Trends and Philosophy in Molecular Gastronomy

[BryanZ]

You seem to be misunderstanding one of the main benifits of sous vide cooking which is that it allows you to cook things for extended periods of time at sub-boiling temperatures. If you're doing sous vide solely at boiling temps, then it's exactly the same as airless braising but thats not the point of sous vide.

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I don't know about you, but when I make a braise, stew, etc..., I don't cook it at 100 degrees Celcius... Heck, I don't even cook carrots in 100 degree water. Obviously you don't understand the technique.

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I take issue with this. How do you blanch your veg then? And when I braise, either stovetop or in the oven it's usually at a simmer (on the stove) or at 325F-ish in the oven. A 325F oven is going to boil the liquid inside your cooking vessel, at 100C.

I'm honestly curious as to how you blanch vegetables and approaching braising. Perhaps I've been missing something. Though this is kind of fodder for another thread.

[Timh]

I braise at below boiling,(180-200) I thought that what braising was. At boiling, its just that, boiling. I agree that some folks seem to get all hyped up on the cool toys without taking the time to learn and understand the basic fundamentals of proper cooking techniques. The terms "molecular cooking" then becomes shallow and one dimensional.

I too was working in a kitchen in Memphis(of all places) that utlized sous-vide, back in the the early 90's, the chefs were ex chef de cuisines from Bocuse and Meneau and they were already pushing the envelope with the methods, but still everything started with the basic foundations of technique. These new gadjets are meant to enhance solid technique and skill, not replace it.

Edited December 8, 2006 by Timh (log)

[Reefpimp]

BryanZ, next time somebody in your area cocks an eyebrow at MG techniques, you can point to a homegrown (Paducah, KY) product: Dippin' Dots. They would never have happened without liquid nitrogen.

It seems to me that a lot of the fuss over MG cookery is from old-school chefs who feel they are about to be made irrelevant; or from organic/Slow Food/Eat Your View purists who think that if there's plastic or chemicals involved ANYWHERE it is de facto eeeevil.

It's just a new set of methods; the food is still the food. Lamb is still lamb, whether you braise it in Le Crueset or food-grade polyfilm. Ya know? I'm interested in the new techniques, try them out as I can, and consider them useful tools to have in my toolbox (so to speak). But whether or not what comes out of the immersion circulator is good to eat is still up to the cook. The chemicals and machines don't in and of themselves mean anything; they're just another way to manipulate the food to get to an end-product.

[C_Ruark]

Good read Bryan, thanks for posting.

MG is facinating and scary stuff, to me anyways. Fascinating in that these"outside the box" techniques present an interesting departure from the standard sensory associations we build as we live; like "if it looks like an apple, it should taste like and apple". FA, GA, and WD (and others) seem to have a knack for making you see one thing and taste another. Again, fascinating...

What's scary is that, if I order a Fettucine Alfredo Especiale not knowing that the MG guru made special pasta using Porchini and Shitake mushrooms and Activa, I'll be deader than a door-nail because of a severe allergy!

In most cases, it's rather obvious to overcome this with natural instinct. If I see or read about an ingredient which might be harmful I avoid it.

But what happens at a tasting event or if I were to dine family style with friends and not follow what everyone else is ordering? The food is out of context, so the threat may not be discernable.

This is where I think the MG trend hits a roadblock. It forces the resto to explain the food a bit more and reduces the alternatives chef and cooks have available to step around a problem like an allergy, and the fallbacks a resto will have if - inadvertently - a customer is harmed by a dish.

ETA: I'd still experiment with few of the products to see what fun I can have in the kitchen though!

~C

Edited December 8, 2006 by C_Ruark (log)

[Mikeb19]

I take issue with this.  How do you blanch your veg then?  And when I braise, either stovetop or in the oven it's usually at a simmer (on the stove) or at 325F-ish in the oven.  A 325F oven is going to boil the liquid inside your cooking vessel, at 100C.

I'm honestly curious as to how you blanch vegetables and approaching braising.  Perhaps I've been missing something.  Though this is kind of fodder for another thread.

