The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science

Working in professional restaurant and test kitchens, MIT grad and chef López-Alt (managing culinary director, SeriousEats.com) learned to question "expert" cooking advice. In the vein of his James Beard Award-nominated column "The Food Lab" and previous writings for Cook's Illustrated magazine, his massive debut debunks false kitchen wisdom through rigorous scientific inquiry. Hugely informative yet not quite a textbook, this title uses humorous prose and more than 1,000 color images to relay the results of tireless experimenting with cooking temperatures, techniques, and tools. After trying López-Alt's perfected recipes for omelets (diner-style and Western), potatoes (fried, mashed, and hashed), meat loaves, and other popular foods, readers will undoubtedly emerge better cooks, with an arsenal of unconventional techniques that really work (e.g., salting eggs 15 minutes in advance of cooking for improved texture).