YES!!! I finally won this 20 year argument with my wife!

@dbprice100

4 жыл бұрын

Best reply yet.

@KimchiSpringRoll

4 жыл бұрын

Happy wife happy life you dumbass.

@rogerx1258

4 жыл бұрын

@@KimchiSpringRoll no you dumbass

@arthurmorgan7642

4 жыл бұрын

@@KimchiSpringRoll well when it comes to winning an arguement, than it's fine to make your wife feel guilty of being wrong,

@Jessejezzz

3 жыл бұрын

@@KimchiSpringRoll my wife just win an arguement so she just aborted my pontentional 1st son. She happy, im happy. I guess? *Edit: gotcha bro....*

All of your videos are so well made and eloquently scripted. Just found your channel a few days ago and I love your content! Definitely deserves wayyy more views :)

@lindagardener855

3 жыл бұрын

Same. I discovered Helen yesterday as well. Now I’m binge watching her vids👍

I only recently found your channel, but I felt compelled to tell you how much I adore you. The time, forethought and energy you put into your videos is so very appreciated. Thank you for your fantastic content!

Hi Helen Thanks for taking the time to reply. I will most definitely have a serious look at your recommendations... Thanks to yourself I am getting Kenji Alt's the Food Lab as a Christmas pressie. Thanks for recommending him. I also was blown away by your poached egg method in a Sieve, ended up purchasing you recommended Sieve from Amazon and am delighted to say your method on poached eggs in large quantities is a delight to put into practice...They did not teach me that method in catering college but you did thank you for that...

Helen, I really like the approach of your test. One thing on steaks that can be key is a room temperature steak are more pliable than a steak from the fridge. I can get a bit more surface contact on a room temp steak vs straight from the fridge. Its minor in detail but it's the only meat I bother to let rest before cooking. Also this only matters when searing in a pan then finishing in an oven. When grilling I've found it makes no difference at all, how you season and cook it is way more important.

"I opened the fridge door and pointed the gun at the chicken ... " Wait, what?

@thebasementbum4570

4 жыл бұрын

When

@schulend

3 жыл бұрын

Hahaha!

@christopherchesaux3554

3 жыл бұрын

Lolz

@sheepbaba

3 жыл бұрын

So funny. It's pure Chick bait. She is so Suet. She's a different gravy.....

@olesyagodlike1096

3 жыл бұрын

ah yes, america

Excellent video. You bring your artistic approach along with a scientific, experimental approach. Great combination and quite understandable. I especially like your approach to cooling the sous vide cooked meat *before* searing. Thus the interior is not overcooked, exterior is thickly browned. Bravo. BTW, with so many approaches to cooking to the right temperature, you sparked a memory of a couple friends 1) On vacation a friend would stop on the road at his favorite fishing hole and catch a couple trout. He previously prepared veggies, butter and seasonings. He then wrapped the cleaned trout and veggies in an aluminum foil pouch. He placed the pouch on top of the truck engine. When he arrived at his cabin further north, dinner was ready ! 2) Another friend prepared a freezer ziplock with fish and seasonings. He placed the bag into his dishwasher. At the end of the washing cycle, dinner was ready ! Bon appétit

Here from Adam Ragusea giving you a shout out!

@venceibul5676

4 жыл бұрын

Mmm warm Italian meringue

@butter5014

4 жыл бұрын

Me too

@jakebake1981

3 жыл бұрын

@@venceibul5676 don't do it......its a disgrace

@winehear

2 жыл бұрын

Ppppp0n

I love your voice almost as much as Chef John's and your writing is beautiful!

@harryhthenorwegian476

4 жыл бұрын

Oooooh..... You are in love.... :-D

@unc4skn244

4 жыл бұрын

hopeimfunny gay

@CHAPI929292

4 жыл бұрын

@@unc4skn244 definitely gay af

@unc4skn244

4 жыл бұрын

Harry Halvstiv gay

@animerlon

4 жыл бұрын

Totally agree. Really like how they say things as well as the tone of voice.