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Green and/or tender vegetables, I'll have very salty water at a boil (105-110 degrees celcius or so), and blanch them very quickly. Root vegetables, I cook at a much lower temperature (65-85 degrees) for a longer amount of time, to ensure that they're evenly cooked throughout. I do like vegetables with a bit of bite to them, but not crunchy. Can't even count the amount of times I've seen vegetables disintegrating on the outside, and raw in the middle...

Braising. When you cook something in water, the water transfers it's heat to the food. The temperature of the food is raised, that of the water is lowered, until it reaches equilibrium. In a braise, you can heat the water up to 180 degrees F, put in a 250 degree oven, and the water temperature will not go up for hours because the cold(er) raw food is keeping the temperature down. Also keep in mind that the specific heat capacity of water is much higher than air, so again, in an oven, things are moving very slow - that's also the reason convection ovens work so much faster than conventional - the air is moving around, so essentially you have more heated molecules coming into contact with the food to transfer their energy and heat it up. Once you reach an equilibrium between the water temperature and the temperature of the food, then the temp will start to go up, however by this time usually your food is cooked or close to it.

A good way to illustrate this is to put a tray of ice cubes and a bit of water into an oven. The ice cubes will melt before the water boils, or even raises significantly in temperature... Think of your ice cubes as the food, and the water as your braising liquid.

With sous-vide cooking, instead of an oven you have a water circulator, as well as much less liquid in your cooking vessel (the bag). Water's specific heat is very high, not to mention the volume of it is much, much more than the contents of your bag, so the temperature of your food raises very quickly. This is why you can have your 'oven' (ie. water circulator) temperature so much lower.

Cooking is all physics and chemistry...

Edited December 9, 2006 by Mikeb19 (log)

[BryanZ]

I take issue with this.  How do you blanch your veg then?  And when I braise, either stovetop or in the oven it's usually at a simmer (on the stove) or at 325F-ish in the oven.  A 325F oven is going to boil the liquid inside your cooking vessel, at 100C.

I'm honestly curious as to how you blanch vegetables and approaching braising.  Perhaps I've been missing something.  Though this is kind of fodder for another thread.

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The temperature of the food is raised, that of the water is lowered, until it reaches equilibrium. In a braise, you can heat the water up to 180 degrees F, put in a 250 degree oven, and the water temperature will not go up for hours because the cold(er) raw food is keeping the temperature down. Also keep in mind that the specific heat capacity of water is much higher than air, so again, in an oven, things are moving very slow - that's also the reason convection ovens work so much faster than conventional - the air is moving around, so essentially you have more heated molecules coming into contact with the food to transfer their energy and heat it up. Once you reach an equilibrium between the water temperature and the temperature of the food, then the temp will start to go up, however by this time usually your food is cooked or close to it.

Cooking is all physics and chemistry...

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I agree with you, but to say that over the course of a multi-hour braise, the liquid in a cooking vessel in a 250F oven never boils seems to be false. Also, many well-known chefs "braise" at 350F+. But then again this gets into the semantics of cooking techniques and how they're used in common parlance.

Thanks for the clarification though. Personally I think sous vide is different than braising, but again that's a matter of semantics and not suited for this thread.

[Mikeb19]

I agree with you, but to say that over the course of a multi-hour braise, the liquid in a cooking vessel in a 250F oven never boils seems to be false.  Also, many well-known chefs "braise" at 350F+.  But then again this gets into the semantics of cooking techniques and how they're used in common parlance.

Thanks for the clarification though.  Personally I think sous vide is different than braising, but again that's a matter of semantics and not suited for this thread.

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Strait up, it isn't false. It's much easier to see when doing something like crème brûlées... I make some very thick crème brûlées (3.5 inch deep cups), and I've usually got the custards in a 300 degree oven for 2-3 hours, the water doesn't come close to 100 degrees.

Another good way to see it. Meats (and most organic compounds) are mostly water. You place a roast in an oven for several hours, is the water in the centre of the roast boiling? I don't know about you, but my roasts are usually 55-65 degrees in the middle depending on type and doneness, not 100.

