KEYS TO GOOD COOKING - MEATS

Meats are the flesh of land animals and birds. They’re especially satisfying foods: substantial, firm textured, mouthfillingly flavorful, rich in nourishing protein. Meaty. They’re often the centerpiece of a meal.

Meats are challenging to cook well because their protein fabric is both fragile and stubborn. They become appealingly juicy in a very narrow range of internal temperatures, roughly 130 to 150°F/55 to 65°C. During cooking, they can pass through that range and go from juicy to dry in just a minute or two. But some tough cuts actually need prolonged high heat just to become tender enough to chew. So the essential key to cooking meat well is knowing what kind of heat a particular cut needs, and how to strike a good balance between juiciness and tenderness.

Given meat’s special status, you’d think that any serious cook would make a point of knowing how to make the best of it. Alas, no. Many published recipes guarantee that meat will come out overcooked and dry. Less than diligent food authorities of all kinds, from TV personalities to trained chefs, offhandedly repeat old myths about meat that perpetuate misunderstanding and disappointing results.

There are also plenty of good meat recipes out there, and knowledgeable, reliable authorities on meat cooking. But in order to find them you have to be able to tell good from bad. So you need to become your own authority, at least for the basics.

It’s not hard. No matter what you read in recipes or hear pronounced by people who should know, keep these simple truths in mind:

• Searing meat does not seal in its juices, and moist cooking methods do not make meats moist. Juiciness depends almost entirely on how hot you cook the center of the meat. If it gets much hotter than 150°F/65°C, it will be dry.

• Meat overcooks quickly. Low heatslows cooking and gives you the greatest control over doneness.

• Most recipes can’t predict correct cooking times. There’s no substitute for checking meat doneness yourself, early and often.

Cook by these truths and you’ll be ready to make the best of any meats and meat recipes you choose.

MEAT SAFETY 

Like dairy products and eggs, meats are a favorite haunt for microbes that cause spoilage and illness. Unlike dairy products and eggs, meats are almost sure to carry significant numbers of these microbes. Some contamination is inevitable when living animals are slaughtered and their bodies are butchered into meat.

Microbes are always present on raw meat surfaces, even the freshest and finest quality, and usually with no obvious smell or visible sign. They’re normally not present in the meat interior, but may be if the meat has been cut into, and certainly will be if it has been ground up. Bacteria grow well on meat and can multiply quickly.

Meats carrying harmful bacteria cause many serious cases of illness every year.

Handle all meats with caution. Assume that any piece of raw meat may carry harmful bacteria.

Keep all raw and most prepared meats cold, as close as possible to the freezing point, 32°F/0°C. They won’t actually begin to freeze themselves until several degrees below this. Dry-cured sausages and hams can be kept at cool room temperature.

Isolate raw meat and its juices from contact with other foods.

Wash hands, knives, and cutting boards with warm, soapy water before and after handling raw meat.

Use a reliable thermometer to measure cooking and internal meat temperatures, and wash it between measurements. Meat color is not a reliable indicator of doneness.

Avoid contaminating cooked meats with marinades or sauces that were applied to raw or partly cooked meats. Reserve a portion of the liquid for serving with the cooked meat, or reheat it to at least 160°F/70°C.

Meats made safe by cooking are usually not the most delicious meats. Temperatures high enough to kill harmful bacteria quickly also dry the meat out. Temperatures low enough to leave meat juicy don’t necessarily kill harmful bacteria.

To prepare meat safely for people who are especially vulnerable, heat its surfaces to the boil or to temperatures high enough to brown, and its center to at least 155°F/68°C, a temperature that effectively eliminates harmful bacteria in 15 seconds. Prepared cold cuts and hot dogs are potential carriers of listeria bacteria; to be safest, heat them until they’re steaming hot.

To prepare juicier meats and take the usual precautions and chances, keep meats cold, handle them with clean hands and utensils, and cook them to the doneness you prefer.

To prepare juicier meats and take more time and trouble to make them safer than usual, hold them at juicy temperatures long enough for the lower heat to kill most bacteria.

For a rare interior, cook until the center reaches 130°F/55°C, and hold that temperature for 90 minutes. For medium-rare, cook to 135°F/57°C and hold for 40 minutes. For medium, cook to 140°F/60°C and hold for 15 minutes.

To prepare safe raw meat dishes or quick-cooked ground meats — steak tartare, carpaccio, rare hamburgers — cut or grind your own low-microbe meat.

• Start with a large, intact piece of meat, whose interior is likely to be microbe-free.

• Immerse the meat completely in rapidly boiling water for 30 to 60 seconds to kill bacteria on its surfaces. Remove the meat with clean utensils.

• Plunge the meat in an ice-water bath for 1 minute to stop the cooking, then remove it and blot it dry.

• Immediately prepare the meat with clean hands, knives, cutting boards, and grinders.

• Keep the meat very cold until you’re ready to cook or serve it.

To save leftover cooked meats, refrigerate them as soon as possible. Don’t leave cooked meat out at room temperature for more than 4 hours, less if it’s especially warm. Discard any meats or sauces inadvertently left out overnight. To keep cooked meat for more than a day or two, freeze it wrapped airtight.

