Good Eats
Alton Brown: No matter what shape you hope to whittle your food down to. You’re going to have to use one or all of a primary cuts that means you are going to slice, you are going to chop and you’re going to have to pare. Let’s start at the top, slice to cut with a long pulling stroke that’s it. The fact that such emotion may very well produce a piece of food known as a slice is completely beside the point.
Roasted beast, now since we want to minimize back and forth so we need a knife that is good and long, we also like to minimize drag. So, a thin blade would be very desirable in other words when it comes to slicer you can never be too long or too thin. Now, the goal is a single pulling cut that puts the tip on the board. It doesn’t matter if your cutting roast beef or rhubarb the slicing motion is always the same.
Chop, what a terrible word for a procession cutting operation you know why? Because it implies—hey watch out! Get back, that’s my cherry tree. Who would do such a thing?
Speaker 2: I cannot tell a lie, I was passing by and found this in yard; I have no idea where it came from.
Alton Brown: By my definition, chop is a forward cutting motion in which the entire length of the blade comes in contact with the board. But you know the real secret here is not to think chop but to think choo-choo. By choo-choo train of course, I mean locomotive, next time it comes around check out the drive arm on that engine. See how it goes up and down and front and back and orbital pattern. That is exactly what you want to see out of your knife during the chopping process.
Notice that the hand holding the knife drives it rhythmically but the blade itself is actually being guided by the front of the fingers on the other hand. Now, in this configuration with the wide knife like a chef’s knife it is very difficult to actually cut yourself as long as the food you’re cutting isn’t too tall and you keep your fingertips folded back. Although this is especially useful for breaking down multiple long items, I like to say green onions or celery. Chopping is also handy for herbs for instance basil. Pick yourself about a dozen leaves and then just stack them up with the largest leaf on bottom and roll it up. Place it on board seam side down and then just gently mow through using that smooth choo-choo train motion that will prevent bruising of the leaves. The French called this Chiffonade by the way which I guess sounds better than really skinny ribbons. You be the judge.
Paring is defined by trimming down or reducing something in size but very helpful in practical application it is unique from the other cutting methods because the cutting happens up of the board and the knife is always facing the cutter. Back in the days before peelers when someone needed a peel of peach, they didn’t reach for a peeler but a paring knife got it? Good, here’s an example. Now, realize to putting one of your digits right up against the blade is not a natural instinct but this seemingly dangerous dance is an integral part of paring. The crucial detail here that the knife and the thumb are connected to the same hand so slicing your own thumb becomes a lot less likely. And if you keep your next sharp minimum force will be required. Remember, when you start forcing knives around bad things happen.
Here’s the truth, 90% of your home cutting jobs are going to be hybrid breed cutting jobs. Calling for slicing, chopping and paring, one example you’ve got it. Right, step one; pare off the ends being careful to not cut all the way through the base root for all the leaves and the onion come together there. And just make a very thin incision of the side and peel off that outer skin. I like to do this by pinching the skin between the blade and my thumb. Which you can always get it to work sometimes you have just get medieval with it. Now, we’re going to split the onion longitudinally making sure that you keep an equal piece of that root on either side of the incision.
Okay, now here is the cool part I like to kind of slice this in the fan pattern and position the knives so that you can cut everything but the rue. Again, once you get all the way around to this point you can simply slice through or chop through in individual pieces. Chop or slice, your choice here, whatever you do don’t cut straight down, knives work best when they’re working two directions at once always remember that. Use your fingers to guide the knife there.
Transcription by:
Scribe4you Transcription Services