Food Preparation

This article is about food preparation in general.

Preparing food with heat or fire is an activity unique to human beings, and some scientists believe the advent of cooking played an important role in human evolution.Most anthropologists believe that cooking fires first developed around 250,000 years ago. The development of agriculture, commerce and transportation between civilizations in different regions offered cooks many new ingredients. New inventions and technologies, such as pottery for holding and boiling water, expanded cooking techniques. Some modern cooks apply advanced scientific techniques to food preparation.

Heating techniques

• Cooking

 Chemical techniques  

• Brining
• Ceviche
• Drying
• Fermentation
• Marinating
• Pickling
• Salting
• Smoking
• Souring
• Sprouting
• Sugaring

 Mechanical techniques

• Chopping
• Dicing
• Grinding
• Julienning
• Kneading
• Mincing
• Peeling
• Shaving
• Blending
• Beating
• Grating
• Mixing

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Vitamins and Minerals

Vitamins are materials required for normal metabolism but which the body cannot manufacture itself and which must therefore come from soil. Vitamins come from a number of sources including fresh fruit and vegetables (Vitamin C), carrots, liver (Vitamin A), cereal bran, bread, liver e ( B vitamins), fish liver oil (Vitamin D) and fresh green vegetables (Vitamin K).
Many minerals are also essential in small quantities including iron, calcium, magnesium and sulphur; and in very small quantities copper, zinc and selenium. The micro-nutrients, minerals, and vitamins in fruit and vegetables may be destroyed or eluted by cooking. Vitamin C is especially prone to oxidation during cooking and may be completely destroyed by protracted cooking.

Water

Cooking often involves water which is frequently present as other liquids, both added in order to immerse the substances being cooked (typically water, stock or wine), and released from the foods themselves. Liquids are so important to cooking that the name of the cooking method used may be based on how the liquid is combined with the food, as in steaming, simmering, boiling, braising and blanching. Heating liquid in an open container results in rapidly increased evaporation, which concentrates the remaining flavor and ingredients - this is a critical component of both stewing and sauce making.

Fats

Types of fat include vegetable oils and animal products such as butter and lard. Fats can reach temperatures higher than the boiling point of water, and are often used to conduct high heat to other ingredients, such as in frying or sauteing.

Cookies, crackers and other commercial baked goods made with partially hydrogenated vegetable oils may be high in trans fat. French fries, donuts and other commercial fried foods are major sources of trans fat in the diet.
    

Carbohydrates

Carbohydrates include the common sugar, sucrose (table sugar), a disaccharide, and such simple sugars as glucose (from the digestion of table sugar) and fructose (from fruit), and starches from sources such as cereal flour, rice, arrowroot, potato. The interaction of heat and carbohydrate is complex.
Long-chain sugars such as starch tend to break down into simpler sugars when cooked, while simple sugars can form syrups. If sugars are heated so that all water of crystallisation is driven off, then caramelization starts, with the sugar undergoing thermal decomposition with the formation of carbon, and other breakdown products producing caramel. Similarly, the heating of sugars and proteins elicits the Maillard reaction, a basic flavor-enhancing technique.
An emulsion of starch with fat or water can, when gently heated, provide thickening to the dish being cooked. In European cooking, a mixture of butter and flour called a roux is used to thicken liquids to make stews or sauces. In Asian cooking, a similar effect is obtained from a mixture of rice or corn starch and water. These techniques rely on the properties of starches to create simpler mucilaginous saccharides during cooking, which causes the familiar thickening of sauces. This thickening will break down, however, under additional heat.

Protein

Edible animal material, including muscle, offal, milk, eggs and egg whites, contains substantial amounts of protein. Almost all vegetable matter (in particular legumes and seeds) also includes proteins, although generally in smaller amounts. These may also be a source of essential amino acids. When proteins are heated they become denatured and change texture. In many cases, this causes the structure of the material to become softer or more friable - meat becomes cooked. In some cases, proteins can form more rigid structures, such as the coagulation of albumen in egg whites. The formation of a relatively rigid but flexible matrix from egg white provides an important component of much cake cookery, and also underpins many desserts based on meringue.

Cooking

Cooking is the process of preparing food by applying heat. Cooks select and combine ingredients using a wide range of tools and methods. In the process, the flavor, texture, appearance, and chemical properties of the ingredients can change.

Ingredients in cooking:

1. Protein
2. Fats
3. Water
4. Carbohydrates
5. Vitamins and Minerals

Cooking Methods:

1. Roasting
2. Baking
3. Boiling
4. Frying
5. Smoking
6. Microwaving 

Recipes

A recipe is a set of instructions that describe how to prepare or make something, especially a culinary dish.

Modern culinary recipes normally consist of several components

* The name (and often the locale or provenance) of the dish
* How much time it will take to prepare the dish
* The required ingredients along with their quantities or proportions
* Equipment and environment needed to prepare the dish
* An ordered list of preparation steps
* The number of servings that the recipe will provide
* the texture and flavor

Some recipes will note how long the dish will keep and its suitability for freezing. Nutritional information, such as calories per serving and grams of protein, fat, and carbohydrates per serving, may also be given.

Earlier recipes often included much less information, serving more as a reminder of ingredients and proportions for someone who already knew how to prepare the dish.

Recipe writers sometimes also list variations of a traditional dish, to give different tastes of the same recipes.