Food preparation

The overview and topical guide on food preparation that follows is provided:

Cooking is one method of food preparation that can be used to make ingredients fit for ingestion or at least palatable.

Food preparation's essence

Food preparation entails selecting the necessary ingredients and correctly handling those ingredients to create the components of a meal.

• Art is a creative endeavor or discipline.
• Culinary art is the preparation and cooking of food.
• Skill - the learned ability to perform predetermined tasks with the least amount of time, energy, or both.
• The process of planning meals is known as meal preparation.

General food preparation ideas

preserved food

• A chef is someone who cooks professionally for other people. Although the term has come to refer to anyone who cooks for a living, it originally referred to a highly skilled professional who is proficient in all aspects of food preparation.
• Cookbook
• Cooking is the process of preparing food for consumption. It includes a wide range of methods, tools, and ingredient combinations used to improve the flavor or digestibility of food. To achieve the desired result, ingredients must be selected, measured, and combined in an orderly manner.
• Cooking oil
• Cooking weights and measures - includes common cooking conversions and equivalences.
• Eating  Flavor
• Food is anything solid or liquid that, when swallowed, digested, and assimilated in the body, provides it with essential substances known as nutrients and keeps it healthy. It is a basic human requirement. Food provides energy and promotes the growth and repair of tissues and organs.
• Food and cooking hygiene
• Foodborne illness
• Food preservation
• Ingredients
• International food terms - useful when reading about different countries' foods and recipes.
• Recipe Restaurant Staple food - a food that is "consistently consumed in sufficient quantities to constitute the dominant part of the diet and supply a significant proportion of energy and nutrient requirements."

• Food preparation methods

• Cooking over a low flame
• In-use use KitchenAid Stand Mixer
• Baking is the technique of cooking food for an extended period using dry heat acting by convection, typically in an oven, but it can also be done in hot ashes or on hot stones. Automatic baking is also possible with appliances such as the Rotimatic.
• Bread making at the Roscheider Hof Open Air Museum
• Blind baking is the process of baking pastry before adding a filling.
• Barbecuing is a method of cooking meat, poultry, and occasionally fish over a fire, smoking wood, or hot coals of charcoal.
• Grilling is a type of cooking that involves applying dry heat to the surface of food, usually from above or below. A grill, grill pan, or griddle may be used.
• Roasting is a cooking method that uses dry heat, whether from an open flame, an oven, or another heat source. Roasting usually results in caramelization or Maillard browning of the food's surface, which some consider to be a flavor enhancer.
• Rotisserie - meat is skewered on a spit - a long solid rod used to hold food while cooking over a fire in a fireplace or a campfire, or while roasting in an oven.
• Smoking is the flavoring, cooking, or preserving of food by exposing it to smoke from burning or smoldering plant materials, most commonly wood. Cold smoking only flavors the food while hot smoking cooks it.
• Searing is a technique used in grilling, baking, braising, roasting, sautéing, and other cooking methods in which the surface of the food (usually meat, poultry, or fish) is cooked at a high temperature, resulting in a caramelized crust.
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• Cooking with wet heat

• Water and other liquids
• Basting is the continued application of a liquid marinade or sauce during dry-heat cooking, most commonly when roasting meat.
• Boiling is the rapid vaporization of a liquid that occurs when it is heated to its boiling point, which is the temperature at which the vapor pressure of the liquid equals the pressure exerted on the liquid by the surrounding environmental pressure.
• Blanching is a cooking technique in which a food substance, usually a vegetable or fruit, is immersed in boiling water, removed after a brief, timed interval, and then immersed in iced water or placed under cold running water (shocked) to stop the cooking process.
• Braising is a combination cooking method that uses both moist and dry heat; typically, the food is seared at a high temperature and then finished in a covered pot with a variable amount of liquid, resulting in a specific flavor.
• Coddling is the process of heating food in water that is kept just below the boiling point.
• Infusion - the process of soaking plant matter, such as fruits or tea leaves, in a liquid, such as water or alcohol, to impart flavor into the liquid.
• Poaching is the process of gently simmering food in liquid, usually milk, stock, or wine.
• Cooking in a sealed vessel that does not allow air or liquids to escape below a preset pressure.
• Simmering - foods are cooked in hot liquids that are kept at or just below the boiling point of water[3], but higher than the poaching temperature.
• Steaming is the process of continuously boiling water so that it vaporizes into steam and transfers heat to the food being steamed, thus cooking the food.
• Double steaming is a Chinese cooking technique in which food is covered with water and placed in a covered ceramic jar, which is then steamed for several hours.
• Steeping is the saturation of a food (such as a herb) in a liquid solvent to extract a soluble ingredient into the solvent. For example, a cup of tea is made by steeping tea leaves in a cup of hot water.
• Stewing is the process of cooking food in liquid and serving it with the resulting gravy.
• Vacuum flask cooking

• Fry in oil

• Frying is a technique that originated in ancient Egypt around 2500 BC for cooking food in oil or another fat.
• Deep frying is the process of immersing food in hot oil or fat. Normally, this is done with a deep fryer or chip pan.
• Gently fry
• frying with salt in hot oil
• Pan frying is the process of cooking food in a pan with a small amount of cooking oil or fat to act as a heat transfer agent and to keep the food from sticking.
• frying under pressure
• Sautéing
• Deep frying
• frying in a skillet

Other cooking methods

• Chemical procedures

• Brining is a similar process to marination in which meat or poultry is soaked in brine before cooking.
• Ceviche
• Drying \sFermentation
• Marinatin
•  \Pickling
• Salting
• Seasoning
• Souring
• Sprouting
• Sugaring
• Board for cutting
• Dicing is the process of cutting an ingredient into uniformly sized cubes.
• Grating is the process of shredding an ingredient with a grater, such as vegetables or cheese.
• Julienning - the process of slicing an ingredient into very thin, long pieces, such as the thin carrots in salad mix.
• Mincing is the process of chopping an ingredient into very small pieces.
• Peeling is the process of removing the outer skin/covering of an ingredient, most commonly a fruit or vegetable.
• Shaving is the process of slicing an ingredient into thin strips.
• Chiffonade is the process of transforming an ingredient into ribbons.
• Kneading
• Milling
• Mixing entails combining several different ingredients to create something new; for example, mixing water, sugar, and lemon juice produces lemonade.
• Blending is the process of grinding or pureeing ingredients together using a spespecializedchine known as a blender.