Word: mcgee
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That is the sort of invaluable, fundamental information provided by Harold McGee in his 684-page volume On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen (Scribners; $29.95). Gathering data from experiments of others and performing many of his own, McGee has put together an exhaustive account of foods of all sorts with facts on their chemistry and physical properties, translated into correct cooking methods...
...best sections are those dealing with dairy products, eggs, meats and fish. In his introduction on the lore of the egg, McGee writes that at one point in history, eggs existed before chickens. He hastens to explain that by egg he refers to the specialized container of the ovum of early organisms that predated all birds by millions of years. Pleasant rambling through history makes good reading, but the author's practical information is more illuminating. For instance, beaten egg whites are important to cakes and soufflés because they hold air that expands as it heats. Yolks, which hold...
...McGee's description of the differences between the muscle fibers of fish and those of meat makes it clear why seafood is naturally tender whereas meat needs cooking to become easily chewable. Detailed diagrams of molecular structures and cross sections of tissues are always related to cooking and eating properties. A reader with a less scientific turn of mind can skip the theory and get almost as much from the applied information. Never mind the cell structure of beef: anyone attempting to broil a very thick cut will find that the surface is burned long before the interior...
...this book, a project that took five years, it is surprising to learn that the author received his doctorate from Yale not in science but in English literature. His Bachelor of Science degree from the California Institute of Technology is perhaps more telling; although it is also in literature, McGee, 33, chose Caltech because he wanted to dabble in science, a minor but persistent interest throughout his life. After teaching at Yale, he took time off to write this book. He is now busy with another work on the history of biology, and prepares promotional material for the science departments...
...Shirley Hoffnagel," he began with eyes laughing, "and I'm here to talk tonight about the wonderful progress that medical science has made in sex-change operations." The studio audience rollicked to that line, but the lady in Nebraska rose from her chair, muttering, "That's not so funny, McGee!" With that, she swept into the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. And no doubt to ponder the mysterious equations of show business that have enabled her son John to become the nation's midnight idol by telling silly jokes like that. --TIME...