To serve leftover cooked meats as safely as possible, reheat them quickly to an internal temperature of 160°F/70°C, and bring sauces and gravies to a boil. Reheat in covered containers to prevent evaporation from cooling the upper surfaces.

SHOPPING FOR MEAT 

Fresh meats are available in a wide range of quality levels and prices, from a number of different production systems, and from convenience stores, supermarkets, gourmet markets, and butcher shops. If you want to know where your meats come from and how to get the best from them, shop around and find a butcher who’s passionate about quality.

Commodity meats in supermarkets come from standardized animals bred for productivity rather than quality, raised in crowded factory operations on agricultural by-products, antibiotics, and growth-stimulating hormones. They’re inexpensive, but generally have the least flavor and are most prone to becoming dry and tough when cooked.

Specialty meats, including organic, grass-fed, and heritage meats, often come from less common breeds that have been developed for the quality of their meat, and that have been raised in smaller operations with whole feeds and little or no manipulation of their growth rate. They’re often older and more flavorful than commodity meats. Game meats — venison, buffalo, ostrich — come from undomesticated but farm-raised animals and usually have much less muscle fat. Because they’re more expensive, specialty meats may sit longer in the display case and lose their quality advantage.

USDA beef grades provide an indication of potential flavor and tenderness, based on the general quality of a carcass and on the amount of fat dispersed within the meat tissue. “Prime” is the highest grade, scarce and expensive, “choice” the more common good-quality grade, and “select” the grade for ordinary quality.

Dry-aged beef is hung unprotected in a cold room for several weeks, a period that evaporates moisture, tenderizes, and intensifies flavor, and increases production costs and price. Wet-aged beef has been held in shrink-wrap for several weeks. It also becomes more tender and somewhat more flavorful, but doesn’t develop the same intensity as dry-aged beef.

Judge and choose fresh meats by appearance. For a given cut of meat, the darker the color, the more flavorful it will be. Marbling, white streaks of fat in the red or pink meat, will make it moister and richer, as will abundant white fat particles in ground meats. For good hamburgers, look for ground beef with 20 percent fat.

For fresh meats with the best flavor, have them cut or ground to your order, and cook them promptly. Large and bone-in pieces will lose less moisture when cooked than small or boned pieces with more cut surfaces.

Precut meats, either exposed in the display case or packaged in a plastic tray, have a large surface area exposed to the air, light, and bacteria, and develop off flavors in a day or two. Avoid meats that are brown at the edges, or gray instead of pink, red, or purplish.

Among packaged and frozen meats, choose those with the latest sell-by date, and with no dark or off-color patches.

Vacuum-packed “primal” cuts—whole roasts, racks, legs—have been minimally handled and are enclosed in airtight plastic wrap. They keep for several weeks in the refrigerator. Their purple color will bloom to red when meat meets air.

Avoid vacuum-packed ground beef for hamburgers. Vacuum packing tightly compresses the beef particles, and this produces a dense, pasty-textured hamburger. Vacuum-packed ground meat is also more likely to come directly from a packer who combines scraps from many carcasses, a practice that raises the risk of contamination with E. coli. Grind your meat yourself, or have your butcher grind it for you fresh.

Prepared meats are often lower-quality cuts dressed up with added flavorings. Check ingredient lists.

Check the labels of “enhanced” fresh meats packaged in marinade and “self-basting” turkeys. You’re likely to be paying meat prices for the substantial amount of injected salt water. Bacon with added water from brine-curing shrinks much more when cooked than dry-cured bacon.

To make chickens with crisp skin, choose dry-processed or kosher poultry, preferably not shrink-wrapped. Their skin is noticeably thinner and crisps faster because it hasn’t been plumped with water.

Put fresh meats in your cart just before you check out. If it takes more than a few minutes to get back to the kitchen refrigerator, transport them in a cooler.

STORING MEATS

Most meats are at their best the moment we buy them, and gradually decline in quality until we cook them. Beef is an exception; its flavor and tenderness can benefit from a week or more of aging in the home refrigerator.

Age cuts of beef in the refrigerator sealed in their plastic vacuum pack, or exposed and loosely covered on a rack to allow evaporation of their moisture. Choose large cuts for exposed aging, to allow for the trimming and loss of dried and rancid surface patches.

The enemies of meat quality are oxygen and light, which turn fats rancid; microbes, which produce off flavors; and warm temperatures, which encourage the other two.

Keep meats in the coldest corner of the refrigerator. Store shrink-wrapped or freshly wrapped cuts unopened. For cuts sold in plastic trays, remove them and blot dry with paper towels before rewrapping tightly in fresh plastic wrap.

Use fresh meats promptly, within a few days, and ground meats within a day or two. Large cuts of meats with hard fats — beef, lamb — keep longest.

Freeze meats to keep them longer than a few days, but don’t wait days before freezing them. Beef keeps for up to a year, pork for 6 months, poultry for 3 months.

Freezing does its own damage to meat quality. It forms ice crystals that puncture the meat cells and cause fluid loss. Dry freezer-temperature air causes “freezer burn,” surface drying that toughens and creates off flavors.

