Indholdsfortegnelse for September/October 2025 i Cook's Illustrated

Even though it’s been a long time since I’ve sat in a classroom, September still triggers a “back-to-school” mindset for me. I get organized with to-do lists, pack lunches for work, and make sure my calendar is up to date. I also tend to reflect on learning—and since this is my first fall at Cook’s Illustrated, I’m specifically thinking back on when I learned to cook. My pathway to food was through words: My first job out of college was at Gourmet. I knew nothing about cooking, but I was an English major who desperately wanted to work in publishing and it seemed like an interesting place to start. (I had no idea I had just struck professional gold.) I was hired as an editorial assistant, and my job was…

Carlos Olaechea wrapped his arms around himself and smiled as he mused on the comforts of tallarines verdes. “[When] I’m away from my family and I just need a hug, I make tallarines verdes,” the Peruvian American food writer said during a video call about the lush, spinach-sauced pasta. “It’s cozy.” The homey, incredibly popular recipe is the result of a merger of foodways from two cultures. After the unification of Italy in 1861, waves of impoverished Italians, many from Liguria, left the country in search of a better livelihood and made their way to Lima, Peru. As they settled into their new Andean home, Italian Peruvian fusion recipes began to take shape, including tallarines verdes, or “green noodles.” “Tallarines verdes is a warm hug.”– Peruvian American food writer Carlos…

By now, you’re probably familiar with the way that browning transforms a brussels sprout: Unlike the boiled, pallid globes of yesteryear, roasted sprouts are complex and flavorful, their brassica pungency transformed by the Maillard reaction into a downright craveable sweet nuttiness. But what you might not know is that you can—and should—push that browning even further. Brussels sprouts can achieve very deep, flavorful color and char before they start to taste burnt and acrid the way a higher-sugar vegetable (such as a carrot) would. And what better place to test the browning capabilities of brussels sprouts than the grill? In addition to imbuing the sprouts with roastiness, cooking sprouts al fresco would also introduce subtle smokiness, making them all the more complex. There’s just one problem: If you cut the…

CHOOSE THE RIGHT CHEESE Cheese selection isn’t just about flavor; you also need to consider how well—or poorly—it melts. USE A COMBO OF AGED AND YOUNG CHEESES In general, aged cheeses taste great but melt poorly, while younger, blander cheeses melt beautifully. So the key to grilled cheese that’s delightfully gooey and stretchy but also flavorful is using some of each. In general, we like a 2:1 ratio of aged to young cheese. Poor melters (aged) →Asiago → Gruyère → Aged Swiss → Sharp cheddar Great melters (young) → Mozzarella → Mild cheddar → Fontina → American → Swiss → Monterey Jack → Colby → Brie 2 AGED CHEESE: 1 YOUNG CHEESE SCIENCE Why Aged Cheese Melts Poorly Cheese is an emulsion of fat and water bound up by a…

Gâteau invisible doesn’t share the storied provenance of legendary French apple desserts such as tarte Tatin or tarte Normande. In fact, the chic cake may well be an arriviste—an upstart among more classic examples of patisserie. But trust me, you’ll forgive the cake its ambiguous origins as soon as you see it sliced: The mesmerizing cross-section showcases paper-thin slices of apple so snugly stacked on top of each other that the batter surrounding them seems to disappear (hence the name). It’s also one of those desserts that looks rich but tastes exquisitely light—all bright and tender fruit, with a touch of custardy creaminess from the batter that subtly girds it. If there’s a caramel sauce or sweetened whipped cream served alongside, the gâteau will offset it with plenty of vibrancy.…

DELICATE/MILD INTENSITY WADAMAN Golden Sesame Oil PRICE: $73.00 for 16.9 oz ($4.32 per oz) ORIGIN: Japan COMMENTS: This artisan brand toasts every type of sesame seed; golden is its top seller. The fourth-generation owner, Etsuji Wada, personally controls the roasting, said Chris Bonomo of The Japanese Pantry. Tasters found it “lightly nutty and toasty,” with a “subtle,” “very fresh type of taste.” Bonomo of The Japanese Pantry. Tasters found it “lightly nutty and toasty,” with a “subtle,” “very fresh type of sesame seed; golden is its top seller. The fourth-generation owner, Etsuji Wada, personally controls the roasting, CUIZI Small-Mill Roasted Sesame Oil (Cuizi Xiaomo Xiangyou) PRICE: $14.00 for 7.4 oz ($1.89 per oz) ORIGIN: China COMMENTS: “Delicate” and “sweet,” this stoneground, filtered oil from Shandong had a “toasty aroma backed…

Turn Leftover Rice into a Crispy Topping If you’ve got leftover rice in the fridge, it’s easy to transform it into a crispy, toasty snack or topping for salads and creamy soups. The golden brown grains offer great texture and roasty flavor when they’re simply salted, but you could also toss them with togarashi, curry powder, lemon pepper, cajun seasoning, or any other spice blend to change them up. METHOD: Combine 1 cup cooked rice, 2 teaspoons vegetable oil, and ⅛ teaspoon table salt in bowl. Transfer rice to rimmed baking sheet and, using spatula, spread into very thin, even layer, keeping rice as a single mass. With oven rack adjusted 8 inches from broiler element, broil until rice begins to brown, about 4 minutes. Turn and stir rice, then…

