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Pro Chef Lessons for Home Cooks – Precision in the Kitchen and Why Size Matters. Copyright © 2022 Terence Carter / Grantourismo. All Rights Reserved. Dish from the Royal Mail Hotel, Dunkeld, Victoria, Australia.

Pro Chef Lessons for Home Cooks – Precision in the Kitchen and Why Size Matters

Pro chef lessons for home cooks – or travelling cooks if you’re cooking in a holiday house or apartment rental kitchen – is a subject I’ve been mulling over, so I thought I’d share some of the cooking tips I’ve picked up from the experts, starting with a lesson about precision.

Over the years, during the course of our work as travel and food writers, I’ve spent a lot of time with chefs in their restaurants, observing them at work, photographing their food, sitting down to do interviews, and even cooking in their kitchens.

I can’t recall who was the first chef we got to chew the fat with, because chatting to chefs after a meal was just something that Lara and I found ourselves naturally doing, often over a glass of wine or three, well before we began writing professionally about travel and food.

But some stand out: the night our fly-in-the-wall reporting at Reflets in Dubai resulted in me cooking dinner for chef Pierre Gagnaire (and learning the secret to his Côte de Bœuf); a couple of days spent with Rene Redzepi and his chefs Beau Clugston and Thomas Frebel in the kitchen at Nahm, Bangkok; the chef in Jordan who ended up taking us on a street food tour of Amman; and an afternoon spent with a Zen vegetarian chef in the calmest Michelin-starred kitchen ever in Milan.

I’ve always left those experiences and interviews, informal or otherwise, with a few pro chef lessons for home cooks that have stayed with me – expert tips that I’ve been able to put to use in our various home kitchens over the years.

I thought it time to share some of those pearls of cooking wisdom with you, starting with a lesson in precision in the kitchen and why size matters from chef Dan Hunter, one of the finest chefs cooking contemporary Australian cuisine.

Pro Chef Lessons for Home Cooks – Precision in the Kitchen and Why Size Matters

Increasingly in recent years, as part of a growing global movement to go organic and reduce food waste, both in professional and home kitchens, we’ve seen a return to using ‘ugly produce’, the imperfect vegetables of our childhoods, from a time before the supermarket giants decided every potato and carrot should look perfect.

I’ve also noticed a parallel trend in the food media – a shift away from following recipes by, somewhat ironically, recipe site editors who in their weekly newsletters encourage time-poor readers to whip up dishes with whatever’s in the fridge and throw together meals, tossing ingredients into a pressure cooker or chucking a chicken and vegetables into a roasting pan.

The image of the dish in their magazine or on their website is always of a big glistening chook surrounded by colourful rustic-looking vegetables, varying in size. The vegetables always look mouth-watering but how do they taste? They are probably unevenly cooked.

One of the things that distinguishes a great professional chef from a good home cook is precision – which goes against this trend, yet it is a perfect way to handle those imperfect ingredients we love so much.

When chefs make a mirepoix (in French) or a soffritto (in Italian), they painstakingly ensure that those finely chopped onions, carrots and celery are precisely the same size, because what that means is even cooking time for the ingredients. In the case of the soffritto, the ingredients virtually disappear in a ragù.

Which makes me think about how we cook ingredients more generally. Are those steaks or fillets of fish that we bought at the supermarket or market exactly the same size? And what about the vegetables, which, unless they’re genetically modified, probably won’t be the same shape or size.

We get some great pork here in Siem Reap. The chops are butchered with just the right amount of fat so that you can rest the chop upright on its bone end and render the best fat ever. There are a million uses for pork fat, too, such as helping to finish off the roasted potatoes that often accompany them.

Lara never likes to order pork chops in restaurants because they’re invariably overcooked. It’s true, because the window of temperature where the pork goes from being undercooked to becoming dry is quite narrow. As a result of my brining technique and experience at getting them just right, Lara asks for my brined pork chops almost as often as she asks for my ragu alla Bolognese.

With an order of pork chops for dinner from Lara, I often make a side salad of baby potatoes, rocket, and a classic vinaigrette dressing, along with some finely chopped pieces of fresh chorizo that I’ll also toss through the boiled potatoes, which I’ll finish cooking in a pan.

I tip the bag of baby potatoes into a colander and notice that they vary in size, so much that some of the spuds are no longer ‘babies’ – a few are the size of marbles, others closer to golf balls.