As for what 'famous' chefs do, doesn't concern me much (although I have too braised at 350, it's not ideal, but if you are in a pinch and don't have a free oven it will still work). I've worked in restaurants that have been featured in national media, won dozens of awards, I've personally cooked for many photo shoots, celebrities, critics, etc...(btw, every time I've cooked for a critic or publication, been a very good review) I've done top-level food, both savoury and sweet. My mentor came out of a 2, promoted to 3 Michelin star restaurant in Switzerland. At 21 years old I've already been offered several executive chef jobs, one of which was already recognised nationally (turned down however, my personal life isn't steady enough, actually quite @#$%ed up). I am however working on funding a restaurant of my own in the next couple years (shooting for 2009 or 2010), I've got money of my own, and already know people who are willing to invest.

I'm actually supposed to be in France at the moment, but again, going back to my life, too much going on...

Anyhow, not trying to talk myself up too much (just a little ), but I do know about cooking (including molecular gastronomy). It's my profession, one I take very seriously, and will be for a very long time.

Edit - BTW, I do know a cook (buddy of mine, talented guy, also worked in a couple 3 and 4 NYT star restaurants) who has worked for Wylie Dufresne... I won't tell you what he thought of working there though....

Edited December 9, 2006 by Mikeb19 (log)

[Vadouvan]

So if molecular gastronomy goes out of fashion - hardly difficult to conceive - it will simply shrivel up and disappear; to put it crudely, because there's no longer money in it. The main thing going for it at the moment, speaking from the customer's end of things, is image. At a guess, I'd say it will not be terribly long before the phrase "molecular gastronomy" becomes commercial poison, and it will be interesting then to see how many chefs still want to be associated with the name.

You mean like "Nouvelle Cuisine" ?

It started already, even Adria has said there is no such thing as molecular gastronomy.

Interestingly, all the hype with MG is epicentered in the USA.

While boundary pushing should not be discouraged, the europeans still understand that good chorizo tastes a hell of a lot better than chorizo emulsions and what not.

[Shalmanese]

Green and/or tender vegetables, I'll have very salty water at a boil (105-110 degrees celcius or so)

Uh, no you aren't. Unless you are cooking in a 30+% salt solution (which is beyond the saturation point for NaCl), your not going to get a 105C boiling temperature at sea level (~ 50 grams of salt per litre of water per 0.5C increase in boiling temp).

Braising.  When you cook something in water, the water transfers it's heat to the food.  The temperature of the food is raised, that of the water is lowered, until it reaches equilibrium.  In a braise, you can heat the water up to 180 degrees F, put in a 250 degree oven, and the water temperature will not go up for hours because the cold(er) raw food is keeping the temperature down.  Also keep in mind that the specific heat capacity of water is much higher than air, so again, in an oven, things are moving very slow - that's also the reason convection ovens work so much faster than conventional - the air is moving around, so essentially you have more heated molecules coming into contact with the food to transfer their energy and heat it up.  Once you reach an equilibrium between the water temperature and the temperature of the food, then the temp will start to go up, however by this time usually your food is cooked or close to it. 

What you described is certainly not standard braising which involves first bringing both sauce and meat up to a boil and then putting it into a 100C+ oven to ensure that the food is kept at a simmer at all times.

Your approach might work but I very much doubt it. The breakdown of collagen in meat does not happen to any appreciable extent below 60C and meat becomes cooked past medium rare at 65C. The problem sous vide solves is in keeping the meat between 60 to 65 degrees long enough for the collagen to dissolve. The inherent variablity of the oven means that there is no way to achieve this reliably. You are either going to end up with undercooked and potentially dangerous food or the functional equivilant of a braise which is NOT the same as sous vide.

Cooking is all physics and chemistry...

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It is but so far you've shown no evidence of understanding the physics and chemistry behind sous vide cooking.

[Magnus Lindgren]

[quote name=Anyhow' date=' not trying to talk myself up too much (just a little ), but I do know about cooking (including molecular gastronomy). It's my profession, one I take very seriously, and will be for a very long time.

