AY Honors/Cooking/Answer Key

Cooking

1. Know how to properly operate the kind of stove you have in your home. Know how to put out an oil or grease fire on your stove. Know how to prevent such a fire. Know safety precautions while cooking, including consideration of small children.

Operating a stove

There are two major classes of stoves in common use in the United States today, the gas stove and the electric stove. Gas stoves burn either propane or natural gas and cook with an exposed flame. Most have automatic ignition so you do not need to strike a match to light a burner. Simply turn the knob and set the flame to the desired level. Electric stoves cook with a heating element which converts eletrical energy into heat. Like gas stoves, the cook must turn a knob, but unlike gas stoves, there is no flame, so its level cannot be directly observed. Instead, the knobs are marked with numbers generally ranging from 1 to 9 or 10. The settings 1-3 corresponds to low heat, 4-6 correspond to medium heat, and 7-10 correspond to high heat.

Putting out a grease fire

In case of a grease fire in a pan, cover the pan with its lid. This will deprive the fire from oxygen and it will go out. If the cover is already on the pan, you may need to use a fire extinguisher.

Safety considerations

Stoves with knobs along the back of the unit are more appropriate in households with small children because the children cannot reach the knobs and turn the stove on. This does present a lesser danger to the cook, as he or she must reach across the burners to adjust the knobs - don't wear loose clothing when cooking with such a stove.

Another hazard to children involving stoves are pot handles. These should always be turned such that they to not overhand the edge of the stove where a child could grab it or run into it. An overturned pot of boiling water can cause severe burns.

Do not place flammable items on the stove, ever. This includes paper or plastic plates, or food packaging items (boxes and bags). It is easy to accidently turn on the wrong burner, and if a flammable item is on that burner, tragedy may ensue.

Remember that the burners stay hot for several minutes after they have been turned off.

Many foods (especially pastas) are boiled in water and the water is then drained. Use a colander for this purpose. When transporting a pot full of boiling water from the stove to the sink, so not lift the pot over the head of a child who may be underfoot - clear the area first. While cooking, dishes and cooking implements pile up in the sinks of even the cleanest of kitchens. Remove any dishes from the sink before pouring boiling water into it. The sudden temperature increase can shatter glass, and you do not want boiling water to pool up in any dishes in the sink.

3. What is meant by boiling, broiling, frying, baking, simmering, waterless cooking, and if available microwave cooking? Which are the most healthful ways of preparing common foods? Which are the most unhealthful ways?

Cooking Methods

• Boiling is cooking food in boiling water, or other water-based liquid such as stock or milk. Simmering is gentle boiling, while in poaching the cooking liquid moves but scarcely bubbles.

In places where the available water supply is contaminated with disease-causing bacteria, boiling water (and allowing it to cool) before drinking it is a valuable health measure. Boiling water for a few minutes kills most bacteria, amoebas, and other microbial pathogens. It thus can help prevent cholera, dysentery, and other diseases caused by these organisms.

Foods suitable for boiling include fish, vegetables, pasta, eggs, meats, sauces, stock, and soups.

Advantages:

• Older, tougher, cheaper joints of meat and poultry can be made digestible.
• It is appropriate for large-scale cookery
• Nutritious, well flavoured stock is produced
• It is safe and simple
• Maximum colour and nutritive value is retained when cooking green vegetables, provided boiling time is kept to the minimum

Disadvantages:

• There is a loss of soluble vitamins in the water.
• It can be a slow method
• Foods can look unattractive

Boiling can be done in two ways: The food can be placed into already rapidly boiling water and left to cook, the heat can be turned down and the food can be simmered; or the food can also be placed into the pot, and cold water may be added to the pot. This may then be boiled until the food is satisfactory.

• Broiling is a process of cooking food with high heat with the heat applied directly to the food, most commonly from above. As it is a way of cooking without added oil, it is popular in low-fat diets.

In electric ovens, broiling is accomplished by placing the food near the upper heating element, with the lower heating element off and the oven door partially open. Gas ovens often have a separate compartment for broiling, as a drawer below the flame.

• Frying is the cooking of food in oil or fat. Chemically, oils and fats are the same, differing only in melting point, but the distinction is only made when needed.

Fats can reach much higher temperatures than water at normal atmospheric pressure. Through frying, one can sear or even carbonize the surface of foods while caramelizing sugars. The food is cooked much more quickly and has a special crispness and texture. Depending on the food, the fat will penetrate it to varying degrees, contributing richness, lubricity, and its own flavour.

Frying techniques vary in the amount of fat required, the cooking time, the type of cooking vessel required, and the manipulation of the food. Sautéing, stir frying, pan frying, shallow frying, and deep frying are all standard frying techniques.

• Baking is the technique of cooking food in an oven by dry heat applied evenly throughout the oven or only from the bottom element. Breads, desserts, and meat are often baked, and baking is the primary cooking technique used to produce cakes and pastry-based goods such as pies, tarts, and quiches.

• Simmering is a cooking technique in which foods are cooked in hot liquids kept at or just barely below the boiling point of water (at average sea level air pressure), 100 °C (212 °F). To keep a pot simmering, one brings it to a boil and then adjusts the heat downward until just before the formation of steam bubbles stops completely. Water normally begins to simmer at about 94 °C or 200 °F.

Simmering ensures gentler treatment than boiling to prevent toughening and prevent food from breaking up. Simmering is usually a rapid and efficient method of cooking.

• Waterless cooking

• Microwave cooking has revolutionized cooking since its use became widespread in the 1970s.

Professional chefs generally find microwave ovens to be of limited usefulness. On the other hand, people who are lacking in free time, or not comfortable with their cooking skills, can use microwave ovens to reheat stored food (including commercially available pre-cooked frozen dishes) in only a few minutes.

Food is heated for so short a time that it is often cooked unevenly. Microwave ovens are frequently used for reheating previously cooked food, and bacterial contamination may not be killed by the reheating, resulting in foodborne illness. The uneven heating is partly due to the uneven distribution of microwave energy inside the oven, and partly due to the different rates of energy absorption in different parts of the food.

The first problem is reduced by a stirrer, a type of fan built in to the over (but hidden from view) that reflects microwave energy to different parts of the oven as it rotates, and by a turntable or carousel that turns the food.

It is also important not to place food or a container in the center of a microwave's turntable. That actually defeats its purpose. Rather, it should be placed a bit off-center so that the item travels all around the area of oven's cooking cavity, thus assuring even heating.

The second problem must be addressed by the cook, who should arrange the food so that it absorbs energy evenly, and periodically test and shield any parts of the food that overheat.

Many microwave ovens' performance drops after about 15 minutes of continuous usage, which means food takes longer to cook. When heating several meals, the last meal to be cooked may not be heated properly as a result.

Defrosting is another common weakness, as many microwave ovens may start to cook the edges of the frozen food, while the inside of the food remains frozen.

Closed containers and eggs can explode when heated in a microwave oven due to the pressure build-up of steam. Products that are heated too long can catch fire. Manuals of microwave ovens warn of such hazards.

Tin foil, aluminium foil, ceramics decorated with metal, and products containing other metals can cause sparks when they are used in a microwave.

Several microwave fires have been noted where Chinese takeout boxes with a metal handle are microwaved, and also where "homemade" microwave popcorn bags have been sealed using a metal staple, which is then heated and sets fire to the bag. This type of accident can pose a dangerous situation because of the extremely flammable mixture of popcorn and oil in the bag. Thus, it is good practice to remove any metal utensils or metal containing objects from a microwave oven before operating it, as the behavior of these objects when immersed in a strong microwave radiation field is unpredictable.