Chill

Moreover, few skills teach us as much about the way food and cooking work than understanding the power of stopping or reversing the application of heat. It forces us to pay attention to the stages of cooking—learning how a vegetable goes from hard to tender to soft helps us stop its march to mush. We learn to envision a steak as it goes from soft to firm on the outside and soft on the inside to firm throughout and therefore overcooked. We learn to see and understand the power of “carryover cooking”: that food continues to cook well after it’s removed from the oven or pan, whether a leg of lamb or a custard. Ultimately we learn to have greater control over our food so that we’re more agile in the kitchen.