Posts by chris.lawrence

it doesn't matter how you cook the sirloin. What's important to know is that this cut of meat isn't a well-used muscle, therefore contains little or no connective tissue that needs to be cooked out. What that means is that the longer...

I'm a purist when it comes to white bread, alot of sandwich loaf recipes call for shortening to give a softer crumb, but as this massively reduces the effectiveness of the gluten strength in the flour, i don't add it. I make sure I work...

already been answered but here's all the important points for cakey cookies, perhaps it will help explain whats going wrong: 1. flour to water; cakey cookies should be 100 parts flour to 38 parts water (but that in grams in divide for...

Well I would think not, as the glutens would be disrupted by the fats. But just as an argument with myself; i found an interesting page on the net from a guy who's done alot of experiments attempting to find the perfect texture for...

The staling is the retrogradation of the starch (crytalising), an emulisifier can help reduce that; try adding an egg yolk (or two) to your mix and that may help with the life of your donuts or reheat them to 60 degrees to regelate the...

Thank you all for the kind greetings.

Well from inside the industry I always blamed the attitude that cooking is an Art, not a science. However its not the end of the world when cooking is merely a hobby, but you'll be amazed how many professional chefs misunderstand...

Well its a strange place. I can't say the food here is very good though! Western style chinese food is much more considered (ironically!). Thank you all for the warm welcome.

I don't think it would make much difference at all, the leavening has very little time to work in fried doughs, and the crumbs are always quite dense. I doubt adding a chemical to improve or reduce the efficiency of the gluten bonds in...

I'm almost positive that nobody will read this, but it says I should introduce myself so here goes: Hello all, I'm British and currently working in China. I'm a chef by trade and have been for more than 5 years. One thing that always...