Kitchen lab

Much of what gets called modernist cooking depends on control rather than on expensive machinery. This section takes those methods one at a time and asks what a home cook needs to make them work safely.

Sous-vide comes first. Food sealed in a bag and held in water at a precise temperature cooks evenly all the way through, but the lower heat means safety depends on how long the food stays at that temperature, and the piece on it follows federal guidance on both. Spherification is the technique that turns a flavored liquid into beads with a thin gel skin. Its piece explains the chemistry: sodium alginate setting into a gel where it meets calcium ions, and how the direct and reverse methods differ.

The section also covers the plainer side of a kitchen, meaning which appliances and tools a household actually uses, and what to do when a refrigerator or an oven gives out.