Cooking in Advance / Prep

[eternal]

Are there any rules of thumb on cooking in advance - or how far ahead you can do prep work? I feel like this is one area that is hard to get info on and separates the restaurants from home kitchens. Where do you draw the line on prep work?

For example, I want to prepare patatas bravas on Tuesday. I imagine cooking down the onions and tomatoes today and sticking them in the fridge for tomorrow would be fine. Could I parboil the potatoes today as well to just finish on a cast iron pan tomorrow? Will the skins be as crisp? What about the aioli? Could I make that tonight too?

Aside from the questions above, does anybody have any good book recs on deciding on what you can prepare in advance? Are there some rules of thumb?

[Chris Amirault]

Great topic -- especially with winter holidays coming.

The prep depends on the item and your ability to control the things that degrade it, most particularly air, moisture, acids, and temperature. Par-cooking is possible for a lot of things, especially if you can ice them down quickly and stop the cooking.

So for your patatas bravas: making the sofrito and aioli (or allioli if you're sticking to your Catalan roots ) in advance and holding it for a day would be fine, especially with a coating of olive oil across the top of the sauces. I'd boil, steam or cook sous vide the potatoes, then ice down and seal carefully (no need if you SVed 'em). As for crispy skins, you're likely to get a crispier skin if you dry the skins and them cook them quickly in your oil; it's pretty likely that you can get them even crispier using this method since the potato will have cooled and become more firm, allowing you a more time to crisp the skins before the potatoes fall apart.

[cbread]

My memory is failing me here. Isn't there some beneficial change in some starches - potato or rice I believe - that occurs when cooked and completely cooled, then reheated? Am I dreaming this up, or if not, can anyone fill in the details? I'm sure I heard that somewhere, I think....

Theoretic queries aside, there's another benefit to advance prep and precooking. Having many items precooked, and only needing a quick finish makes timing the whole shebang much easier for ham handed amateurs like me. It's easy to see how much time will be needed to warm, crisp, plate, etc. Much harder to time a larger number of intermediary stages with very different cook times.

[Chris Amirault]

Having many items precooked, and only needing a quick finish makes timing the whole shebang much easier for ham handed amateurs like me.

Not to mention professionals, who parcook many, if not most, of the items on your restaurant plate as a matter of course.

[eternal]

Right. But what and how far in advance *should* you parcook something. I say *should* because I believe we're trying to find a balance of flavor and convenience. For example, would a good restaurant make aioli for the entire week, once a week?

[eternal]

on another note, would anybody sear meat a day in advance before completing a braised meat dish the following day?

[vice]

It would make more sense to me to do the whole braise ahead of time and reheat for service.

[Chris Amirault]

What Dave said -- happens all the time, especially by letting the protein cool in the braising liquid.

[KarenDW]

added bonus of braising the day before... can remove excess fat