Cooking With Sian: Cutting Up

A Dicey Matter

If you have ever read through a recipe and wondered what’s the difference between chopping and dicing, this post is for you. The way you cut the ingredients not only affects the final appearance of the dish. It can also have a great impact on the amount you use and on the finished flavor of your actual dish. The smaller you cut, the more your vessel will hold.
1 cup of minced onion is significantly more than 1 cup of chopped onion.

Tastefully Speaking

As an inexperienced cook, one of the things I used to wonder is, does it matter how I chop it as long as I use the right amount?  Well, imagine biting into something like the conch salad and encountering a large chunk of raw onion, instead of the finely chopped pieces the recipe calls for. The same holds true for cooked dishes too.  The flavor of many ingredients, sweet and savory are released when it is cut/ chopped into smaller pieces. Whether it’s served cooked or raw, a smaller cut will yield more flavors from your ingredients and result in a more robust, better flavored dish.

Taste and See.

Cutting or slicing herbs and veggies into smaller pieces before sautéing is a guaranteed way to release flavors and natural juices.
Take for example the three pictures below.. The picture on both ends shows brown stew fish. In one picture, the snapper has been left whole and is presented more formally on a fish platter. The other shows two pieces of fish, casually placed on a plate with two boiled dumplings. Even a casual glance tells that there has been more thought and effort put into preparing one of these plates. A closer look tells you that the veggie on the whole fish is more uniformly cut and the sauce is thicker and richer.

The same holds true for soups. The smaller you cut the ingredients, the richer, more flavorful your soup will be. One of the things I have come to appreciate as a chef is that ‘chicken is chicken’ No matter where in the world you are, Different preparations and presentations however could mean the difference between mom’s home cooking and a gourmet meal.

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