Immediately I think back to when we spent a few days with Australian chef Dan Hunter, when he was helming the restaurants at the Royal Mail Hotel in Dunkeld in the Grampians region of Victoria. These days Dan has the wonderful Brae, one of Australia’s best restaurants, which he opened in the Otway hinterland, 30 minutes from the coast and an hour and a half from Melbourne.

Back during his Royal Mail Hotel days, chef Dan had convinced the owners that they should establish a kitchen garden. This wasn’t just a little row of herbs in a window sill for garnish to be snipped just before service that we see a lot of these days – often the idea of a restaurant PR keen for a ‘kitchen garden’ talking point to promote a chef. This was a real kitchen garden concept that Dan and his team have taken much further at Brae.

The chef had already left a deep impression on me over a couple of days of master classes on Hamilton Island and a gala dinner we covered before staying and eating at the Royal Mail Hotel. I imprinted numerous gems of Dan’s on my memory that weekend. See this video from the weekend for a taste of how the chef works.

“Put your vegetables in your refrigerator and you’re already killing their natural flavour and mixing it with whatever other flavours are circulating in your modern day ice box,” he had said during the masterclass.

It was a revelation, and it was true. But how many of us can afford the acreage and have the time to grow a kitchen garden to be able to just saunter out at 5pm and pull up some carrots for dinner that night?

A restaurant like Brae can, because growing vegetables, fruit and herbs is part of the business model of the restaurant. It’s accounted for in the price of the menu because of the enormous amount of farming and gardening they do to serve these amazing ingredients in the beautiful dishes placed in front of you.

Back at the Royal Mail Hotel, I scanned the menu after setting up my camera in preparation for shooting the new seasonal menu. Dan had a dish on there that caught my attention: a ‘degustation’ of carrots. At the time, I thought he was of unsound mind. Who else, apart from Bugs Bunny, wants to eat a plate of carrots? On. Their. Own.

When the carrots arrived in the kitchen straight from the garden, the sous chef began sorting them and placing different sized carrots into different prep trays. I asked Dan why they were being separated.

“Because they take different amounts of time to cook,” he said, with a withering look. It was the kind of look I recognised receiving from chef David Thompson that conveyed that this was probably the stupidest question he’d ever been asked about cooking in a professional kitchen.

Later that night during dinner, the dish of carrots was a revelation. The plate was beautiful and these funky carrots with their different shapes, sizes and colours were cooked and seasoned to perfection.

I found myself scanning the room to observe the reactions of other diners when the dish arrived. Not long after looking quizzically at the dish in front of them, they had devoured everything on the plate and were sitting back with a smile. Just like Bugs Bunny.

Fast forward to my Siem Reap kitchen and staring at the baby potatoes in the colander. I know what I have to do. I get three kitchen trays and divide the potatoes by size. I boil a pot of salted water and put in the largest potatoes. I set a timer for seven minutes then plop in the smaller potatoes, and then set the timer again for five minutes, after which I slip in the marble-sized potatoes.

If you have a hungry family to feed and you’re going to make some mashed potatoes or throw some spuds in a slow cooker for a casserole, you’re not going to weigh each potato and calculate and monitor their individual cooking times.

But separating and timing different sized vegetables for a dish such as Dan Hunter’s plate of carrots is one way to let that delicious albeit imperfect organic produce you bought at the farmers market really shine.

That precision and level of detail is one significant factor that sets a professional kitchen apart from one at home and it’s one of those pro chef lessons for home cooks that will stay with you forever.

Although as I set the alarms on my iPad, I’m still not sure whether to thank Dan or curse him for it, but of course he’s right.

Have you learnt any pro chef lessons for home cooks that have stayed with you? Whether they’ve come from chatting to chefs, doing a cooking class or watching a cooking demo or show on Netflix, we’d love to hear from you. Feel free to share tips in the comments below.

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About Terence Carter

Terence Carter is an editorial food and travel photographer and infrequent travel writer with a love of photographing people, places and plates of food. After living in the Middle East for a dozen years, he settled in South-East Asia a dozen years ago with his wife, travel and food writer and sometime magazine editor Lara Dunston.

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Lara and Terence are an Australian-born, Southeast Asia-based travel and food writers and photographers who have authored scores of guidebooks, produced countless travel and food stories, are currently developing cookbooks and guidebooks, and host culinary tours and writing and photography retreats in Southeast Asia.
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Still looking for Christmas cooking inspo? Check o Still looking for Christmas cooking inspo? Check out our seafood recipe collection, especially if you celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve with a fish focused meal in the Southern Italian tradition, transformed by Italian-Americans into the Feast of the Seven Fishes, or like Australians, who celebrate Christmas in the sweltering summer, feast on seafood for Christmas Day lunch, we’ve got lots of easy seafood recipes for you.