Garlic Press Turned Nutcracker Lynn Haller of Evanston, Ill., has found that a sturdy garlic press can be used as a nutcracker for small nuts such as hazelnuts and pistachios. Just place the nut in the hopper and squeeze to crack the shell. Easy Bouquet Garni Brittany Budden of Ellicott City, Md., uses her nut milk bag for a variety of kitchen tasks beyond straining cashew and almond milk, including making spice sachets or bouquets garnis. Just place fresh herbs and/or whole spices into the finely woven cotton bag, pull the drawstring tight, and drop it into your stockpot. How to Clean and Dry Pie Weights Over time, pie weights become sticky and dirty. Renee Coha of Palatine, Ill., washes them in a bowl of warm, soapy water, but drying…

Of all the options at the deli counter, the meatball sub is king. Everything about it—from the tender, juicy meat and deeply savory marinara to the blanket of gooey cheese and toasty sub roll—screams comfort and coziness. But what I relish just as much as the sandwich itself is that someone else has prepared and assembled all the components for me. The process of browning meatballs, simmering a sauce, braising the meatballs in the sauce, putting it all together with the cheese and roll, and broiling the sandwich for that requisite fresh-from-the-oven melt usually makes a trek to a sub shop the more convenient option when the craving hits. That is, until I gave the process some thought and realized that there were great opportunities to streamline. Hence, my take…

It’s a rare pleasure to work with an ingredient that’s wholly new to me. I’d read about shio koji, but until I started cooking with it, I didn’t fully appreciate its ability to enhance—and in some cases, even utterly change—the taste of nearly any food. Shio koji is derived from just three ingredients: water, salt (shio), and cooked rice that’s been inoculated with koji, the ancient, safe-to-eat mold Aspergillus oryzae. “Japan’s national fungus,” as this mold is nicknamed, is also used to make soy sauce, miso, and sake. After fermenting for a week or so, the mixture takes on a milky, porridge-like appearance and a floral-fruity fragrance, and the shio koji is ready to transform food. Japanese cooks use shio koji to cure fish, to turn vegetables into pickles overnight,…

Growing up in an African family in the San Francisco Bay area, I learned at a young age that if there’s a Nigerian party, there has to be suya. The iconic skewers of smoky, crispy meat (most commonly beef), seasoned with the piquant, peanutty spice rub yaji, are a crowdpleasing staple in the Nigerian community, whether you’re nabbing them fresh off the grill at a cookout or loading up your plate from a catering tray at a house party. Once I grew old enough to tolerate their heat (a milestone that was bad news for my suya-obsessed brother, who had laid claim to all my portions before then), I fell in love with suya’s charry grill marks, deeply beefy flavor, and nutty, vibrant spices, and I always added some to…

An English muffin is like a book: You can’t judge its quality from the outside; the defining features of greatness are actually hidden within. Splitting a muffin open should reveal a field of variously sized holes. The more holes, the more irregular the surface is, and an irregular surface toasts unevenly, which produces a pleasing array of colors, textures, and flavors. And that’s vital, considering that British baker Samuel Bath Thomas, the inventor of what we know as the English muffin, intended for the breads to be split and toasted. I’ve been trying for years to make English muffins, following recipes that promised surfaces as craggy as the moon only to deliver uniformly textured breads that were more like burger buns. The recipes followed similar methods: Knead a moderately moist,…

Toasted sesame oil is a pivotal ingredient. Just a teaspoon or two in a sauce or drizzled on at the end of cooking adds a burst of distinctive toasty, nutty flavor. It’s a component of many beloved Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Taiwanese, and Hawaiian dishes, among others, from liang mian to japchae, pai huang gua to mapo tofu, and ramen to poke. It dresses banchan and salads, and it’s often the final touch for fried rice, stir-fries, and stews and braises such as san bei ji. “We use sesame oil like Americans use Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt; a little bit too liberally and at the end of the cooking process,” writes Clarissa Wei in her James Beard Award–nominated cookbook, Made in Taiwan: Recipes and Stories from the Island Nation (2023). Sesame…

The Best Nonalcoholic Wine Sales of nonalcoholic wine are booming. You can get a glass at restaurants or snag a bottle at liquor stores. Some nonalcoholic wines are made in recognizable styles, such as Chardonnay and Tempranillo; some aren’t trying to be exactly like existing styles of wine but still promise to be a good companion for food and special occasions. MAKING NONALCOHOLIC WINE Alcohol makes up 9 to 16 percent of any conventional wine, and it serves multiple purposes. It “provides a lovely, soft cushion to all the other things that tend to present as extreme in wine, such as sourness from the acid and dryness from the tannin,” said Miguel de Leon, wine director for Pinch Chinese in New York City. If you were to simply remove the…

Kitchen Rulers Rulers are versatile tools that can improve your cooking. You can use them to measure the thickness of dough and to check the distance between oven racks and a broiler. We tested everyday and culinary rulers made from stainless steel, wood, and plastic. They varied from 12 to 18 inches. Everyday rulers are long and thin and can be used for everything from art projects to homework, while short, wide culinary rulers provide information such as FDA-approved cooking temperatures. We found stainless steel to be the best material. Stainless-steel rulers were durable yet had some flexibility so they didn’t break or lose shape when bent. They also resisted warping and were easy to clean, and they didn’t absorb water. On the other hand, plastic rulers were flimsy, and…