Читать книгу Len Deighton’s French Cooking for Men: 50 Classic Cookstrips for Today’s Action Men - Len Deighton - Страница 11

Meat, fish and poultry are the basic protein foods. All such flesh foods contract, dry and then harden, with cooking. Such protein foods cooked under a grill or broiler are served juicy and only partly cooked. Because only choice, expensive cuts are tender when under-cooked these are the ones chosen for the fierce heat of the grill or barbecue.

Flesh foods cooked in liquid will also harden. But after hardening they will break up, and eventually disintegrate, as the connective tissue disolves. Some cuts of meat have so much connective tissue that they can be cooked to a point where the disintegration resembles tenderness. For example try cooking a shoulder of lamb or mutton for five hours at 250ºF.

Egg and fish are also protein foods but they are much softer than meat, so although they will harden above boiling point they will not be rendered inedible. But a fresh new-laid egg will still taste better below boiling point than above. Eggs subjected to brisk heat (e.g. omelette) are best served only partly cooked, i.e. still moist and soft in the centre.