and appearance of produce when it Cooks at a lower temperature taking this step isn't always necessary or even desirable but when prepping some plant Foods a preliminary blanching step is essential Meats and Seafood can also be blanched before cooking sousi to decrease any risk posed by harmful bacteria on their surface but the same degree of food safety can be had by searing them before cooking and for most Meats and Seafood pre-searing is our preference why because the intense heat of searing also triggers a complex Cascade of chemical reactions that generate an attractive appearance together with many of the flavors we like in traditionally cooked Foods surface temperatures well above the boiling point of water are required to get the so-called Meer reaction started but the flavor generation will continue during the low temperature sousi cooking step pre-searing can thus add depth to the flavor of soused cooked meats and seafood brinds and marinades are two other very common pre-treatments brining is all about salting our food most often a cut of meat or seafood other flavorful ingredients can be added to a brine but salt is the key ingredient its ability to improve juiciness enhance flavor and alter the texture of food is almost magical the definition of a marinade is more difficult to pin down this is because so many kinds of ingredients can be used that act on food in Myriad of ways a marinade might swell the food with moisture or do just the opposite and draw water out through osmosis some will tenderize tough Foods by loosening the structure of the food itself or even go so far as to undo the structure of the food in a way that is analogous to cooking with heat and historically most marinades were used to Forstall spoilage as well as to add flavor so far we've only discussed pre-treatments that require submerging an ingredient in a liquid but these are only one set of a nearly endless list of possibilities smoking for example is a subtle combination of heating and with a gaseous marinade added to the mix we mention it here because smoking in combination with Sous cooking can be thought of as a kind of pre-treatment or like searing it can be done after the soused cooking step there are pros and cons to whether you do the smoking step first or last and we'll touch on these in one of the next lectures but there's no question that soused cooking and smoking were made to go together one of the virtues of soused cooking is its flexibility often pairing sousi cooking with traditional culinary techniques like brinds marinades or smoking is the easiest way to enjoy meals that you love more often\n"