On Food and Cooking

Knowing When to Stop Cooking The key to
cooking meat properly is knowing when to
stop. Cookbooks are full of formulas for
obtaining a given doneness — so many
minutes per pound or per inch thickness —
but these are at best rough approximations.
There are a number of unpredictable and
significant factors that they just can’t take
into account. Cooking time is affected by the
meat’s starting temperature, the true
temperatures of frying pans and ovens, and
the number of times the meat is flipped or the
oven door opened. The meat’s fat content
matters, because fat is less conductive than
the muscle fibers: fatty cuts cook more slowly
than lean ones. Bones make a difference too.
The ceramic-like minerals in bone give it
double the heat conductivity of meat, but its
frequently honeycombed, hollow structure
generally slows its transfer of heat and turns
bone into an insulator. This is why meat is
often said to be “tender at the bone,” more