To minimize freezing damage, freeze fast to minimize ice crystal size, and wrap meats tight with no air pockets. Set your freezer as cold as possible. If possible, divide the meat into small portions that freeze faster, and set in the freezer unwrapped. Once frozen, wrap the meats in several tight layers of plastic wrap and a final opaque layer of foil or paper.

PREPARING MEATS FOR COOKING 

The first step in preparing raw meat is to bring it out of storage and refresh it. Thaw frozen meat very gradually and gently in the refrigerator — large cuts can take several days — or much faster in a bowl of ice water. Don’t thaw in hot water or at room temperature, which favors the growth of microbes. Meats can be cooked directly from the freezer, but it requires more time and a low cooking temperature to avoid overcooking the outside while the inside warms up.

Examine the meat, and clean and trim it as necessary. Remove it from the packaging and smell it. If there’s an off smell, rinse the surface thoroughly, or briefly blanch it in boiling water. Scrape or cut away patches discolored by long exposure to air. Blot the surface dry.

Rinse poultry thoroughly, especially the body cavity of whole birds, and blot dry. Once meat is cleaned, it’s often pretreated before cooking to improve its flavor or texture.

Warming meat to room temperature and even higher reduces the cooking time and helps cook more evenly. Give steaks and chops an hour on the countertop, larger cuts more time.

Flavoring with spice rubs and pastes imbues the meat surface with intense flavors.

Leave only sparing amounts of rubs and pastes on meats during cooking, except in low-temperature, long-time cooking or Cajun-style blackening. Herbs and spices scorch at roasting and grilling temperatures. To prevent pastes from simply drying out on lean cuts, include some oil or fat.

Salting is the simple application of salt to meat surfaces. At first salt draws some moisture out, but then it diffuses into the meat interior, seasoning it and improving its ability to retain moisture and tenderness when cooked. Salt diffusion is very slow, and can take days to reach the center of a roast. Even when smaller cuts are salted many hours in advance of cooking, the surface portions will be saltier than the interior.

Brining is the immersion of meat in a weak solution of salt and water, with or without other flavorings, for hours to days before cooking. Injecting brine into the meat interior speeds the process. The salt penetrates the meat, seasons it, and improves its ability to retain moisture and tenderness.

Brines of a certain strength, 5 to 10 percent salt by weight, also cause the meat proteins to absorb extra water from the brine, making the meat seem exceptionally juicy when cooked. Very lean poultry and pork can benefit from this extra moisture, especially when they’re overcooked.

Brine selectively. Brines have drawbacks: they dilute the meat’s own flavorful juices with tap water, and usually make the pan juices too salty for deglazing into a sauce.

Marinading is the immersion of meat in acidic liquids, often wine based, to flavor and tenderize it. Marinades penetrate meat very slowly, so their effects are usually limited to the surface layers unless they’re injected deeper into the meat. Acids do weaken meat proteins, but the result is often mealy rather than tender. More helpfully, they reduce the formation of carcinogenic substances on the meat surface during roasting and grilling.

To make a wine marinade, simmer the wine for a few minutes to reduce the alcohol, which has a drying effect on meat. Let the marinade cool before adding the meat.

Tenderizing is a method that weakens the protein structures of the meat and makes it easier to cut and chew when it’s cooked. “Tenderizers” are protein-digesting enzymes from various plants, which break the long protein molecules into smaller pieces, and can weaken both muscle fibers and tough connective tissue. They’re sold in powdered form, but are also present in fresh pineapple, ginger, kiwi fruit, and figs.

Don’t rely on tenderizers to tenderize tough meat, especially before cooking. They don’t penetrate meat on their own, so they work very unevenly, just at the surface or where they’re injected. They’re most active as the meat heats up during cooking, and stop working at temperatures above about 160°F/70°C.

To tenderize meat most effectively, break up its structure physically. Pound thin cuts gently with a mallet or pan bottom. Cut the fibers in a thicker cut with a Jaccard, a device with an array of small, sharp blades.

Grinding is a method that breaks the meat down into tiny pieces that can be pressed back together into a more tender mass.

To grind meats for sausages, hamburgers, and similar foods:

• Use a meat grinder or, if necessary, a food processor.

• Prechill the meats, grinder or processor blade, and bowl in the freezer to prevent the meat and fat from softening into a paste.

• Process the meat in short pulses, stopping every few to scrape down the sides of the bowl.

• For a moist-cooked sausage or hamburger, include pieces of fat to make a total of about 20 percent fat in the mix, about 3 to 4 ounces per pound/200 grams per kilogram.

TENDER MEAT AND TOUGH MEAT 

To cook meat well, it helps to know why some meats start out tender and others tough, and what kind of cooking is best for each. Standard roasts, steaks, and chops come from muscles that move the animal. “Variety meats,” or offal, are its internal organs and skin.

Tenderness and toughness are textures created by the meat fibers and connective tissue.

Meat fibers are the long, threadlike bundles of meat cells whose proteins make the body move. They’re about one-third protein and two-thirds water.

