Coddies

Chilling to firm: the fridge as binder 48 recipes

• It went cold before it was handled any further, and it went in spread flat and covered rather than as a warm mass that insulates its own centre.
• It is cold through rather than cold at the edge: tested at the middle it is as firm as it is at the rim.
• It holds its shape unsupported; it can be cut, portioned, rolled or lifted without slumping, tearing, or sticking to the hands.
• The fat in it has gone solid: it feels firm and waxy to the fingers rather than greasy and yielding.
• It survives the step it was chilled for, going into heat or a coating or a mould still holding its form rather than collapsing the moment it is touched.

Where it goes wrong It was given twenty minutes instead of the hours it needed, so it is firm at the rim and soft at the core: it slumps out of shape as it is portioned, and everything made from it spreads or breaks apart in the pan.

Sautéing & the shallow fry 80 recipes

• Everything sits in a single layer with visible space between the pieces: nothing stacked, nothing touching, or the pan is too small for the quantity.
• The pieces move freely and keep moving, sliding across the pan rather than sticking and tearing when the pan is worked.
• Light even browning arrived at quickly: colour on most faces, not the deep crust of a sear and not grey.
• A thin film of fat with the food glossed by it: no pool left in the pan at the end, and nothing greasy on the fingers or the plate.
• Cooked through but still firm, having spent only a few minutes in the pan: anything that has gone soft has been in there too long.

Where it goes wrong Too much went in at once, the pan cooled, and the food released its water: what was meant to brown in three minutes stews for ten and comes out grey, slack and wet.