Incredible production for such a small subscriber audience. You are well thought-out, articulate, and the right level of cheeky/humorous. Really well done, and as a noobie, thank you.

@youtubeuser206

Жыл бұрын

you're stinky

After always hearing to take meat out for an hour before cooking and never remembering to do it, I now no longer feel bad about it at all. Thanks for doing this experiment for us, Helen!

Gosh you deserve so much more exposure on youtube

I truly appreciate your attention to details and the wherewithal to troubleshoot and investigate. I viewed on America's Test Kitchen on starting salmon in a cold pan, not a searing hot pan, particularly with the skin on and placed in pan skin side down first, then gradually bring the temperature to medium high. I have yet to explore this method with a steak but the salmon came out wonderfully, although at the near end of cooking I would add butter and spoon the hot butter over the salmon before resting. This may be a valid process for steaks as well.

Wonderful experiment, Thank you💜💕🍽

I don't understand how Helen's videos don't have 100k or more views. they're so well made and very informative. plus she's gorgeous! please leave a like and share and let's get her more views, she definitely deserves it!

@helenrennie

5 жыл бұрын

Ah! I really appreciate that :)

@ClaudeSac

4 жыл бұрын

I've seen three videos niw and basically she is a nice picture babbling a load of bullshit. She should not be taken seriously in most cases, but I won't see those cases because I'm out of here...

@blueplasma5589

3 жыл бұрын

@@ClaudeSac don't let the spachula hit you in the....

@ClaudeSac

3 жыл бұрын

@@blueplasma5589 I'm gonna be OK, thanks. ;-)

@Raven1024

2 жыл бұрын

@@ClaudeSac Based on what? Come on. Surely if you are so certain then coming up with an actual counterpoint can't be that hard for you...what is your extensive cooking experience you draw upon to be able to make your claims?

What great information! Much obliged, Ms Helen ❤

You're amazing! There's so many chef tips and tricks that go generally untested sometimes for decades. And you could even get yelled at in a professional kitchen for questioning it or even worse just doing things differently. Having a science minded youtube chef like you might save a couple asses. :)

@armastat

4 жыл бұрын

Lol, yeah there is Science and then there is Tradition.

Wonderful experiment and a very nicely detailed explanation. I think your methodology is very good but I'm not a food scientist. I'm curious to see where this goes so hopefully you'll take a future opportunity to continue this research.

I'll often set up cold meat on a sheet pan and put it in a low oven (175) for a few minutes. Pre-warming like this always gives me better browning, but it might be due to the protein surface drying out a little as well. Thanks, Helen.

I want to be like Helen: just a normal and lovely chef but also a Nobel prise winning food scientist

@smoll.miniatures

3 жыл бұрын

Does she have a Nobel prize?

@KK-yj7lb

3 жыл бұрын

she has a Nobel prize? :0

@shipyufrenchsong

3 жыл бұрын

@@KK-yj7lb she doesn't, its a joke haha

@morehn

3 жыл бұрын

@@smoll.miniatures there's an unwritten strong pause before "but."

@smoll.miniatures

3 жыл бұрын

@@morehn haha. Still doesn’t make any more sense grammatically.

Thank you for your detailed video. I think the only reason chefs say to get to room temp is because they heat their pan so hot and would "think" they would burn the food before the inside got to desired done-ness. I trust your findings and it makes sense. However, if my heat was really high I still think I would give the meat 30 minutes out of the fridge. I think the rule at culinary school they teach students on proper food safety is the 4 hour mark outside the fridge is the danger mark . If memory serves me correctly food should be stored under 4 degrees C or simmering above 60 degrees C to be safe for extended amounts of time.

I have been watching a good cook on YT who claims meat will “seize up” if put directly on heat after removing from the fridge. Thank you. New sub from Roanoke VA.