Raw meat fibers are chewy and mushy. Moderate heat firms their proteins, which makes them easier to chew and releases their water to make them juicy. High heat hardens the proteins and dries them.

Connective tissue is the physical harness that surrounds and connects individual cells, cell bundles, and whole muscles. Connective tissue is tough collagen protein, especially tough in beef, which comes from older, larger animals than veal or lamb or pork or chicken.

Raw connective tissue is chewy and tough. Moderate heat softens and partly dissolves it into gelatin over the course of many hours. High heat softens and dissolves it in an hour or two.

Fat tissue, the light patches interspersed among the meat fibers, contributes to their apparent tenderness and moistness.

There are two general categories of meats: tender and tough.

Tender meats have little connective tissue, and come from muscles that don’t get used very much, along the back and sides. They include the loins of cattle, pigs, and lambs and the breasts of birds. Liver is a tender offal meat.

Tough meats have a lot of connective tissue and come from hard-working muscles, especially legs and shoulders. Tripe (stomach) and tongue are tough offal meats.

Tender meats are best cooked just to a moderate temperature at which they’re juicy and tender.

Tough meats are best cooked long enough to dissolve their connective tissue and make them tender. This can take a few hours at high fiber-drying temperatures, a full day at moist-fiber temperatures.

MEAT DONENESS

Meat doneness is a set of qualities by which we define different stages of cooking. It’s a combination of moistness and, in red meats, chewiness and color. Each of these qualities is caused by the meat’s sensitive molecules, the fiber proteins. As the fibers heat up, their proteins stick to each other tighter and tighter, become firmer and firmer, and release more and more moisture until the moisture runs out.

In tough meats, chewiness also depends on the connective tissue proteins. The following descriptions apply most directly to tender steaks, chops, and roasts.

Raw meat is soft but chewy, and the moisture is trapped in the fibers and pasty.

Rare meat is firmer and easier to chew, and the moisture is free and juicy.

Medium meat is even firmer but still easy to chew, and the moisture is still free and juicy.

Well-done meat is very firm, becoming hard, and the moisture is gone.

It takes only a few degrees to go from firm and juicy to hard and dry, a transition that begins at around 150°F/65°C. When meat is cooking, its inner temperature may be rising several degrees every minute.

To get the meat doneness you want, check it early and often.

DONENESS AND COOKED QUALITIES OF TENDER MEAT CUTS

Judge doneness by cutting into the meat to check the color; by inserting a thermometer into the meat to measure its temperature at the center; or by pressing on the meat to check its firmness, which increases with doneness. Judging by touch takes practice. A good model for rare, medium, and well done is the firmness of the muscle on the back of the hand between the thumb and the first finger when it’s relaxed, extended, and clenched.

Don’t judge doneness by color alone. Well-done birds are sometimes persistently pink-fleshed and red at the bone, underdone ground meats are sometimes brownish, and vacuum-packed meats slowly change color when they’re cut and exposed to oxygen.

THE ESSENTIALS OF COOKING MEATS 

The keys to cooking meats well are attentiveness and careful temperature control. Meats can overcook and dry out in minutes.

Don’t rely on recipe cooking times or simple formulas to guarantee a good result. Recipes can’t account for significant changes in cooking time caused by small variations in meat thickness, temperature, and the temperature of grills and ovens and pans.

Bring most meats to room temperature or even warmer before cooking. This reduces cooking times and the usual surface overcooking while the inside heats through. But cook thin cuts directly from the refrigerator, to give the surface time to brown.

Cook meats in large pieces and on the bone to retain the most moisture and flavor. The more meat is cut up, the more surfaces it has through which juices will get squeezed out.

Cook most meats in two stages. An initial dose of very high heat kills surface bacteria and browns and flavors the meat surface. A finishing period of low, carefully controlled heat cooks the meat through slowly and gently while preserving its moistness and tenderness. Keep the finishing cook-through as close as possible to the final inner temperature you want.

Check meat doneness early and often. If you’re using a thermometer, check its accuracy beforehand.

When cooking at high temperatures, stop when meat is still slightly underdone, by 5 to 10°F/3 to 5°C for steaks and chops, 15 to 20°F/7 to 10°C for large roasts. The hot surface will continue to heat the interior for some time.

To cook tender cuts so that they’re juicy, heat them to rare or medium rare, an inner temperature between 125 and 140°F/52 and 60°C.

Loin roasts, most steaks and chops, poultry breasts, including duck and squab, and ground meats are tender cuts. Chicken and turkey breasts are less juicy but more pleasing at slightly higher temperatures, around 150°F/65°C.

To cook tough cuts relatively quickly, so that they’re tender but dry and fibrous, heat them to an inner temperature of 180 to 200°F / 80 to 93°C. This common method will dissolve connective tissue into gelatin and produce tender meat in 2 to 12 hours, depending on the temperature and the cut. It works best with cuts rich in gelatin and fat, which can lend moistness to the dry meat fibers. These include pork shoulders, chuck roasts, and pork and beef cheeks.

To cook tough cuts so that they’re tender and their fibers retain some juiciness, heat them to an internal temperature of 140 to 160°F/60 to 70°C. This modern method will require cooking for 12 to 24 hours or more to dissolve connective tissue into gelatin and produce tender meat.