Our recipes include a classic prawn cocktail, blini with smoked salmon, a ceviche-style appetiser, and devilled eggs with caviar. We’ve also got recipes for fish soup, seafood pies and pastas, salmon tray bake, and crispy salmon with creamy mashed potatoes.

You’ll find the recipes here: https://grantourismotravels.com/seafood-recipes-for-christmas-eve-and-christmas-day-menus/
(Link in bio if you’re seeing this on IG)

Merry Christmas if you’re celebrating!! 

#christmas #christmasfood #seafood #fish #recipes #christmasrecipes #foodstagram #foodblogger #food #foodlover #igfood #picoftheday #igfood #igfoodie #cooking #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #grantourismo #grantourismotravels #xmas #merrychristmas #happychristmas
If you’re still looking for food inspo for Chris If you’re still looking for food inspo for Christmas Eve or Christmas Day meals, my smoked salmon ‘carpaccio’ recipe is one of dozens of recipes in this compilation of our best Christmas recipes (link below). 

The Christmas recipe compilation includes collections of our best Christmas breakfast recipes, best Christmas brunch recipes, best Christmas starter recipes, best Christmas cocktails, best Christmas dessert recipes, and homemade edible Christmas gifts and more.

My smoked salmon carpaccio recipe makes an easy elegant appetiser that’s made in minutes. If you’re having guests over, you can make the dish ahead by assembling the salmon, capers and pickled onions, and refrigerate it, then pour on the dressing just before serving. 

Provide toasted baguette slices and bowls of additional capers, pickles and dressing, so guests can customise their carpaccio. And open the bubbly!

You’ll find that recipe and many more Christmas recipes here: https://grantourismotravels.com/best-christmas-recipes/ (link in bio if you’re seeing this on IG)

Merry Christmas!! X

#christmas #christmasfood #recipes #christmasrecipes #foodstagram #salmon #smokedsalmon #foodblogger #food #foodlover #igfood #picoftheday #igfoodie #cooking #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #recipedeveloper #writingacookbook #grantourismo #grantourismotravels 
#xmas #merrychristmas #happychristmas
If you haven’t visited our site in a while, I sh If you haven’t visited our site in a while, I shared a collection of recipes for homemade edible Christmas gifts — for condiments, hot sauces, chilli oils, a whole array of pickles, spice blends, chilli salt, furakake seasoning, and spicy snacks, such as our Cambodian and Vietnamese roasted peanuts. 

I love giving homemade edibles as gifts as much as I love receiving them. Who wouldn’t appreciate jars filled with their favourite chilli oils, hot sauces, piquant pickles, and spicy peanuts that loved-ones have taken the time to make? 

Aside from the gesture and affordability of gifting homemade edibles, you’re minimising waste. You can use recycled jars or if buying new mason jars or clip-top Kilner jars, you know they’ll get repurposed.

No need for wrapping, just attach some Christmas baubles or tinsel to the lid. I used squares of Cambodian kramas (cotton scarves), which can be repurposed as napkins or drink coasters, and tied a ribbon or two around the lids, and attached last year’s Christmas tree decorations to some.

You’ll find the recipes here: https://grantourismotravels.com/homemade-edible-christmas-gifts/ (link in bio if you’re seeing this on IG)

Yes, that’s Pepper... every time there’s a camera around... 

#christmasgiftideas #ediblegifts ##christmasfoodgifts #foodgifts #giftideas #homemadegifts #christmasfood #ediblegiftideas #hotsauce #chillisauce #sriracha #pickles #homemadepickles #recipes #foodstagram #foodblogger #food #foodlover #igfood 
#blackcat #blackcatsofinstagram #picoftheday 
#christmas #christmastree #xmas #merrychristmas #happychristmas #cambodia #siemreap
This crab omelette is a decadent eggs dish that’ This crab omelette is a decadent eggs dish that’s perfect if you’re just back from the fish markets armed with luxurious fresh crab meat. It’s a little sweet, a little spicy, and very, very moreish.

Our crab omelette recipe was one of our 22 most popular egg recipes of 2022 on our website Grantourismo and it’s no surprise. It’s appeared more times than any other egg recipes on our annual round-ups of most popular recipes since Terence launched Weekend Eggs when we launched Grantourismo in 2010.

If you’re an eggs lover, do check out the recipe collection. It includes egg recipes from right around the world, from recipes for classic kopitiam eggs from Singapore and Malaysia and egg curries from India and Myanmar to all kinds of egg recipes from Thailand, Japan, Korea, China, Mexico, USA, Australia, UK, and Ireland.