Nice video. Perhaps it is the temperature at the centre of the cooked piece that is relevant and not the sticking or colour . Let us say you want the centre temp at a "safe to consume 60 deg c". It stands to reason that with a fridge piece compared to a room temperature piece cooked an equal time that the centre of the fridge piece will take longer to achieve a target temperature. This colder piece will need a longer cooking cycle and so the external surface protein will be more denatured than the shorter room temperature piece. It may be postulated that a more cooked outer surface is "tougher" than a shorter cooked piece and perhaps, for some people more pleasant to eat. Consider, if you will, sous vide. The end result of a sous vide cycle is all the substrate at the same temperature and all that remains is the need to caramelise the surface for aesthetic and taste considerations. The stove top or grill plate cannot achieve that result. Once again, Thank you, Richard

Thanks for yourhard work creating this experiment, executing and filming this video. One question that came to mind was did you compare the taste and texture of both sets of meats? Visibly, they looked the same, but to me, the taste and mouth feel of the resultng product is also very important. Foods don't always taste the way they look.

@helenrennie

5 жыл бұрын

Several people have asked about taste :) I didn't notice a difference in taste, but taste is very subjective and you need WAY more samples and people to evaluate it. it also needs to be evaluated blind using the proper taste test protocol (people are given 3 pieces. 2 are the same and one is different. can you spot which one is different?) For example, one of the pieces of salmon was slightly less done than the others, so I personally like it best. it was a bit thicker than all the others too. so was this difference due to thickness or due to leaving it out at room temperature?

Thank you! I’ve always been uncomfortable with keeping proteins out of the cold for an hour or more, particularly on a hot, humid summer day.

I'm considering moving to the Boston area so I can take your classes! Well not really, but you are such a great instructor! Love your videos!

I've seen this info on Kenji's blog and believe it. Always great to see another proof 😊

OMG so right. Thank you for this video.

Great job with the details!

Hello Helen love watching your video. You really have given me such advice. Thanking you so much Kindest regards Patricia

@patriciagriffiths398

4 жыл бұрын

Oh dear I've just looked and you have received the same message before. So sorry Helen. It's me just cracking up!!!

I have learned so much for you. Thank you! As for "room temperature": I salt and freeze my steaks in vacuum bags. At noon, I put the frozen bagged steaks in my sous vide container filled with room temp water. By dinner time they are at room temperature. I reverse sear starting in a 200 degrees Breville toaster oven with a thermometer in the meat. Starting temp is usually about 70. It gets to 120 in about 45-50 minutes.

Impressive info, thank you!

Thank you Helen. This was so interesting.

to cut down on the heat variable of the cooking surface, have you considered trying your searing experiment on an induction burner, assuming you have one available? let the stove keep the cooking temp constant. regardless, i think i'll stick to cooking out of the fridge, better than risking any kind of contamination or spoilage when possible.

I discovered the reverse sear method. I don’t worry about starting at room temperature. Guess I arrived at the same place by accident.

It’s enjoyable to see a nicely designed experiment.

Hi Helen, I just found you on KZread and I'm very impressed! I think that any good cook never does the same thing twice. I write notes on my prime rib when I cook it for future reference and lack of my memory! The last time I made it, it went from the fridge to the oven. This time it sat out for 3 hours before cooking. It took less time to cook even though I like to cook the same weight. I will cook two smaller roasts rather than one large roast. The South West spice I use on it tastes awesome and that means 4 people get the spicy side cuts instead of two. My theory is that even though the center rose only 8 degrees, that's 8 degrees less exposure to oven heat and drying out less. It also helps a more even rare all the way through the roast.

I've even cooked a steak which was ever so slightly frozen inside because I was impatient to eat. I just used medium high heat - in cast iron - allowed more browning that I might normally get, on both sides, and it turned out just fine. I happen to like a really well browned steak, done nice and pink - no red - inside).

Very informative thank you 😊

Great to see cooking advice coming from an evidence based approach ( noted reference to Meathead ). Substance and real information counts for more than high production values and flamboyance! ( nothing wrong with your production :-)....) I believe the room temp thing can make a small difference, but in my experience you need to leave the meat out for many hours ( covered ) so that the internal temp comes up significantly. This goes against all food safety advice so any gains are not worth the risk. Just subscribed, great format.

I too love listening to Helen's voice - still trying to get my heard around NOT bringing my Cowboy Steak to room temp before cooking... browning not with standing!