Cook ground meats, pâtés and terrines, and fresh sausages in the same manner as tender meats, briefly and moderately to retain juiciness. To make sure bacteria are killed throughout fresh sausages, poach them to an internal temperature of 140°F/60°C, hold that temperature for 30 minutes, then cool them briefly and flavor their surface quickly on the high heat of the grill or frying pan. Cooking isn’t necessary for cured or precooked sausages, or for prepared pâtés or terrines.

GRILLING AND BROILING 

Grilling and broiling expose meat to burning heat from flames or glowing coals or electrical elements. The high temperatures deeply brown or char the surface to create strong, distinctive flavors.

For maximum flexibility in grilling and broiling, divide the cooking into two stages. First cook the surface quickly with high heat, then cook the interior through more gently with low heat.

On the grill, arrange the coals or flames into two areas, one very hot and one moderately hot. Color the meat as desired over the very hot area, then finish cooking over the moderate area. Make the hot area too hot to hold your hand just above the grill for more than a second or two. The faster it can color the meat, the less time the meat interior spends being overcooked.

When broiling, use the oven to finish cooking meat through. First place the meat as close as possible to the broiler flame or electrical element and color the meat as desired on both sides. Then remove the pan from under the broiler and finish the cooking in a moderate oven.

Choose thick cuts for more flexibility in balancing flavor and juiciness. Thin cuts of ½ inch/1 centimeter or less cook through very quickly, often before the surface is browned.

Prewarm the meat so that it will cook more quickly and lose less moisture. Wrap steaks and chops watertight and immerse them in a pot of warm 100°F/40°C water for 30 minutes just before cooking.

Dry meat surfaces thoroughly before beginning to grill or broil so that they will start to brown immediately.

To prevent meat from sticking to the grill, keep the grill clean, preheat it well before cooking, oil the meat surface, and let the meat brown thoroughly before trying to turn it.

Flip steaks and chops frequently to cook them faster and more evenly. Turn the meat every minute or so, from the beginning if distinct grill marks aren’t necessary, otherwise during the low-heat finishing.

Handle hamburgers gently to maximize their tenderness and prevent disintegration during cooking. Salt the ground meat to extract protein and help the particles stick together. Press the meat into a disk as gently as possible, and allow it to set and firm in the refrigerator for a few hours. Don’t prewarm fragile patties, and don’t flip frequently.

Go easy on the charring. Deep browning and charring produce chemicals on the meat surface that damage DNA and increase cancer risk. To reduce carcinogen production, soak meats beforehand in an acidic marinade.

BARBECUING 

Barbecuing is a low-temperature method that heats foods for hours in an enclosed grill. The cooking is done mainly by hot, smoky air, not by direct strong heat from the coals or gas flames. It’s essentially slow baking in an outdoor oven.

Barbecuing is usually applied to large, tough cuts of meat — shoulders, ribs, briskets — that benefit from many hours of heating at 170 to 200°F/75 to 90°C to dissolve their connective tissue into gelatin and produce smoky, flavorful, falling-apart tender meat.

Keep the food as far as possible from coals or heating elements, whose direct heat radiation can overcook it very quickly. Small backyard grills often don’t have enough room to protect the food from excessive heat radiation. Use them briefly at the beginning or end to give smoky flavors to the food, but place it in an oven for the long hours of slow cooking.

Check the cooking temperature frequently. Have a reliable thermometer to check the air temperature inside the enclosure, and make sure that it doesn’t rise much above 200°F/90°C for more than a few minutes (as when replenishing coals), or fall below 170 to 180°F/75 to 80°C (which will greatly slow cooking). Aim for 160 to 170°F/70 to 75°C inside the meat.

Frequent basting, or “mopping,” with flavorful liquids slows the cooking significantly. Opening the grill interrupts the heating process, the basting liquid temporarily cools the food surface, and its moisture continues to cool the surface in the grill by evaporating.

Toward the end of cooking, baste with fresh liquid and utensils to avoid contaminating the cooked meat with bacteria from the raw meat.

ROTISSERIE COOKING

Rotisserie cooking is a method of cooking meats with repeated brief periods of heat radiation. The rotisserie is a rotating spit mechanism. The meat is impaled on the spit, a long metal rod, and the mechanism constantly turns the spit next to or above flames, coals, or an electric heating element.

Rotisserie cooking has two valuable features. It alternates a few seconds of exposure to high flavor-producing heat with longer periods of cooling down, so that the surface browns but the meat interior can heat through gently and gradually without overcooking. And it concentrates flavorful juices at the meat surface by causing them to cling and spread as the food turns, rather than dripping away.

Use a rotisserie in the open air or in an oven with the door left open. It’s most effective when the meat can cool significantly as it turns away from the heat source. In a closed oven, the meat simply bakes and can quickly overcook. Outdoors it’s best for the fire or coals to be alongside the rotisserie rather than directly below it, to avoid flare-ups and enveloping heat from rising hot air.

