The Michelin-star cook-alongs
Celebrity chefs are beaming into your home, showing you how to turn leftovers into lockdown treats (with a side order of kitchen envy). JAN MOIR tucked into...
Stuck at home, perhaps bored with home-schooling the kids, definitely missing their restaurants? Yes, yes and yes again.
Many top chefs and cooks have turned to the internet to rustle up tasty films showing how they are cooking and caring for their families during the lockdown.
For once these Michelin-starred gods are not tweezering herbs, indulging in molecular gastronomy or figuring out new and inventive ways of charging diners £30 for a portion of rib-eye steak and half a spud.
Instead, over on their Instagram accounts and Youtube channels, they are browning chickens, peeling carrots, mixing cakes and hiding slices of aubergine from the kiddies in vegetarian bakes.
I love these little films! Not just because they are packed with top-quality tips, they also show chef life in the raw, with children running in and spouses shouting in the background.
the first thing that these professional chefs teach us? that it doesn’t matter — just go with what you’ve got in the kitchen. One uses cashew nuts instead of pine nuts in his pesto. Another makes do without garlic for the first time in his adult life. One smuggles courgette into his bolognese sauce simply because ‘it needs using up’.
Everyone is focusing on economical, tasty meals to keep the family happy during lockdown.
As the chefs are cooking in real-time in their own kitchens, these cook-alongs are meant to be informative rather than entertaining, but end up being both.
It’s always a joy to watch professional cooks at work; to admire their economy of movement, their asbestos fingers, and that way they casually toss their pans to combine the ingredients.
Not to mention their efficiency, speed and military levels of organisation.
I also love that they are so scrupulously tidy — cleaning up as they go along, like no man ever.
THE COOKING QUEEN USED TO TIME INSIDE
ACTUALLY I can barely focus on what Martha Stewart is cooking because of the envy-inducing majesty of the barnsized kitchen at her farm in New York state. Copper pans hang from the ceiling while shelves are lined with glass flour jars and divine pale green china.
Martha (pictured), who once had an enforced period of self-isolation in jail for insider trading, suggests making a cheesecake for Easter. ‘Whoops, I almost forgot the eggs,’ she says.
TOP TIP: Once baked, prop open the oven door and leave your cheesecake in there to cool completely. This prevents unsightly surface cracks.