My Cooking Rules
Welcome to my substack. This is the place to find my food writing. My written recipes and my musings on places to eat, markets to shop and ingredients to lean into.
Here are my cooking rules
This is what I live by, and what works for me:
I tend to cook protein with lots of heat, followed by periods of no heat, and then repeat this process. The mid-point resting is critical for excellence in protein cookery for me.
Season at the very beginning of all your cookery. This takes practice and repetition and good judgement; you will be rewarded.
I rest meat after cooking for a LONG time. Often more than the time it has been in the oven. This will greatly improve your eating, and your cookery.
Whenever possible I cook meat (and fish for that matter) one the bone, or attached to its carcass. The reason for this is for flavour, shape and consistency (of the protein).
Stand-over cooking time in a pan is the time in which magical things happen, but you need timing and judgement. Use this period of heat like a precious gift.
Use uncomfortably heavy based pans. They conduct and retain heat – which is a gift and will transform your cookery.
Sharp knives make a huge difference. Most of the refinement in my cookery is due to one thing – razor shape knives.
Let the decision on what to cook be made by your belly, not your ego. Cooking food you desperately want to eat is so much more satisfying and rewarding.
Never cook when you are angry or upset; you can taste it, trust me.
Buy the best ingredients you can personally afford, do as little with them as you can afford to and serve them as generously as you can afford.
I use two olives oils and two salts. A cheaper olive oil for cooking with and a first press early harvest for drizzling over or eating as is. I use a simple mass-produced sea salt for big batch cooking or blanching, and a fine sea salt such as fleur de sel for raw meat or for seasoning cooked items.
Cooking with frugality is at the heart of every great cook. Make stocks from your chicken carcasses, save your vegetables trimmings for long slow braises and keep the bones from your roast beef for next week’s gravy (in the freezer of course). This makes cooking the adventure that never ends.
If you want the video versions I’m over on:
Happy Cooking,
Adam x
Great to also see you on Substack. Can you give more info on how you rest the meat (in the oven with the door open, out but covered in foil?…). My main question is how do you make sure it stays hot enough to be served.
I enjoyed this article especially the part about waste. I made my first beef stock last week. Amazing flavor and so much better than anything from the store. Today Espagnole and then my first demi glace.