Im concerned very concerned when kids that comes for a stage ask u about liquid nitrogen and gellan gum and they are not more than 20 and should be focusing on carving their career from the simplest but also the best things in the kitchen, stocks e.t.c. I think it is important that every chef cooking this kind of experimental cooking (hates the term molycular gastronomy) teaches his commis chefs solid skills and traditional methos (wich has been around and developing for decades). What i always do when i thinktop and ask yourself. Does it taste good? do i rather eat this than my best traditional dish.

executive chef by 21 bah

/Magnus

[Mikeb19]

What you described is certainly not standard braising which involves first bringing both sauce and meat up to a boil and then putting it into a 100C+ oven to ensure that the food is kept at a simmer at all times.

Your approach might work but I very much doubt it. The breakdown of collagen in meat does not happen to any appreciable extent below 60C and meat becomes cooked past medium rare at 65C. The problem sous vide solves is in keeping the meat between 60 to 65 degrees long enough for the collagen to dissolve. The inherent variablity of the oven means that there is no way to achieve this reliably. You are either going to end up with undercooked and potentially dangerous food or the functional equivilant of a braise which is NOT the same as sous vide.

Cooking is all physics and chemistry...

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It is but so far you've shown no evidence of understanding the physics and chemistry behind sous vide cooking.

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Strait up, my braising technique DOES work. Demonstrated many times in the REAL world. In case you didn't read what I wrote properly, I heat up the braise to ~80 degrees celcius (which, BTW, is also high enough to kill any bacteria you're going to find in the meat), put in a 120 degree oven, let it go for a few hours. And no, it never boils, and yes, it makes a better product than boiling the shit out of your meat... And yes, the product will be different that cooking meat sous-vide at 65 degrees, just like cooking sous-vide at 75 degrees will again produce a different product, and boiling meat will give you yet another product.

As for salt and boiling temperatures, my numbers were a little off. Your numbers are a little low as well however. And in a professional kitchen, we do salt the water for this kind of blanching alot more than you'd think... (making the food too salty isn't an issue when it's in the water for 20 seconds...)

And honestly, I'll venture a guess that in the last year or two I've cooked more things (both in variety and total numbers) sous-vide than you will in your entire life.... Same goes for roasting, searing, baking, etc..., because I'm cooking for 50+ hours a week, every single day of my life.

Anyhow, this thread has been hijacked enough. Maybe a new thread - young foodie thinks he knows better than the real pros...

[Mikeb19]

Im concerned very concerned when kids that comes for a stage ask u about liquid nitrogen and gellan gum and they are not more than 20  and should be focusing on carving their career from the simplest but also the best things in the kitchen, stocks e.t.c. I think it is important that every chef cooking this kind of experimental cooking (hates the term molycular gastronomy) teaches his commis chefs solid skills and traditional methos (wich has been around and developing for decades). What i always do when i thinktop and ask yourself. Does it taste good? do i rather eat this than my best traditional dish.

executive chef by 21 bah

/Magnus

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I'm not sure what posts you were reading, or what you know about me (obviously not much), but I don't cook molecular gastronomy-type food. I cook traditional-style food using modern techniques and equipment. We fired a kid once because all he did was talk about science (unfortunately he wasn't very smart either, we had a good laugh), but he couldn't sear a piece of meat, or even assemble a salad...

And no, I'm not an executive chef ATM, I don't feel I'm ready for that yet, as my personal life is very @#$%ed up, I don't need that kind of stress right now. I do however contribute recipes and dishes at every restaurant I work at even if it's not my name on the menu, when a critic comes in it's not the executive chef cooking, it's usually me and the other CDPs...

/hijack

[Timh]

This isn't about you or your percieved expertise in cooking(at such a young age). Its about the trend of "molecular cooking" and philosophy behind it. Agree or disagree, but its not about you.

[Mikeb19]

This isn't about you or your percieved expertise in cooking(at such a young age). Its about the trend of "molecular cooking" and philosophy behind it. Agree or disagree, but its not about you.

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I know, I'm very sorry. I get defensive (part of the culture I grew up around) when people who really don't know me, have never cooked with me or tasted my food, call into question my ability, and knowledge. Some things are so much easier to discuss, demonstrate in person, and I'm not the best with words either. If the mods want to delete all the off-topic posts, it's fine with me.