OVEN ROASTING 

Oven roasting heats meats relatively slowly, by means of hot air and radiation from the oven walls, at temperatures ranging from 200 to 500°F / 90 to 260°C. It’s used mainly for large cuts that take 30 minutes or more to heat through. The prolonged dry heat produces brown, flavorful surfaces on the meat and juices in the pan.

Choose oven temperatures according to the cut of meat and your cooking and eating preferences. In general the larger the roast, the lower you should set the oven temperature, so that the outside doesn’t overcook while the inside cooks through.

Low oven temperatures, below 300°F/150°C, cook roasts through slowly and evenly, but also are slow to brown the surface and crisp poultry skin.

Use low temperatures for large or tough roasts that will cook for hours, or to cook any roast through after an initial period of high heat to brown the surface.

High oven temperatures, above 400°F/200°C, brown and cook through quickly, but overcook the outer portions while the center gets to the proper temperature, can quickly overcook the center, and can scorch pan drippings. They require close monitoring.

Use high oven temperatures for chickens and other small roasts that cook through in less than an hour, or for an initial browning followed by low-temperature roasting to finish.

To stop valuable pan drippings from scorching in a hot oven, carefully pour enough water into the pan to cover the bottom and remoisten the drippings. Repeat as necessary.

Use moderate oven temperatures, around 350°F/175°C, to brown and cook moderately quickly and evenly, and without the close attention required by high temperatures.

Convection fans speed surface drying, browning, and cooking through by blowing the hot oven air onto the meat surface, and can cause scorching at ordinary oven temperatures. To avoid scorching, reduce nonconvection roasting temperatures by 25 to 50°F / 15 to 30°C, and check browning often.

Don’t trust the timings in recipes. There are too many unpredictable variables for them to be reliable. Among them are these useful adjustments:

Basting with a water-based liquid will slow browning and cooking through, because it interrupts the heating and cools the roast surface by evaporation.

Prerubbing a roast with oil or butter will speed browning and cooking through. Fat limits evaporation and the cooling it causes.

Roasting pans and tents of foil slow cooking by blocking heat radiation from oven surfaces. If the roast sits directly on the pan, not raised up on a rack, the roast bottom will fry, and brown faster than the other surfaces. A deep pan will slow the heating of the roast sides unless the rack raises the roast above the pan walls.

Remove the roast from the oven several degrees early, 5 to 10°F/3 to 5°C for a small roast, 15 to 20°F/7 to 10°C for a large one, if you’re cooking at moderate to high oven temperatures. Residual heat near the surface will continue to raise the temperature of the center.

Let the roast rest for at least 30 minutes before carving, and preferably until the center temperature has cooled to 120 to 130°F/50 to 55°C. The meat will retain more of its juices when cut. Cover the roast loosely with foil to prevent the surface from getting too cool.

Whole birds are a challenge to roast well. Their breast meat is low in connective tissue and best cooked to 150°F/65°C for chickens and turkeys, 135°F/57°C for ducks and squab, but their leg meat is high in connective tissue and best cooked to 160°F/70°C, and their skin is best cooked to 350°F/175°C to make it crisp and brown.

To obtain moist breast and tender leg meats:

• Don’t stuff the body cavity or rely on a pop-up thermometer. Stuffing must be heated to 160°F/70°C to kill bacteria, so the breast meat will be overcooked and dry. Pop-up indicators pop only when the breast meat is already overcooked.

• Don’t truss the legs. Trussed legs look neater but take longer to cook through, and longer cooking makes it even more likely that the breast will be overcooked.

• Prewarm the legs. Let the bird and legs sit at room temperature for an hour with a bag of crushed ice keeping the breast cold.

• Start the bird breast down in the roasting pan to slow its cooking. Turn it and cook breast up just long enough to brown the breast skin.

• Baste the breast with stock or another water-based liquid, or put a foil tent loosely over the breast, to slow its cooking.

To obtain a crisp skin:

• Start with a kosher or halal bird or one labeled “air-chilled,” which is not soaked in water during processing.

• Predry the skin by cleaning the bird the day before and leaving uncovered on a rack in the refrigerator.

• Oil the skin, and don’t baste with a water-based liquid.

• Cook in a hot oven. Prebrown quail, squab, and other small birds in a frying pan, and then cook through in the oven.

• Cut the skin from the bird as soon as it’s done, to separate it from the steaming meat underneath.

To salvage overdone breast meat, pull it into shreds and bathe in pan juices.

FRYING, PAN ROASTING, AND SAUTÉING 

Frying and sautéing are methods that transmit heat from a metal pan through a thin layer of fat or oil. They can brown and flavor meat surfaces very quickly, in a minute or less.

Frying is the general method of pan cooking steaks, chops, and other large pieces of meat. It’s best suited to flat tender cuts, or to browning tough cuts that will go on to be slowly braised.

Pan roasting is a convenient and effective hybrid of frying and oven roasting. It quickly browns the meat on the stove top in a frying pan, then transfers the pan to the oven, which heats the meat through from all sides more gradually and evenly.

Sautéing and stir-frying are methods for frying small pieces of meat that move the pieces frequently to color all surfaces and cook them through evenly.