Thank you for your comprehensive efforts! Information we can believe! :)

I knew a guy from Barbados who would heat up his lunch of fish and rice ( in a plastic bowl ) on the dashboard of my truck..everyday.

@venceibul5676

4 жыл бұрын

Sounds like a good story from a book

@armastat

4 жыл бұрын

Heck we would use the car engine to cook/heatup dinner as we traveled on camping trips.

Dear Helen, thank u yet again for such a detailed video_info ! ♥️👏

Wow Helen, that was amazing experiment. Using quantitative approaches to analize both initial and final result give us bigger picture about browning process of a meat. But we also interested about the subjective aspects from results, like: How it taste? Could you find any difference from these two? Which one did you prefer (subjectively)? Up until now, I'm still put some faith in method of storing meat at room temperature right before cooking. Not for the sake of browning, but mainly for meat's tenderness.

I cannot stress how happy I am that you made this video! The idea of room-temping the meat/fish always concerned me since it gives bacteria a chance to form. I'm thrilled to hear that it doesn't make that much of a difference! Secondly, I appreciate the time you took to test this in a scientific manner. I watch cooking shows daily and alot of chefs/cooks advise the room-temp method, but none of them have ever gone into any depth to justify the result. But You Did so I thank you for your effort!

Really glad I found you. Enjoy all your videos. New subscriber, thanks.

Hey thanks for the video it's great to know this! I've also learned a lot from your other videos. Just a question: is it better to defrost in the fridge or the counter?

I’ve heard that in smoking applications you get a much better smoke ring if you keep the meat refrigerated until right before putting it on the smoker.

Thank you for showing the use of the tongs on top of the spatula. Never considered it. But can you do a video on chargrilling fish, as catfish is liked by many, but it's bad for sticking and crumbling. My only solution I had was to put skin side down of fillet so membrane helps hold it together while bone side dries so when it's flipped to bone side, it's already crispier so not as sticky. Which I poured bacon drippings to sear the fillet while on initial start blazing heat to sear it fast. Which, as a professional, you can tell a better way.

Really interesting video. I'm thinking there may be a few very specific cases for leaving out the fridge. One is that if cooking a steak "blue" so that the inside is bloody still, if you cooked it straight from the fridge you might end up with the inside still being a bit solid from being fridge cold. That's not so pleasant for the person eating it. If it had been left out a while, the inside might have a more pleasant texture. But I honestly can't think of other reasons.

Scientific method with cooking experiments 😍

Hi! When it comes to other "materials" like e.g. metals and ceramics thermal shock is a very real issue. Perhaps something similar could be the reason behind the recommendation of allowing the meat to reach room temp before cooking. Just guessing now but cold meat might experience a large size reduction (at least for smaller cuts) -> which might squeeze out more moisture from the meet. Measuring the weight loss on cold and room temp meat before and after cocking could be a good way to test this. Surface "warping" might also something that could be affected by start temp. Thank you for a wonderful channel.

#realcomment Thank you so much for this video that is all a lot of time and effort to put into something like that and we're also curious and you've shown us what the reality is and managed to save a lot of people a lot of time. How many of us are trying to cook quick dinners or cook for families or get things done fast and we waste time thinking we need to allow this to sit to come to Room temperature for better Browning for better flavor Only to find out in the long run we've been wasting our time thank you so much for such a wonderful video I love your videos they make my day.

Beneficial! Thank you

From engineering/ heat transfer perspective. The colder the centre the more the temperature gradient. So I agree with all the old cookbooks. When I made Samin's buttermilk whole chicken (marinades in buttermilk/salt for a day) I took it out the fridge for an hour before. But obviously it was still cold inside after that. So I just left it out for like 3 hours figuring that any bacteria is just going to die in that oven temperature anyway. Having it hotter on the outside won't make the inside heat up much faster - it's like traffic. But 3 hours outside might raise the centre temperature by 5 or 10 degrees so that when you get cooking, the outside layers can spend less time at high temp. Next time I make Samin's chicken I'll take the marinade pack out of the fridge the night before. But tbh that's why I just bought a sous-vide cooker!