As for Molecular Gastronomy (as defined in popular food culture), I see it disappearing in the not-so distant future. It's a fad, a gimmick. Theres really nothing revolutionary about the techniques, sous-vide has been around since the 70's, and most of the chemicals being used have already been used in commercial applications. The avant-garde dishes I've tasted have left alot to be desired, they're interesting to be sure, but not satisfying.

Here's an analogy for you: Molecular Gastronomy is like hooking up with a stripper for a night. Can be fun, but at the end of the day, theres nothing like a real, genuine woman.

Then again, just to throw the whole discussion sideways, the word Molecular Gastronomy was coined by Hervé This and Nicholas Kurti, and for anyone familiar with their work, you'd know that this 'hyper-modern', 'avant-garde' cuisine really has nothing to do with Molecular Gastronomy. The chef most associated with Molecular Gastronomy, Pierre Gagnaire, from what I've seen and read from his work (BTW, off-topic, but his new book is an incredible read), really doesn't cook anything like American 'hyper-modern' chefs either. Molecular Gastronomy isn't about the esthetic of the food, it's about using science and modern knowledge to cook better.

I'm really surprised that so much has been said about the chemical warfare aspect of modern cooking, and so little about the techniques and concepts that Hervé This introduced in his book (especially since it's been released in English recently). I've used quite a few of the techniques he's proposed, with great results.

[BryanZ]

Molecular Gastronomy isn't about the esthetic of the food, it's about using science and modern knowledge to cook better. 

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This has been said a million times before but still we get into these semantic debates. If only people would understand the above and accept this literal definition there would be a lot less BS.

MG, again in the literal sense, is completely different from hypermodern cooking. Though, of course, they're by no means mutally exclusive.

I'm out.

[sizzleteeth]

Statement on the 'new cookery'

"Below is the international agenda for great cooking written by Ferran Adria of El Bulli, Heston Blumenthal of the Fat Duck, Thomas Keller of the French Laundry and Per Se, and writer Harold McGee"

Ferran Adria, Heston Blumenthal, Thomas Keller and Harold McGee

Sunday December 10, 2006

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/sto...1968665,00.html

[BryanZ]

Shit. I'm back.

Statement on the 'new cookery'

"Below is the international agenda for great cooking written by Ferran Adria of El Bulli, Heston Blumenthal of the Fat Duck, Thomas Keller of the French Laundry and Per Se, and writer Harold McGee"

Ferran Adria, Heston Blumenthal, Thomas Keller and Harold McGee

Sunday December 10, 2006

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/sto...1968665,00.html

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How timely.

And, yeah, from the above.

. The fashionable term "molecular gastronomy" was introduced relatively recently, in 1992, to name a particular academic workshop for scientists and chefs on the basic food chemistry of traditional dishes. That workshop did not influence our approach, and the term "molecular gastronomy" does not describe our cooking, or indeed any style of cooking.

[RyuShihan]

I love this part on that link

Nearly two centuries ago, Brillat-Savarin wrote that 'the discovery of a new dish does more for human happiness than the discovery of a new star

I have been quoting savarin for years, in the end if you stikc to just tradition you will never grow forward. The need to continue to grow is in the essence of all things in mankind. If we take away the given right to be creative we stop to evolve. Bruce Lee went out of the box of tradition now look at martial arts today.

I am pretty sure one day in the past someone said another style of cuisine was a fad but its not the fad that matters, its the innovation to move forward.

Luckily for the few, the masses do not accept things readily because its the few who go against the stream that really make the great things in life happen.

"They says a handfull of people can't make a difference, when it has been a handfull to truelly make a difference." ---Some poster

Edited December 12, 2006 by RyuShihan (log)

[sizzleteeth]

Bruce Lee went out of the box of tradition now look at martial arts today.

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And we could all learn a great deal from Bruce Lee.

Liberate Yourself:

It is conceivable that a long time ago a certain martial artist discovered some partial truth. During his lifetime, the man resisted the temptation to organize this partial truth, although this is a common tendency in a man's search for security and certainty in life. After his death, his students took 'his' hypotheses, 'his' postulates, 'his' method and turned them into law. Impressive creeds were then invented, solemn reinforcing ceremonies prescribed, rigid philosophy and patterns formulated, and so on, until finally an institution was erected. So, what originated as one man's intuition of some sort of personal fluidity has been transformed into solidified, fixed knowledge, complete with organized classified responses presented in a logical order. In so doing, the well-meaning, loyal followers have not only made this knowledge a holy shrine, but also a tomb in which they have buried the founder's wisdom.