The key to effective frying and sautéing is to keep the pan hot enough to sizzle constantly. Sizzling is the sound of the meat’s moisture vaporizing as it hits the pan. If the pan temperature is too low, the moisture will accumulate, sizzling and browning will stop, and the meat will boil. By the time the moisture cooks away and browning resumes, the meat will be overcooked. To keep the pan hot enough to fry:

• Dry the meat of excess surface moisture.

• Preheat the pan alone to 400 to 450°F/200 to 230°C, then add the fat or oil. Oil heated up along with the pan is more likely to get gummy and cause sticking.

• Cook the meat in small, uncrowded batches. Too much meat will cool the pan down.

• Adjust the heat to maintain a constant sizzle of rapid water vaporizing.

• Leave the pan uncovered, or use a perforated spatter guard, so the water vapor won’t condense back into the pan.

If sizzling and browning do stop, remove the meat from the pan, raise the heat, and add the meat back when the liquid has evaporated.

To brown faster and more evenly, press meat with a spatula or weigh it down with a heavy pan or foil-wrapped brick, to force contact with the pan surface. Don’t worry, pressing won’t make the meat less juicy. When you turn the meat, start the second side on a part of the pan that had been unoccupied. Move the meat occasionally to make full use of the pan surface.

To avoid overcooking, check the pan side of the meat often. As soon as it has browned, turn the meat. Then check the meat interior often. As soon as it’s done, remove the meat from the pan.

• For thick cuts, lower the burner heat after the second side browns and then turn frequently, every minute or two, or move the pan into a moderate oven, where less efficient heat transfer will cook gently.

POACHING, CONFITS, AND LOW-TEMPERATURE COOKING

Poaching is a method that cooks tender meats by immersing them in a hot liquid below the boiling point, usually between 130 and 180°F/55 and 80°C.

To produce moist poached meats, cook at low temperatures. Start with the poaching liquid near the boil for a few seconds to kill bacteria on the meat surface, then quickly lower the liquid temperature and finish cooking tender cuts at 130°F/55°C for rare, 140°F/60°C for medium, 150°F/65°C for well done.

A meat confit is made by presalting and seasoning a tough cut of meat overnight, then poaching it for hours in that meat’s fat, and storing the meat covered with the fat. Duck legs and gizzards are an example. Traditional confits often call for temperatures close to the boil, 190 to 200°F / 85 to 93°C, produce tender but fibrous meat, and would be kept for months at cool temperatures while their flavor developed.

To produce moister, less fibrous confits, poach them at 160 to 180°F / 70 to 80°C until a fork easily penetrates them. Low heat is slower to tenderize, so cooking times will be longer.

To keep a confit for weeks, remove the meat from its juices to a fresh pot, pour off the fat onto the meat and bring it to 160°F/70°C, then cool and refrigerate.

Low-temperature cooking heats meat at the temperature that corresponds to the particular doneness you want in the meat. It’s carried out in a water oven or a pot of water whose temperature is maintained either manually by the cook, or automatically by an immersion circulator. It produces meat that is evenly and perfectly cooked throughout, and that remains that way for hours without any risk of drying out or toughening.

Low-temperature heating also makes it possible to cook shoulder meat, brisket, short ribs, and other tough cuts as if they were tender cuts, to a juicy medium rare instead of well done. Medium-rare temperatures will dissolve the tough connective tissue if they’re held steadily for a full day or two.

The disadvantage of low-temperature cooking is that it doesn’t create the rich, savory surface flavors that high-temperature frying and grilling do.

To get the best of both low- and high-temperature cooking, heat meats in the water bath until they’re done, allow them to cool somewhat, and then quickly sear them over very high heat just long enough to flavor the surfaces and reheat the interior.

Tender meats are typically cooked in a water bath at 130 to 140°F / 55 to 60°C for an hour or so before searing.

Tough meats can be cooked in a water bath at 135 to 150°F/58 to 65°C for 48 hours or more.

Understand and avoid the potential hazards of low-temperature cooking. Low cooking temperatures are slower to kill the bacteria that cause foodborne illness, and tight wrapping makes it possible for botulism bacteria to grow. Use recipes that explain the hazards, and follow their instructions exactly. In general, it’s simplest and safest to serve foods cooked at low temperatures immediately.

To cook meats at low temperatures:

• Heat the water oven or a large pot of water up to the temperature that corresponds to the desired doneness: 130°F/55°C for rare, 140°F/60°C for medium, and so on.

• Seal the meat in a plastic Ziplock storage bag, pressing out as much air as possible by immersing it in the water just up to the zipper and then zipping it; or vacuum-pack using a home vacuum-packing machine.

Immerse the bag in the water and heat until the meat is cooked through to the desired texture. Low temperatures heat slowly, so allow more time than usual: an hour or so for steaks and chops, for example.

• Make sure that the bag remains fully immersed in the cooking water and surrounded by it. Air and vapor pockets in a bag can cause it to float, and water flow or crowding can push bags against each other or the pot sides.