And do browse our Weekend Eggs archives for further eggspiration (sorry). We have hundreds of egg recipes from the 13 year-old series of recipes for quintessential egg dishes from around the world, which we started on our 2010 year-long global grand tour focused on slow, local and experiential travel. 

We’re hoping 2023 will be the year we can finally publish the Weekend Eggs cookbook we’ve talked about for years based on that series. After we can find a publisher for the Cambodia cookbook of course... :( 

Recipe collection here (and proper link to Grantourismo in our bio):
https://grantourismotravels.com/22-most-popular-egg-recipes-of-2022-from-weekend-eggs/

If you cook the recipe and enjoy it please let us know — we love to hear from you — either in the comments at the end of the recipe or share a pic with us here.

#recipe #recipes #eggs #eggslover #breakfasteggs #WeekendEggs #egg #breakfast #brunch #igfood #igfoodie #cooking #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood  #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #recipedeveloper #lookingforapublisher #writingacookbook  #grantourismo #grantourismotravels
I’m late to share this, but a few days ago Angko I’m late to share this, but a few days ago Angkor Archaeological Park, home to stupendous Angkor Wat, pictured, celebrated 30 years of its UNESCO World Heritage listing. 

That’s as good an excuse as any to put this magnificent, sprawling archaeological site on your travel list this year.

While riverside Siem Reap, your base for exploring Angkor is bustling once more, there are still nowhere near the visitors of the last busy high season months of December-January 2018-2019 when there were 290,000 visitors. 

Last month there were just 55,000 visitors and December feels a little quieter. A tour guide friend said there were about 150 people at Angkor Wat for sunrise a few days ago.

If you’re looking for tips to visiting Angkor, Siem Reap and Cambodia, just ask us a question in the comments below or check Grantourismo as we’ve got loads of info on our site. Click through to the link in the bio and explore our Cambodia guide or search for ‘Angkor’. 

And please do let us know if you’re coming to Siem Reap. We’d love to see you here x

#siemreap #cambodia #asia #travel #instatravel #traveldeeper #slowtravel #localtravel #experientialtravel #exploremore #neverstopexploring #goexplore #igtravel #angkorwat #angkor #temple #temples #angkorwithoutcrowds #unesco #unescoworldheritagesite #unescoworldheritage #archaeology #archaeologicalsite #traveladdict #beautifuldestinations #beautifulplaces #travelgram #wanderlust #picoftheday📷 #grantourismotravels.
Our soy ginger chicken recipe will make you sticky Our soy ginger chicken recipe will make you sticky, flavourful and succulent chicken thighs that are fantastic with steamed rice, Chinese greens or a salad, such as a Southeast Asian slaw. 

The chicken can be marinated for up to 24 hours before cooking, which ensures it’s packed with flavour, then it can be cooked on a barbecue or in a pan.

Terence’s soy ginger chicken recipe is one of our favourite recipes for a quick and easy meal. I love the sound of the sizzling thighs in the pan, and the warming aromas wafting through the apartment. 

It’s amazing how such flavourful juicy chicken thighs come from such a quick and easy recipe.

Recipe here (and proper link to Grantourismo in our bio): https://grantourismotravels.com/soy-ginger-chicken-recipe/

If you cook it and enjoy it please let us know — we love to hear from you — either here or in the comments at the end of the recipe on the site or share a pic with us x 

#recipe #recipes #chicken #soygingerchicken #asianfood #southeastasianfood #igfood #igfoodie #cooking #cookingtime #recipe #recipes #comfortfood #foodblog #food #foodstagram #healthyfood #instafood #healthy #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #recipedeveloper #writingacookbook #grantourismo #grantourismotravels
Who can guess the ingredients and what we’re mak Who can guess the ingredients and what we’re making with my market haul from Psar Samaki in Siem Reap — all for a whopping 10,000 riel (US$2.50)?! 

Birds-eye chillies thrown in for free! They were on my list but the seller I spent most at (5,000 riel!) scooped up a handful and slipped them into my bag. She was my last stop and knew what I was making.

My Khmer is poor, even after all our years in Cambodia, as I don’t learn languages with the ease I did in my 20s, plus I’m mentally exhausted after researching and writing all day. I have a better vocabulary of Old and Middle Khmer than modern Khmer from studying the ancient inscriptions for the Cambodian culinary history component of our cookbook I’m writing.