I love watching your videos. I learn a lot. I have a thought about your test. Because you didn't do steak or other form of beef, you have missed testing one aspect that you don't get with chicken or salmon. I used to use a searing element on my last barbecue, on a mostly frozen steak. What this did was help me control the internal cook temp of the steak by slowing it down. My favourite way to have steak is Chicago style, which is lightly charred on the outside, cooked to order on the inside. If you have a cold steak and a room temperature steak, and cook them the same amount of time and at the same temperature, the cold one will be slightly delayed, and end up slightly less cooked in the inside, so room temp would come out as MEDIUM for example, and the refrigerated one would come out MEDIUM RARE. Does that not seem plausible? I tend to cook from the fridge, simply because I feel like it works better for me when trying to create a medium rare steak with a crispy exterior.

@annchovy6

2 жыл бұрын

Kenji Lopez-Alt specifically tested this with steak and he showed it didn’t make a difference.

You are beyond fantastic. You should get your own show. You are better than Alton Brown imo but no dis to him I just like your style with all of the science and your voice and personality. I just cant stop watching! I have to share your videos with friends. I wish I was in Boston. Thank you so much.

@helenrennie

4 жыл бұрын

Thank you so much for sharing my videos with your friends :)

I think it's a good idea for deep/pan frying as surely dropping in cold meat messes with your oil temperature. Then again I suppose you could let your oil get hotter first to compensate

I thought that if you salt a meat, at first it will pull out some humidity, but that after a while it will absorb it and equalize. I.E. after 15-20 minutes it will no longer dry the meat. However, soluble proteins will have found their way to the surface enhancing browning. BTW Love your channel Helen !!

First, thanks for this video and your whole body of published work. I think the puzzle of the salmon and chicken heating up more than you expected may have a simple solution. You show them resting on a rather heavy ceramic bowl. If the bowl is at room temp it will quickly conduct heat to the food making the apparent surface temp seem too high. There are two ways to test this. One is to use a low mass plate (paper plate) resting on a low conductive surface - towel. This should result in "normal" temperature rise of the food surfaces. The other way is to put the high mass plate in the refrigerator until it comes to fridge-temp and then use that. This should result in an abnormally lower raise in surface temperature of the food since the conductance is now pulling heat out of the food instead of putting it in.

I learned two things about beef: Braise brisket starting at 325F for 90 minutes and then reduce to 275 for 2 hours. The higher starting temp gets the interior of the meat to get warm enough to release the interior gelatin and results in a moist roast. Second, I salt steaks and leave uncovered in the fridge overnight. This causes the salt to draw moisture to the surface, but then the salty liquid returns to the center thereby seasoning the meat throughout.

Yes, I’ve a suggestion for your experiment. I’m not sure if others have already suggested it, please let me give it a try. My suggestion is using cast iron to do your experiment. Thank you.

The last part about rising 10 degrees after drying the meat with your hands and a towel reminds of something lots of people don't realize. Your hands are pretty warm. If you've ever warmed a tiny animal like a kitten or a chick you can just hold them in your hands and it'll be enough. Same thing if you ever wanted to take the temperature of something but accidentally touched the thermometer. The temperature reading will jump up pretty quick and takes a few seconds to go back down.

Thankyou for knowledge 👍🏻

that kind of thermometer gets an average of the area around the laser point, so it could be that you were holding the thermometer farther away from the meat when it was out of the fridge

@corrigenda70

4 жыл бұрын

There is indeed a risk that users of this type of thermometer assume that they are measuring the temperature at the point of the spot of red light. You are right to warn that instead an average is taken of quite a large area that is 'seen' by the thermometer which is more or less centred on the spot of light.

