Many chefs agree that the way to test if a potential hire is worth is salt is to have him cook the "perfect egg." But how does one do that? Gordon Ramsay and Mark Bittman have thoroughly different methods; they're both great instructor-chefs. Andy and I have got an experiment (see the pun now?) going on to test what methods really work best. Here's our chart for the results:
The "Gordon method" is illustrated in this link; the Bittman method is more typical in that eggs are scrambled before they hit the pan, in which the butter has been melted/oil has been heated already.
We decided (against our better [or worse?] judgment to only do the control this weekend. We'd thought about carrying the whole thing out at once, but we wanted to go out to dinner, and eating two dozen eggs between the two of us would probably foil that plan. Here are our Materials:
And here's me engaged in one of the Methods (the Gordon method):
Observations on the Bittman method: moderate degree of creaminess, light yellow, average fluffiness.
The results of the Gordon method were more grey in color and, while fluffy, also strangely granular in texture, not curdled, but granular. My current theory is that because the eggs are cooked over low heat while being moved around, they cook in teeny clumps.
Stay tuned for the rest of the eggsperiment, which will resume in three weeks when Andy once again visits New York!
I also made a loaf of Jim Lahey's no-knead bread, for which I had to remove the plastic handle from one of my pots. Thank you, neighbor, for your electric screwdriver.
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