But the distortion does not necessarily end here. In reaction to 'the other truth,' another martial artist, or possible a dissatisfied disciple, organizes an opposite approach--such as the 'soft' style versus the 'hard' style, the 'internal' school versus the 'external' school, and all these separate nonsenses. Soon this opposite faction also becomes a large organization, with its own laws and patterns. A rivalry begins, with each style claiming to possess the 'truth' to the exclusions of all others.

At best, styles are merely parts dissected from a unitary whole. All styles require adjustment, partiality, denials, condemnation and a lot of self- justification. The solutions they purport to provide are the very cause of the problem, because they limit and interfere with our natural growth and obstruct the way to genuine understanding. Divisive by nature, styles keep men 'apart' from each other rather than 'unite' them.

One cannot express himself fully when imprisoned by a confining style. Combat 'as is' is total, and it includes all the 'is' as well as 'is not,' without favorite lines or angles. Lacking boundaries, combat is always fresh, alive and constantly changing. Your particular style, your personal inclinations and your physical makeup are all 'parts' of combat, but they do not constitute the 'whole' of combat. Should your responses become dependent upon any single part, you will react in terms of what 'should be' rather than to the reality of the ever-changing 'what is.' Remember that while the whole is evidenced in all its parts, an isolated part, efficient or not, does not constitute the whole.

Prolonged repetitious drillings will certainly yield mechanical precision and security of that kind comes from any routine. However, it is exactly this kind of "selective" security or "crutch" which limits or blocks the total growth of a martial artist. In fact, quite a few practitioners develop such a liking for and dependence on their 'crutch' that they can no longer walk without it. Thus, any one special technique, however cleverly designed is actually a hinderance.

Molecular Gastronomy is just a phrase, and like any phrase or symbol you can take it to mean what it actually means, see it for what it originally stood for, or you can choose to associate it with whatever you perceive it to be.

This is a personal choice.

What is Molecular Gastronomy literally?

Molecular is defined as: "Of or relating to simple or basic structure or form"

Gastronomy is defined as: "The art or science of good eating."

So it stands to reason that "Molecular Gastronomy" is literally, in practice, investigating elements "relating to the basic structure of the art and science of good eating."

Or, looking for the reasons cooking works and food is pleasing to the senses.

That would include all aspects of art and science - from why food performs the way it does in any type of cooking to how the aesthetics in sight, sound, taste, touch and smell affect the way we like to eat, in any given context.

Seems to me that applies to every cook on the planet to some degree - and always has.

Though perception and interpretation, as always, belong to the individual.

Edited December 12, 2006 by sizzleteeth (log)

[Timh]

A great post! Well put. I also find the analogy shockingly apropriate. Why is it that Americans routinely are at the forefront of taking a new concept and mangeling it it the name of creative freedom?

[Miriam Kresh]

A great post!  Well put. I also find the analogy shockingly apropriate. Why is it that Americans routinely are at the forefront of taking a new concept and mangeling it it the name of creative freedom?

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I've read through this thread with interest. From a housewife and home cook/home winemaker, this rant.

It strikes me that many people are uncomfortable with a concept unless it has been organized into a detailed framework of rules, complete with hierarchy, and presented in a neat package. That way everything's clear, no grey areas or surprises, and what was fluid and confusing is now comfortingly broken down and comprehensible. Even better if every transformation, every step of the way, has been analyzed to its last square root and then explained. I'm not talking about sensible things like recipes or instruction manuals; I'm talking about the way, as Timh said, Americans mangle concepts. It's as if there were more safety, or pleasure maybe, in the abstruse.

Of course along this path intangible factors like intuition and the creative impluse vanish, but that's a small price to pay for a dependable product, a predictable routine. Or for the sensuous pleasure of abstraction, which yields the additional reward of new tools for manipulating ingredients and methods to the highest degree. Why should anyone prefer the age-old method of allowing time, or gravity, to work their meandering, unpredictable ways when with new thinking you can manipulate and control? Of course no one has come up with a substitute for experience, which may come under the category of time, but nothing's perfect.

