Fundamental Culinary Techniques and Preparation Methods
Fundamental Culinary Techniques and Preparation Methods is the practical heart of the exam: heat transfer, protein and starch behaviour, emulsions, thickening, and the classic preparations everything else is built on.
Heat and transformation
- Conduction (pan to food), convection (oven, water, air), radiation (grill, salamander).
- Maillard browning begins around 140–165 °C at the surface; it needs dry heat and a dry surface, otherwise the food steams.
- Caramelisation is sugar breakdown at roughly 160–180 °C and needs no protein.
- Proteins denature around 40–70 °C and express water; collagen converts to gelatin at 70–80 °C with moisture and time, which is why braises work.
- Starches gelatinise at 60–80 °C and thicken; acid plus long heat breaks them down.
Emulsions and thickening
- Mayonnaise: oil into egg-yolk lecithin, added slowly at the start. A split sauce can be rescued by whisking it into a fresh yolk with a little water.
- Hollandaise: clarified butter into a sabayon at 60–65 °C; too hot and the yolks scramble.
- Thickeners: roux (equal fat and flour, cooked white to brown), slurry (cold starch paste), liaison (yolk plus cream, never boiled), reduction, purée, hydrocolloids.
Worked example
Your hollandaise splits at the pass. Reasoning: the emulsion has inverted - fat globules have merged. Cool the bowl briefly, whisk a teaspoon of cold water into the split sauce, then whisk it slowly into a fresh yolk base off the heat. Never blast it with heat: that coagulates the protein and makes the split unrecoverable.
Traps that cost marks
Quoting a browning temperature without noting the surface must be dry; confusing blanching with parboiling; forgetting to shock green vegetables in ice water to fix colour and texture; salting stock heavily before reduction; claiming resting meat 'seals in' juices - it allows them to redistribute.