I'm Just Here for the Food_ Version 2.0 - Alton Brown [67]
And yet, further testing has convinced me that a tablespoon of oil in the pasta water can help to prevent boil-overs by changing the surface tension at the surface of the water. If you use a really big pot, this isn’t much of an issue, but in certain circumstances the oil could be the difference between a clean cook and a starchy mess.
Boiling is also a position from which the cook retreats, as in “bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer”
A temperature of 212° F at sea level is the point at which water converts to a vapor state, characterized by turbulence, bubbles, and steam production. No matter how heat is applied, once water reaches this point its temperature cannot increase. However, since it conducts heat well, it can heat things very quickly—and heat is heat, regardless of whether it’s wet or dry. Heat is also pressure and pressure squeezes juice out of meat via tissue contraction. To make matters worse, you can’t look at a piece of meat in boiling water (or in steam, for that matter) and “see” that it’s overcooking, because there’s no browning. This can work to our advantage. Corned beef, for instance, is traditionally boiled, and most people would say that done properly it’s not dried out. In reality, it’s boiled to the point that the individual meat fibers break away from each other and thus become tender to the tooth—but they’re still dry. Besides, corned beef has been corned, and that changes everything (see Have a Soak).
Once reached, the boiling point is constant, so it’s a no-brainer to maintain. Because of its density, fluidity, and constancy of movement, boiling water delivers heat to food faster than any other method. It’s also a great way to deliver salt into some foods. And in great enough volumes, boiling water can flush excess starch from foods like pasta.
A rolling boil matters when cooking pasta because it will wash away excess surface starches; heat and agitation are required for the rehydration and gelatinization of starch; and the convection keeps pasta in motion, which keeps it from sticking and helps speed cooking.
In all the cases of boiling, having a large pot and a large volume of freshly drawn, seasoned water is the key. No matter how few servings of pasta I’m cooking, I get out the big pot. It’s one of the few aluminum pans I own, and I only use it for processing canning jars and cooking pasta. I need a big pot because I never cook fewer than four servings of pasta and I never cook it in anything less than a gallon of heavily salted water. Dry pasta gets cooked until done (I always pull mine just before I think it’s perfect), then drained, and immediately sauced without rinsing. I do not add oil to the water—ever (see Oil and Pasta).
BOILING POINT
The “boiling point” is considered the North Star of the kitchen world, unwavering and loyal at 212° F. Sure, if you live within a thousand feet of sea level you can count on 212°, but as atmospheric pressure rises due to a high-pressure weather system or a physical drop in altitude, the boiling point rises to the tune of 2° F per 1000 feet. As the barometer goes down and/or the altitude increases, the boiling point drops 2° F per 1000 feet. This means it takes pasta twice as long to cook in Potosí, Bolivia, as it does in Kaliya, on the shores of the Dead Sea (13,290 feet above and 1,312 below sea level, respectively).
The boiling point of water changes a degree (Fahrenheit) for every change of 540 feet in altitude. So, on Pike’s Peak, which tops out at 14,000 feet, water boils at 187° F (I’ve checked it personally). At 15 psi, the operating pressure of the average pressure cooker, the water boils at close to 250° F. To reach an equivalent temperature in an open pot, you’d have to go to a location at sea level and dig a hole 20,520 feet deep. That’s 3.886 miles.
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