So when one seller totalled my purchases I thought she said 5,000 riel but she handed back 4,500 riel! The sum total of two huge bunches of herbs and kaffir lime leaves was 500 riel.

Tip: if visiting Siem Reap, use Khmer riel for local shopping. We’ve mainly used riel since the pandemic started— rarely use US$ now as market sellers quote prices in riels, as do local shops and bakeries, and I tip tuk tuk drivers in riels. I find prices quoted in riels are lower.

Psar Samaki is cheaper than Psar Leu, which is cheaper than Psar Chas, as it’s a wholesale market, which means the produce is fresher. I see veggies arriving, piled high in the back of vehicles, with dirt still on them — as I did on this trip. 

The scent of a mountain of incredibly aromatic pineapples offloaded from the back of a dusty ute was so heady they smelt like they’d just been cut. More exotic European style veggies arrive by big trucks in boxes labelled in Vietnamese (from Dalat) and Mandarin (from China), such as beautiful snow-white cauliflower I spotted.

Note: the freshest produce is sold on the dirt road at the back of the market.

#cambodia #siemreap #foodwriter #foodblogger #foodphotography #igfood #foodstagram #instafood #instafoodie #foodie #instadaily #picoftheday #market #siemreapmarket #psarsamaki #marketfresh #vegetables #healthyfood #marketshopping #traveltips #foodtravel #culinarytravel #localtravel #cooking #cookingtime #curry #homemade #currypaste #grantourismotravels
My Vietnamese-ish meatballs and rice noodles recip My Vietnamese-ish meatballs and rice noodles recipe makes tender meatballs doused in a delightfully tangy-sweet sauce, sprinkled with crispy fried shallots, with carrot-daikon, crunchy cucumber and fragrant herbs. 

The dish is inspired by bún chả, a Hanoi specialty, but it’s not bún chả. No matter what Google or food bloggers tell you. Names are important, especially when cooking and writing about cuisines not our own.

This is an authentic bún chả recipe:  https://grantourismotravels.com/vietnamese-bun-cha-recipe/ You’ll need to get the outdoor BBQ/grill going to do proper smoky bún chả meat patties (not meatballs).

My meatball noodle bowl is perhaps more closely related to dishes such as a Central Vietnam cousin bún thịt nướng (pork skewers on rice noodles in a bowl) and a Southern relation bún bò Nam Bộ (beef atop rice noodles, sprinkled with fried shallots (Nam Bộ=Southern Vietnam) though neither include meatballs. 

Xíu mại= meatballs although they’re different in flavour to mine, which taste more like bún chả patties. Xíu mại remind me of Southern Italian meatballs in tomato sauce.

In Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, home to millions of Khmer, there’s bánh tằm xíu mại. Bánh tằm=silk worm noodles. They’re topped with meatballs, cucumber, daikon, carrot, fresh herbs, crispy fried onions. Difference: cold noodles doused in a sauce of coconut cream and fish sauce. 

Remove the meatballs, add chopped fried spring rolls and it’s Cambodia’s banh sung, which is a rice noodle salad similar to Vietnam’s bún chả giò :) 

Recipe here: (link in bio) https://grantourismotravels.com/vietnamese-meatballs-and-rice-noodles-recipe/

For more on these culinary connections you’ll have to wait for our Cambodian cookbook and culinary history. In a hurry to know? Come support the project on Patreon. (link in bio)

#recipe #recipes #vietnamesefood #cambodianfood #asianfood #southeastasianfood #ricenoodles #rice #noodlebowl #meatballs #igfood #igfoodie #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood  #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #writingacookbook #writingacambodiancookbook #patreon #patreoncreator #grantourismo
It is pure coincidence that Pepper’s eye colour It is pure coincidence that Pepper’s eye colour matches the furnishings of our rented apartment. So, no, I did not colour-coordinate the interiors to match our cat’s eyes. 

I keep getting DMs from pet clothing brands wanting to “partner” with Pepper and send her free cat clothes and cat accessories. Although she did wear a kerchief for a few years in her more adventurous fashion-forward teenage years, I cannot see this cat in clothes now, can you? 

#pepper #blackcat #blackcats #blackcatsofinstagram #blackcatsrule #blackcatsmatter #cat #cats #catsofinstagram #catstagram #catlover #catlovers #catlove #catoftheday #catphoto #catpic #catpics #cambodiancat #cambodiancatsofinstagram #catlife #catloversclub #catoftheday #catgram #catstagram #cats_of_instagram #catphotography #catsofig #catsoftheworld #catsofinsta #cats🐱 #siemreap #cambodia

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