Roasting may not be the most thrilling or theatrical element of cooking, but there’s a world of difference between food that’s little more than warmed up in an oven and food that’s roasted, crisp and caramelised. In these times when many of us are thinking twice before turning on the oven, follow these tips to make sure you get the best results when you do.
TOM SHINGLER, FOOD EDITOR
Expert knowledge.
When I was learning to cook, it wasn’t cheffy skills like constructing grandiose pies, spinning sugar marvels or piping pomme purée that taught me the most. It was the simpler things, the building blocks of cookery: knowing how to caramelise onions properly; the importance of seasoning at the beginning, middle and end of cooking; how acidity in marinades can transform flavour and texture – these were the little epiphanies that boosted my skillset and covertly (yet greatly) improved my dishes. They might not have showstopper appeal or make a difference to anything visually, but these dark horses can make all the difference.
Knowing how to roast things properly in an oven is one such skill. Recipes keep roasting simple – put food on tray, put tray in oven – but there’s more to it than that. Space, temperature, coverage – these three variables can make all the difference between something that’s merely cooked through and something that’s properly roasted. Thankfully, they can all be mastered with ease.
Getting the oven to temperature: can you skip it?
Heating the oven before you put food in to roast or bake is something every cook learns to do when they start cooking, and it’s long been accepted lore, but there’s now social-media chat about cooking from a cold start.
So... Question: do you really need to wait (and waste all that energy)?
Answer: it depends on what you’re cooking. As a general rule, it pays to wait – especially if you’re following a recipe to the letter – but putting a few jacket potatoes in the oven before it kindly beeps or turns a light off to let you know it’s reached 180°C fan/gas 6 certainly isn’t going to do any harm. Think of it like this:
• Anything that’s gently roasted from raw until crisp on the outside and soft in the middle (root veg, slow-cooked joints of meat, anything that requires little more than toasting or drying out): totally fine to put in the oven before it’s up to temperature.
• Food that requires precision or a sudden wave of heat to crisp up and sear quickly (roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, bakes, pizza, fish): wait for the oven to give you the thumbs-up.
Ensure even coverage w