My mother had a maid, back in Caracas, who made delicious hot arepas. Augustina was illiterate and didn't even know how to use a measuring cup. In fact, once she cooked rice with dish soap instead of oil because the containers looked just alike and she couldn't read the labels to tell the difference. We didn't understand why the rice was so foamy till we tasted it.... But most of the time her cooking was superb, especially those arepas. She confidently mixed her masa harina and patted it into the proper round shapes and turned the arepas out onto a hot griddle, and they were always what arepas should be: a crisp outer crust over a moist interior, ready to be split open and filled with something savory or just spread with butter. I wonder if for some, the pleasure of eating Augustina's hot arepas would not be complete without a learned discussion involving percentages of hydration of the masa harina. Augustina would not understand such a discussion, but she turned out delicious arepas, one after the other, every day.

Myself, I confess I feel a headache coming on when I see peasant dishes spinning off into ever more elaborate variations, finally evolving into unrecognizable forms. But then, I've lived outside the States for so long - almost 40 years - that I've become deculturated. Over those decades, I've lived, studied, worked, and raised a family in Latin America and multicultural Israel. Almost to my embarrassment, I've sometimes found myself in the position of a foreigner when meeting Americans; our points of view are so different now, and even our English seems to be different from each other's. I no longer wish to have everything state-of-the-art, to be on the cutting edge, to be in the vanguard of, well, anything. Hey, that's me - home cook, home baker, home winemaker. If I had to make my living from cooking, the most I could handle would be providing hot lunches from my kitchen to a few steady customers. (There - now you know my facts and my fantasies.) But are there no others like me?

Now: when I read what Ferran Adria actually says, understand his goals, I feel the respect accorded to genius. This is a most unusual man; an innovative, creative artist who, I get the impression, meditates in an almost religious manner upon a subject, then harnesses his formidable energies to make it happen. He is totally open to using all resources. The exquisite dishes and taste sensations which he has created have made him justifiably famous. And the generous spirit in which Mr. Adria, and other chefs associated with the deconstructed way, work - is marvelous. No secrets jealously guarded, nothing kept in the pocket. From what I read, all knowledge accumulated over hours of experimentation and creation is free, to encourage others to learn too. This is noble, idealistic; and I am saying this with sincerity, even though the fact that I keep kosher would prevent me from tasting Mr. Adria's cooking (in the unlikely event that such an opportunity should ever arise).

Mr. Adria's states and laments that his cuisine has become distorted into "molecular gastronomy", a process that "does not describe our cooking, or indeed any style of cooking." Bravo, Ferran Adria, Heston Blumenthal, and Thomas Keller. For what my non-professional opinion is worth, the fad of MG will pass, but the marks they are making on culinary history will remain. Those drops containing the very essence of good olives, exploding in the mouth to soak your senses...amazing. How could such a creation not remain? Who knows, a kosher version might appear, and I'd be the first in line for it.

I'll wind up this long rant. The thread on minimalist, no-knead bread...I've printed out the entire thread up till today, and have dedicated serious time to studying it. The hydration of the dough in bread does matter to me. I'm delighted to be learning about it now. Although I've baked good bread for 25 years at least, this thread, and this bread, were eye-openers, and I am grateful to all those who posted their thoughts and photos. So what's the big difference between this and and what I've been ranting about? Ultimately, it's about, well, soul. Folks experimenting with the no-knead bread are having fun. Within the limits of the technique, we're discovering how flexible the recipe really is, and we're all able to make this delicious bread at home. Now I give everyone permission to jump on me: the thought of eating a foam actually makes me shudder. But even the memory of Augustina's arepas warms me, and as for the next batch of no-knead bread, I think I'm going to try the variation with semolina and rye.

Miriam

[Corinna Dunne]

The problem with the term "moleculor gastronomy" is the connotation; it is now shackled with negative perceptions. Give a dog a name and it sticks. Adria, Blumenthal et al are at extreme pains to distance themselves but have been unable to come up with a name other than their latest phrase "new cookery", and clearly, that's a limp non-runner. Until they find a better name, it will be called MG or avant-garde by most people.

