How do I make a peppercorn sauce for steak?
The pan-sauce sequence — deglaze, reduce, cream, finish — with the peppercorn choice and the brandy step that decide whether it tastes like a restaurant one.
beginner12 min3 min read
Techniques
Roasting, frying, braising and why temperature matters.
234 guides in Food & Cooking
Is sous vide safe when the food never gets very hot?
Why holding chicken at 62°C can be as safe as roasting it to 75°C, what makes it unsafe, and the rules that are not optional.
intermediate10 min4 min readWhy does my sauce go thin when I reheat it?
What happens to starch granules when a sauce is cooked, cooled and reheated — why some sauces thin, others weep, and which thickener to use for something you will not eat straight away.
beginner8 min4 min readWhy does my white sauce taste floury?
A pasty, raw-flour taste has one cause and two contributing factors — and it can be fixed in the pan without starting again.
beginner10 min4 min readHow do I barbecue fish without it sticking to the grill?
Why fish welds itself to a barbecue, the four things that stop it, and which fish are realistic on bars at all.
intermediate20 min5 min readHow do I fix a sauce I have reduced too far?
How to read a reduction on the back of a spoon, what concentrates along with the flavour, and how to correct a sauce that has gone past the point — including when it cannot be corrected.
beginner8 min4 min readHow do I get a smoky flavour without a barbecue?
Six routes to smoke indoors, from charring vegetables directly on a flame to the ingredients that carry smoke without any fire at all.
beginner15 min3 min readHow do I stop whipped cream weeping and collapsing?
Plain whipped cream holds for a few hours and then leaks. Five ways to stabilise it — gelatine, mascarpone, milk powder, cornflour-based icing sugar and a hot syrup — with what each one costs in texture.
beginner10 min4 min readShould I cover meat with foil while it roasts?
Foil turns dry roasting into steaming, which is exactly right for some joints and exactly wrong for others — how to tell which you have, and when to use it as a shield rather than a lid.
beginner8 min3 min readWhy do my green vegetables go grey or olive coloured?
Heat plus acid strips the magnesium out of chlorophyll and the colour goes with it. Why the change is not reversible, and the four cooking decisions that avoid it.
beginner5 min3 min readHow do I make a creamy mushroom sauce that does not go grey or split?
Browning the mushrooms properly before any liquid goes near them, why the sauce goes grey, and the cream and acid order that stops it splitting.
beginner20 min4 min readHow do I make aioli or garlic mayonnaise?
The difference between true aioli and garlic mayonnaise, how much garlic to use, and why garlic mayonnaise turns bitter or acrid a few hours after you make it.
intermediate15 min4 min readHow do I make cranberry sauce?
Fifteen minutes with fresh or frozen cranberries, why it sets on its own without any added pectin, and how far ahead it can be made.
beginner15 min3 min readHow do I roast a whole duck so the skin is crisp?
A duck is a fat-rendering problem, not a roasting problem — the pricking, the drying, the low-then-high oven and how to deal with two litres of hot fat.
intermediate30 min4 min readHow do I stop yoghurt curdling in a curry?
Yoghurt curdles because it is acidic and low in fat, and heat finishes the job — the tempering, the stabilising and the timing that keep a korma or a rogan josh smooth.
beginner10 min4 min readWhy are my lasagne sheets still hard?
Dried sheets have to steal every drop of water they cook in from the sauce touching them. Where the dry spots are, why the corners always go first, and the sauce consistency that fixes it.
beginner10 min3 min readWhy do my fishcakes fall apart?
The three real causes of collapsing fishcakes — too much moisture, the wrong potato, and no chilling — plus the ratio and the coating that hold them together.
beginner30 min5 min readHow do I cook liver so it is not grey and grainy?
The two-minute window, why slicing thickness decides everything, and the soak that removes the metallic edge.
intermediate20 min3 min readHow do I cook ox cheek and beef short ribs?
Two of the cheapest and best cuts on a cow, what makes each behave the way it does, and the braising times and finishing steps they each need.
intermediate35 min4 min readHow do I cook pearl barley, spelt and farro?
The two methods — open pot and absorption — the realistic timings for each grain, and why these are not quick grains.
beginner45 min3 min readHow do I get mixed vegetables to finish cooking at the same time?
Two levers — when each vegetable goes in, and how big you cut it. The roasting ladder for a single tray, and the staggered method for a pan on the hob.
beginner10 min3 min readHow do I make bread sauce?
The infused milk that makes the difference, the bread to use, and how to make it a day ahead without it turning to paste.
beginner20 min4 min readHow long should a ragù cook, and does it really need milk?
What the long cooking is actually doing, why milk goes in before the tomato in a classic Bolognese, and how short you can cut it before the sauce stops being worth it.
beginner3 hr4 min readWhat are the mother sauces and why do they matter?
The five classical sauce families, what each is actually made of, and the more useful idea underneath them — that every sauce is thickened by starch, reduction or emulsion, and each mechanism fails in its own way.
beginner8 min3 min read
Going deeper: PizzaHQ
Dough hydration and fermentation schedules, flour selection, oven types and bake profiles.