Boiling Foods

Boiling is the cooking of foods in a liquid either at or brought to boiling point at 100 degrees Celsius. It keeps the food in motion, it prevents sticking and it cooks the food quickly. Food such as eggs, pasta, rice, beans, soups, sauce, potatoes, stocks and stew meats can be boiled. When ingredients are boiled it is usually done in water, however it can also be used for different sauces to reduce them, or for brown/white stocks, a Blanc (water, flour and lemon), court bouillon or milk. It is important to use the correct proportion of liquid when boiling food because otherwise there might not be an even coverage over the food so it could dry out, or if there is too much liquid it could damage the food.
There are two basic methods of boiling:
1. Food is placed in cold liquid and then brought to the boil and cooked. This is not only safer but prevents the food from losing its shape and helps extract flavour. It also helps tenderise any foods with a fibrous structure.
For example: Stocks and Leaf Vegetables

2. Food is placed in boiling liquid and cooked. This retains as much colour as possible and apparently reduces enzymic action that destroys Vitamin C.
For example: Pasta and Rice

There are also different techniques of boiling:
Simmering: boiling gently with gentle surface motion.
Blanching: is the pre-cooking or part cooking of food by plunging into boiling water e.g green vegetables
Refreshing: is the cooling of food after blanching or boiling by plunging into cold water or running under cold water
Equipment used for boiling:
-Stockpots
-Saucepans
-Boiling pans

It is important to boil things for the correct amount of time so that ingredients withhold their shape and also to prevent them from falling apart. For example when boiling pasta, you don’t want to boil it for too long because it will fall apart and turn soggy, however you don’t want it to be hard so you need to time it right. Sometimes when boiling food, you might have to occasionally stir it to prevent the food from sticking to the pan.
When cooking food you want fresh produce that is clean and in date. Preparation should be done carefully and ingredients should be treated with respect so that the finished dish is of a good quality. Food shouldn’t be over or undercooked and the way the food is presented should be carefully thought out, so that the food looks inviting.

Baking
Baking is the cooking of foods in a dry heat without the exposure of a flame, normally done in an oven, but also in hot ashes or on hot stones. The most common baked item is bread but many other types of foods are baked. For example:
Eggs, e.g. in cocottes
Meat, e.g. steak and kidney pie, Cornish pasties
Chicken, e.g. vol au vent
Vegetables, e.g. potatoes
Apples, fruit flans, baked egg custard, cakes.

Heat is gradually transferred from the surface of cakes, cookies, breads or whatever food is being baked to their centre. As heat travels through it transforms batters and doughs into baked goods with a firm dry crust and a softer centre. Baking means a wide range of savoury and sweet foods can be produced like cakes and bread, also products of bakery yield appetising goods with eye-appeal and mouth-watering aromas that draw people in, hence why we use caked for special occasions like birthdays.
It is important to use the right technique when baking food so that the finished product is at its best or how you want it to be. For example if you are making muffins, cakes or bread, you want the product to rise. Techniques such as sifting the flour from a greater height and knocking the air out properly when folding the ingredients contribute to this as well as just adding yeast or baking soda. Or if you wanted your baked potato to have a soft skin you would wrap it in foil whilst cooking as opposed to leaving it and having a golden crispy skin. Either way different techniques can change small details of the way a dish is presented or cooked.
Timing is really important, sometimes it can take less than 30 seconds for a product to go from absolutely perfect to not at all how you want it to be and the temperature of your oven is also really important because if you have the oven too hot then your food will cook on the outside but not on the inside, and if it is too cold it won’t cook properly either so you need to have it at the right level. The way you prepare your food before its cooked is very important, you need to take into consideration, how delicate is the food going to be when it is taken out the oven? Does the equipment that the product is being baked in need to be grease proofed? If baking a cake, has the cake completely cooled down before you decorate it? These are just a few of the many things that need to be taken into consideration when baking but there are loads that if not thought through can really damage the food you are baking.
Equipment used for baking:

Mixing Bowl
Sieve
Food processors
Cutters
Cooling Rack
Rolling Pin
Whisk
Oven

When baking, just like with boiling you want fresh quality ingredients that are in date and clean. The way you present the food is really important as you want people to want the food once they’ve seen it and when baking the food needs to be timed perfectly and cooked to perfection so that the effort gone in to preparation (mixing, cutting, weighing) isn’t wasted by the food being slightly over or under baked.