My dear Helen, Try taking the unwrapped meat/fish, out, just long enough to dry it off, then put back in fridge .... uncovered till it reads 38 or whatever it was before drying, have your pan hot and ready to sear and then, right from the fridge, place then in the pan.. That should cut the temp variables to virtually nil. Futher, on an expieriment I just did a couple weeks ago, using the oven REVERSE sear method of yours/ kenji's... I dried my 1" ribeye and salted, left out on counter for one hour. Interior temp only went up 12ºF . THE salt took another 4 hours to re-absorb, in fridge, and then I re dried with p towels as dry as possible. Out of the fridge, I placed in 450º Pan, and seared 1 1/2 min. Per side and same on edges, removed, let rest for 8 Min. And it was perfect.!! THANK you AS always, Sam... THE secret chef PS: thermoworks has a ""direct contact"" thermo pen like thermometer that works much better, in fact is perfect for direct contact temping.. It has a small round disk on the end that makes direct contact with the pan...etc you can then check multiple spots with incredible accuracy. worth the extra cost I felt. Ok?

Nice vid. I let the meat rest in sealed wax paper for 4 hours (covered in my spice) on the counter.yum.

@rowynnecrowley1689

4 жыл бұрын

4 hours?! That's a recipe for food poisoning. Are you sure you watched video?

Very interesting. My experience has been that when cooking steaks blood rare putting it out 20 or 30 minutes ahead helps eliminate the cold center. Perhaps letting it sit sets up a temperature gradient in the meat such that although the internal temperature at the center starts out the same it could warm faster as the outer layers warm more quickly. Perhaps embedded temperature probes while cooking might be instructive.

@armastat

4 жыл бұрын

The trick is taking into account Thermal Velocity. that's the tendency of heat to move from one spot to the next. or in this case to equalize in all parts of the meat. When cooking the outside is much hotter than the rest. and when u take it off of the heat that surface heat will also continue to warmup the interior until its all the same temp. or as cooks like to say, let you meat rest after cooking. the internal temp will continue to rise afterwards so remove when its below the target temp.

When I wok I do let meat marinade for 1h and to cool off. I found that If the pieces are to cold they are going to cool off the wok and the oil and I will have to wait a bit longer for the browning to occur and the meat will get overcooked (thin slices). But room temperature meat is starting to brown right away and the temperature of the wok and oil is really hot and does not drop as drastically. But it all could be a placebo.

Wow 😯 very nice such a wounded full video Dear thanks for sharing stay connected

I cook my joints of beef from frozen straight to the oven. Check the core temperature when the joint has browned. If 70ish deg C job done! Sorry we use C in UK

If you watch different chefs they have different ideas. I think if it was a blind taste test the average person couldn’t tell. Probably most chefs couldn’t tell. Love your video.

I think the temperature of meat is also a factor when considering things like breading or batter. A thick, cold piece of meat takes longer to cook, compared to a thick, room temp piece, and therefore the breading or batter will be darker. I’ve had this happen when deep frying chicken tenderloins. It can certainly change the oil temp as well. Things will just take a bit longer if they’re really cold, so cooking time will be affected.

The big question is was there any discernable differences in the taste of the proteins cooked?

I'm still a firm believer in letting my steak sit out. The internal temp rises, so it cooks quicker and more evenly. Two of my "other" favorite chefs Bobby Flay and Alton Brown recommend this. I used to own a burger restaurant, and sometimes we used the inverse of this equation. We prided ourselves on serving fresh ground, never frozen burgers, always with a nice sear. We did keep some patties frozen though. Why? For people who wanted a rare center! While a non frozen burger would cook more evenly, the frozen patty would cook unevenly. Because of this we could still get a nice sear on both sides without overcooking the center.

@Raven1024

2 жыл бұрын

Bobby Flay is a hack...and Alton Brown while I love him has pretty much reduced or eliminated this step from his more recent recipes. He hasn't really spoken *against* it. But it's absent from them. Exception being his election night one where he pulled it back to just 30 minutes.

@xXMkThunderXx

2 жыл бұрын

Kinda late for this reply, but I think the key word there is frozen! Here she compared fridge vs room temp, but I think frozen would indeed see some differences

@jackh577

2 жыл бұрын

@@xXMkThunderXx Well said me friend.

