Cooks Illustrated is easily the best cooking magazine out there: they eschew the food porn in favor of some really excellent science that does a great job of informing the amateur cook. It definitely made a huge difference in my cooking: between that an AB I feel I have a much better understanding of the chemistry that’s going on and where the line is between kitchen myth and reality.
That said, since they base a lot of stuff on tasting panels, the results skew to the average and dull. They’re never going to recommend the piquant, the strong flavored item, the subtle, the … challenging. I dropped my subscription when the review of PB skewed towards a homogenized, PB Confection (Skippy or Jif) rather than actual PB with crunch and salt and (yegads!) a little bit of oil at the top.
I also find that their recipes lean heavily towards the fussy, trying to wring extra flavor from extra steps and go-to extras rather than underscoring the need for quality in the base ingredients. I’m not talking about the best chocolate or best canned tomatoes here, but the difference between small-farm organic poultry vs the saline-injected Tyson blobs, or in-season asparagus vs what you get in November.
Still, I highly recommend a subscription to the magazine for anyone who is interested enough in cooking to actually read and think about it.
I tend to be more interested in the recipes for baked goods, but everything I’ve ever cooked as a result of watching America’s Test Kitchen has turned out exceptionally well. The host is a goofball, yes, but I still find him oddly engaging.
Heh–yeah, when he keeps talking about how he’s a RUGGED OUTDOORSMAN from VERMONT!!!, it’s a bit incongruous to see him flinch like a beaten kitten whenever anyone gets a mallet and flattens meat or uses a cleaver to chop up chicken bones.
I think you hit the nail precisely on the head for why I have reservations for their actual recipes and reviews. It does, IMHO, suffer from that “recipe by committee” approach. Personally, the only cooking magazine I subscribe to is Saveur (although I did get a gift subscription for Cooks Illustrated.) I find Saveur to be the perfect balance of substance, storytelling, and recipes that I actually use over and over again that are not skewed towards average tastes.
A number of years ago I was asked to bring an angel food cake to a party. I’m only an occasional baker but I wanted to make one instead of buying it, and I’d never made one before. A few weeks before the event I tried to make one using Alton Brown’s recipe and although it tasted good the cake was about 3" high and DENSE. Obviously I did something wrong, but what?
I turned to the only folks I know who are possibly geekier about this sort of thing than he is - ATC. They explained the technique perfectly and highlighted the places one could go wrong with it, so the next attempt was not only tasty but also the proper consistency. Now I know that making this type of cake has more to do with the technique than even the ingredients you use. I love them for that sort of thing.
I generally like America’s Test Kitchen (I live in the area).
As for soaking wood, I have no idea, but it doesn’t strike me as strange at all. It isn’t as if wood is a sponge. How much water do you think gets absorbed by a hunk of wood? Certainly not enough to steam squat. Also I think smouldering and smoke go together. I don’t think the two are mutually exclusive.
The TV presentation on ATK is an abbreviated version of the explanations they give in Cook’s Illustrated – I’m sure, if you actually read the BBQ recipe they go into detail on why they recommend soaking the wood. Often in suggesting a new technique they even mention what the conventional wisdom is, and how they demonstrated otherwise.
They usually also mention how to adjust their recipe for taste, if you want more spice or whatever.
Christopher Kimball is doing schtick on ATK, with his fussy complaints about trivialities. They deliberately play it up, and make fun of him for his fussiness. IIRC there was a show where Bridget (I think) was telling him about how to store potatoes “In a cold, dark place… like your soul.” However, his crazy Vermont uber alles editorials in Cook’s Illustrated are whack.
Their recipes have always worked out fab. I’m big on brining chicken, salting meat, etc. now… if I actually made pie crust, I’d use vodka like they do because my friend who tried it made an amazing crust. But, without fail, their recipe will dirty every damn dish in your kitchen. It’s astonishing, really.
I like that they will use general supermarket ingredients versus small-farm organic whatever. They aim for a general home chef, who most likely will buy the less expensive chicken, or supermarket meat. They will have recipes for the 1/2" pork chops one normally finds in the supermarket and others for the wonderful 1" chops one can get at a butcher. They’ll discuss making the cheapest roast beef and making it good, and then discuss how to do a standing rib roast. The magazine tends to publish recipes for in-season items, so you will see recipes for asparagus in the spring editions.
And like you, I enjoy the science, as that can transfer to other recipes.
On the smoke/smoulder debate: the normal misconception about smoking is that it involves lots of billowing white, well, smoke. That gives rise to notions of wetting wood chips or chunks, which will indeed result in lots of the billowy white stuff. The problem is that the white stuff ends up imparting a harsh smoke flavor and coating the meat with things like creosote.
The smoke that experienced smokers are going for is the thin blueish smoke you get from good charcoal. Check the die-hard meat smoking forums, check other SDMB threads on this subject, and heck - take a good look at what’s going on in the BBQ specials on Travel, PBS, or Food network. You don’t generally see a Memphis pit master coughing his way through clouds of smoke as he opens the pit to move the racks around.
All good points. This just illuminates my personal windmill - most of the quality of the meal is determined before knife meets board and that seems to be lost knowledge. It’s not so much the difference between a cheap roast beef vs a standing rib roast as the difference between the cheapest cut at the supermarket and that same cut of pastured beef. One requires a lot of work to turn into something. The other doesn’t. If the goal is to be have techniques to work with substandard ingredients then I can’t argue. But if the goal is to teach how to make great food, they’re missing an important step
From Cook’s Illustrated, on the Vodka Pie Crust recipe:
I’ve made it before, and it is indeed good & easy to roll out. For someone who only occasionally makes pie crusts, it’s definitely the way to go. For whatever reason, I’ve never had much trouble with standard pie crust recipes, so I tend to use them. But I wouldn’t hesitate to make the vodka one if I ever think to do it!
This is true for the most part - but occasionally they’ll assume that certain brands or products are national when in fact, they’re quite New England specific.
And they do tend toward the bland.
On the other hand, I made my first turkey by following their instructions (the dry brining technique) and it came out perfect. Their 30 minute recipes take 30 minutes. The recipes in general are solid, easy to follow, and work.
This person knows what they’re talking about. If you taste barbecue made with predominantly billowing white smoke, it has a sooty, slightly bitter flavor to it. I suspect many people don’t care or notice it that much, as (like I said) Liquid Smoke has that same acrid undertone. The damned stuff tastes like creosote, I have no idea why it’s popular. A properly smoked dish has a cleaner, “sweeter” smoke flavor, for lack of a better word. It doesn’t taste like it’s been suffocated in smoke and soot.