• If you’re not using a water oven or circulator, stir the water regularly, monitor the temperature frequently with an accurate digital thermometer, and heat or add hot water as necessary to maintain it. Be very careful not to let the water fall below 130°F/55°C and into the microbe growth zone. For long unattended cooking, especially tough cuts that cook for many hours, experiment with your oven to find a thermostat setting that will keep the covered pot at the correct temperature.

Sous-vide cooking is a restaurant version of low-temperature cooking in which the meats are vacuum-packed in plastic bags. Vacuum packing in a professional chamber machine can speed the infusion of marinades and other flavors into meat, and removes all air from the package, so that the meat heats more evenly and can be kept longer after cooking. Household vacuum-packaging machines don’t create a strong enough vacuum to infuse foods, can’t be used with liquid ingredients, and leave some air in the package.

BRAISING AND STEWING

Braising and stewing are methods that cook meat in a water-based liquid that will become its sauce. An initial frying browns the meat and deepens the overall flavor.

Many braise and stew recipes call for temperatures near the boiling point, which will badly dry out all but the fattiest or most gelatinous cuts of meat.

Beware of recipes that call for an oven temperature over 180°F/80°C. Never let a braise or stew get hot enough to bubble when the meat is cooking. A closed pot in an oven at any temperature above the boiling point will come to the boil. At oven temperatures above 180°F/80°C, leave the pot open to allow evaporative cooling and produce a lower cooking temperature.

To braise or stew tough cuts of meat in a few hours, heat them at 180°F/80°C. They will develop the fibrous tenderness of standard braises and stews. To braise or stew tender cuts quickly, or tough cuts over a day or more to keep them more moist and less fibrous, heat them at 140 to 150°F/60 to 65°C.

Braise tender pieces of meat, including poultry breasts, gently and briefly. A piece of meat 1 inch/2.5 centimeters thick will be done in about 15 minutes of cooking, including browning time. If cooking breasts and legs, remove the breasts when done and keep warm while the legs finish.

To braise or stew:

• Keep the meat in large pieces to minimize cut surfaces.

• Brown the chilled meat quickly in a very hot pan to flavor the surfaces without cooking through. Dust the meat in flour first to provide a browned thickener for the sauce if desired.

• Add the cooking liquid and other ingredients and heat slowly to the cooking temperature. Presimmer any wine for 10 minutes to boil off some of its alcohol.

• Braise and stew in the oven whenever possible, not over a burner. Oven heat is more even.

• Keep the liquid at the cooking temperature and check meat doneness often.

• Once the meat is done, stop the cooking. If the liquid needs to be boiled down or thickened, or the vegetables softened, remove the meat first.

• Cool and store the meat in the liquid, some of which it will reabsorb.

When reheating a braise or stew, take care not to overcook it. Remove the meat, bring the liquid to a boil and toss the meat briefly in it, then remove from the heat and let the liquid temperature fall to 140°F/60°C. Hold it at that temperature until the meat is heated through.

SERVING MEATS 

Serving meats at their best calls for just as much care as the cooking.

Rest most meats, from steaks to large roasts, before cutting and serving. Just-cooked meats are soft and prone to lose more juices when cut immediately. Rest steaks for a few minutes, roasts for 30 minutes or more. Meats that have been cooked slowly at low temperatures can be served without resting.

Preheat plates to serve hot meat dishes, especially beef, veal, and lamb. As they cool below body temperature, meat fats congeal and the gelatin in connective tissue becomes solid and rubbery.

Cut meats with a sharp knife to avoid pressing down and squeezing out juices.

Carve meats across the direction of the fibers, or grain. This minimizes the length of the fibers in the mouth and makes the meat easier to chew. The grain changes direction in many steaks and roasts, so adjust the carving angle accordingly. Slice chewier cuts very thin.

Shred dry, overcooked meat instead of cutting it, and moisten the fibers with a sauce made intentionally thin and juicelike. Hold cooked meats at 130°F/55°C to prevent the growth of bacteria, especially if the meal will last for more than an hour or two.

LEFTOVERS 

Refrigerate or freeze leftovers as soon as possible after the meat is removed from the heat. Divide large quantities into smaller portions that will cool faster.

The quality of most cooked meat deteriorates in the refrigerator, even in a stew or other dish whose overall flavor may improve for a day or two. Freeze leftovers to keep them in good condition for more than a few days.

Duck and pork confits may be refrigerated for weeks because the flavor changes during storage and rewarming helps define them. To keep them that long without spoiling, be sure to free the meat of all cooking juices and immerse it completely in hot fat before chilling.

Minimize the meat’s exposure to air. Wrap separate pieces tightly in plastic wrap, and cover braised and stewed meats with their cooking liquid.

Reheating meat causes the development of stale “warmed-over” flavors, especially in poultry. Reheating above 140°F/60°C dries meat out.

Consider serving leftover meats cold. Chicken and turkey especially benefit from not being reheated.

Rewarm leftover meat as little as possible consistent with safety. Turn it briefly in a pan of boiling liquid—the liquid portion of a stew, for example, or some meat stock—to kill any bacteria on the surface, then heat the meat through gently.

By  Harold McGee in "Keys to Good Cooking", Penguin Press, New York, 2010, excerpts chapter 11. Adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.

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