Thank you so much, Helen. I'm sick and tired of people perpetuating these food myths. I remember one of Chef John's videos where he said to leave out a tuna steak for 10 minutes before cooking it. I commented that it made no difference. You would not believe the crazy feedback I got from argumentative and pigheaded people. Some even said that the 1 degree celsius in difference before cooking would change the outcome of the finished tuna steak! It was shocking. #realcomment

@helenrennie

5 жыл бұрын

I always want to ask these people if they think restaurants leave their steaks, fish, etc at room temperature for an hour or even 10 minutes. How would you do that? you don't know exactly what people will order. I am sure I give all sorts of advice on my channel that isn't true. Testing this stuff properly takes a lot of time and resources, so sometimes we all have to rely on traditional cooking wisdom. What's interesting to me is how resistant people are to the idea that this wisdom doesn't always work (or maybe never works).

@SuWoopSparrow

3 жыл бұрын

The thing is that people say "let your steak come to room temperature for 1 hour". This is a bit of an oxymoron. Its not going to come to room temperature in 1 hour, clearly. However, to suggest that due to this letting your steak come to room temperature is pointless isnt a fair conclusion. Truly letting your steak come to room temperature does make a difference. As far as the time it takes to get there leading to spoilage, that's a bit silly. Properly kept meat can stay out all day and be perfectly fine. Italian steak, particularly Florentine steak, is fairly well known around the world. The Italians leave large subprimals out for hours upon hours. Is it better or worse? Who can say? But to say theres not a difference to what they are doing and what American steakhouses are doing isnt right.

Thx Adam!

I've always wondered about this myself because my father in law swears by letting your meat hit room temp before grilling. So I had to test for myself. I really noticed a difference in grilling burgers. The burgers I pattied and let reach room temp would fall apart fast on the the hot grill. But the burgers I pattied and left in the fridge until the grill was ready kept their shape and did not fall apart on the hot grill. Most of my other tests with different meats yielded the same result.

@helenrennie

4 жыл бұрын

Yes, burgers have to come straight from the fridge. It's not the matter of browning or even cooking. It's to prevent them from falling apart.

@ezrapound6063

4 жыл бұрын

@@helenrennie ❤❤❤thank you for your response. I love when channels respond to viewers comments.

Large roast I find it makes a difference. From 4 Celsius carry over at room temp and straight from fridge it can be 10c-14c. Which can end up destroying a roast

Great video

Here from Adam Ragusea! Your videos look great!

I roasted the biggest turkey I could find, i.e. 23 to 25 pounds, every year for Thanksgiving. Letting the bird sit outside seemed to make all the difference for me. I'm sure it took at least an hour off my cook time. I was able to roast it at 325F. The breast remained tender and juicy. The thighs had enough time to cook through. Has anyone tested for tenderness in large birds? I just discovered your channel. Love it!!

If you put butter on the outside of a steak (think butter aging) can you use that butter after it is done aging and cook the steak in that butter?

So just my two cents and maybe someone already commented this(im too lazy to read through everything) but the spike in heat probably has to do with heat transfer from your hands when youre drying it with paper towels. Great video as always, and im not a scientist lol

Heat transfer can happen surprisingly fast when physical objects touch one another. Custom knife-makers will use this effect to either deferentially heat a knife with a block of hot metal or cool a knife faster with aluminum plates in a vice. I'll wager the surface temperature of the chicken would've gone down if the paper towels had been stored in the freezer instead of the counter. It would also be interesting to see what the chicken surface temperature would be if the paper towels were warmed to around 110F or so first.

If you changed the vessel the chicken was kept in that would affect the temp and the patting dry would absorb some heat from your hands. Either way, great video as always.

I was waiting for you to cut into them to see if there was any real difference to the done-ness or inside temperature of the pieces.

Nice video. In case it's of any interest to you, the reason your salmon is 10F warmer right after taking it out is because even after 0 time, a thermal boundary layer of air immediately surrounds the meat, with a temperature gradient from Tinfinity (ambient temperature) to Tmeat (refrigerator temperature). As soon as this thermal boundary layer has formed, which may only be a few mm in thickness, but invisible of course, you get thermal transport across the meat's surface. This will quickly raise the surface temperature (the speed is dictated by something called the Biot number). Because meat has a lot of heat capacity though, the inside of the meat will remain fairly stable for a longer period of time. Your IR gun is only measuring the surface though. Oh and I also think the fridge vs ambient thing is BS ;)

Ugh! There is nothing worse than food myths.. there are a huge number of those in the barbecue groups also... Thanks for your testing Helen!