Has anyone got any suggestitions for an alternative descriptor?

[sizzleteeth]

But are there no others like me?

←

You are far from alone Miriam.

The problem with the term "moleculor gastronomy" is the connotation; it is now shackled with negative perceptions.

←

Unfortunately we are all susceptible to logical argument, within which may lie equivocation, categorical syllogism, doublespeak, negative/affirmative or any number of elements that manipulate our perception.

Molecular Gastronomy sounds scary, so people assume it must be.

Molecular Gastronomy sounds scientific, so people assume it must be.

Both of these things sound logical enough to be true, but are not necessarily true.

A classic debate tactic.

Exaggerated examples:

Potassium Cyanide is a scary sounding chemical.

Sodium Chloride is a scary sounding chemical.

Sodium Chloride (Salt) is harmless

So Potassium Cyanide (Poison) is harmless

"Using Potassium Cyanide to cook is no different than using Sodium Chloride to make duck confit."

Or perhaps....

Apples are natural

Natural ingredients are good

Cyanide is naturally present in apple seeds

Cyanide is good

(Though hydrogen cyanide and potassium cyanide are different things).

Sometimes it's important to be careful the associations made in the mind, whether your own doing - or through the agenda of others.

Innovation, tradition - there can be a balance between the two and they can exist in harmony.

The new cookbook by Michael Richards is evidence enough of this.

In fact seeing that innovation stands on a foundation of tradition, to destroy that foundation destroys both innovation and tradition.

The scorpion and the frog.

[sizzleteeth]

Speaking of balance, after reading the link above, you might want to read what Hervé This himself has to say:

http://www.nature.com/embor/journal/v7/n11...EA0B519C47A21E1

I scanned through this a while ago but was just reminded of it today from a blog, so I read the whole thing.

It's opening paragraph is interesting:

For years, a new culinary trend called 'molecular cooking' has been touted as the most exciting development in haute cuisine. It is now the newest fashion for chefs to offer their customers fake caviar made from sodium alginate and calcium, burning sherbets, spaghetti made from vegetables, and instant ice cream, fast-frozen using liquid nitrogen. In the most recent ranking of the world's top 50 chefs—by the British magazine Restaurant—the top three chefs were Ferran Adria from El Bulli in Rosas, Spain; Heston Blumenthal from The Fat Duck in Bray, UK; and Pierre Gagnaire from his restaurant in Paris, France (Restaurant, 2006). In 2005, Blumenthal was first and Adria came second. What is remarkable is that all three of these talented and popular chefs have been inspired by molecular gastronomy.

Though I personally have to say I can see why confusion surrounds the issue, as the paper states both that "the 'molecular' in molecular gastronomy has the same definition as it does in molecular biology" - which "chiefly concerns itself with understanding the interactions between the various systems of a cell" at the molecular level while at the same time stating that "molecular gastronomy not only uses science to explore the technical aspect of cooking but also the 'art' and 'love' components".

But I guess the gist is that findings from the investigation of the science behind cooking and eating gives cooks the information needed to understand techniques, new or old, whether used to create "Contemporary" or "Avant Garde" cuisine, or to better understand the cooking that was already being done.

Which has been said many times.

(Added):

Though after reading this - things start to come into a bit more perspective:

http://theory-in-practice.blogspot.com/200...detest-you.html

It seems perhaps this whole thing has turned into a monster, perhaps one that was not intended to be created but was created none-the-less. It could be that droves of culinary students are abandoning discipline for fun and tradition for novelty.

And the creators of the monster now wish to hide from it, so they are not eaten.

Edited December 14, 2006 by sizzleteeth (log)

[sizzleteeth]

One more interesting viewpoint...

Wall Street Journal Article

Only free on Friday - so read while you can.

Gourmet Canned Cuisine

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116501867662438589.html?

"Here's a secret of high-end cooking: That special taste may have come from Aisle 12. Why top chefs are mixing creamed corn, Gravy Master and supermarket mayo into $75 entrées."

By KATY MCLAUGHLIN

December 2, 2006; Page P1