Thank you my husband will be happy, I continue telling him to take the meat out of the frig. So it will cook right

Perfect!! I grill frozen steaks with great success. Love this channel!!

@rowynnecrowley1689

4 жыл бұрын

My concern with using frozen is that the outside will burn and the inside will still be cold. Or it gets dried out.

@kikataye6293

3 жыл бұрын

Rowynne Crowley I used to cook mine very slow for a while, then adding the fire at the end to get that char

You are AWESOME

Hello Helen. First, let me say I love you. 😘 I have enjoyed your videos. While I agree with your conclusions for the things you cooked, as will as skirt and flank steak pounded thin, the same does not hold true if you are cooking a 2+" ribeye or strip steak. Pan or grill, the steaks will always be more rare in the middle if they came directly out of the fridge before cooking. Sous vide doesn't matter due to the length of time involved but on the grill or pan it's hot and fast so all other things being equal, you end up with rare from the fridge or medium rare that sat out under the same time and conditions. I am 40 years old, have been grilling since I was 12, and pan frying since 17, always cook for others and have had plenty of time where extra people came over and I had to cook extra straight from the fridge that didn't sit out first and they always take longer to be ready and risk getting ruined much easier. Maybe a follow up to this vid is in order cooking a pair of 2.5" strip steaks side by side (1 direct from fridge and 1 that sat out for an hour or two). Eating those will be torture but we would be willing to endure it with you.

@helenrennie

5 жыл бұрын

yes, if you do hot and fast, room temperature might help a little, but why not do reverse sear or do the method I show in my meat grilling video? that helps so much that room temperature doesn't matter. Cooking a 2 inch thick piece of meat on high heat is asking for trouble. basically, I am saying that if you use a smart way to cook meat, room temperature doesn't make a difference. sous-vide is not the only way that cooks long and slow and distributes heat perfectly. it's just the easiest.

Helen, was the flavor any different between the pieces?

I wonder what would happen if you kept it on a cooling rack and put a fan next to it for air flow(both to help drying but also convection to raise the temperature faster) and used a thinner piece of meat(like a chicken tenderloin or a .75inch steak), also comparing fat contents(since fat is an insulator). Rather than an oven, I do a reverse sear-like approach using a 125F dehydrator for 2 hours. It really dries out the surface but keeps the internal temperature very low.

I never thought about doing this with poultry

It's not about cooking evenly or browning. It is about the tenderness of the meat. Cold meat seizes up put directly into a hot pan or grill. An hour out helps it relax and you get a more succulent piece of beef. With chicken it is because chicken releases a lot more water if it goes into a hot pan cold. If you want to keep the juices in better it needs a half hour out. Fish goes straight from the fridge.

@andrazi4050

4 жыл бұрын

That is the issue with trying to put the scientific method into use for things such as cooking. Nobody even tastes things the same and visual, while important, is not the end all to good food. I have made some horrible looking dishes that taste far and away better than the same dish that I managed to get to look halfway decent.

It's funny. I've only heard of the "cooks more evenly" reason for the last 10-15 years. It doesn't make sense. If anything you'd want the center warmer than the surface. However, when I first heard of letting red meat rest before cooking it was back in the early '70s. It was only for red meat (beef and uncured pork) and the reason was that it made the meat more tender. I'd read this in a book and when I asked my mom about it she'd learned it in home economics class about 1950. We also tended to season the meat when we got it out. So it was a relatively brief dry brining. That may have contributed to increased tenderness. Also, as salt inhibits bacteria, I wouldn't be too concerned about 90 minutes or maybe even 120 resting on the counter if the kitchen is cool.

maybe do the patting dry and put it back in the fridge for a few minutes also maybe try frying without oil for more sticking