Greg's cooking times

How long do you cook food? Until it's ready, of course. But how do you know when that is, and how do you plan? For roast meat, you measure the temperature somewhere, but you still need some kind of rule of thumb to know roughly when the dish will be ready. Read cookbooks and you'll get an amazing variety of methods, many of them so different that you can't rely on any of them. On this page I'm collecting observations. It will grow, and I'll almost certainly adjust these numbers as I gain more experience.

Caveat coquus: much of this is specific to my ingredients and my equipment.

Meat

Hamburgers

On hot plate of barbecue, 7 minutes.

Roast beef

I believe that roast beef should be very rare in the middle, and that's what I'm basing these times on. I've had a lot of difficulty deciding the times. There's more in the roast beef recipe, but currently it boils down to: cook in a fan oven at 180° for about 50 minutes per kg, and take out when the temperature in the middle is about 53°.

Roast chicken

This is based on a chicken of about 2 kg. Cook at 180° for 50 to 55 minutes per kg and measure the temperature in the middle of the breast. If it's stuffed, take out when the temperature is 82°. Otherwise take it out when the temperature is 88°. The time should be pretty much the same. Many people measure at the top joint of the leg, where the temperature will be much lower, but I've found this to be unreliable: it's very easy to misplace the sensor, and that results in over or (usually) undercooking.

For some reason the breast temperature of an unstuffed chicken rises quickly at the start, and then slows down. The last 5° can take 15 to 20 minutes.

Breast at 88° is marginally overcooked. It's probably better to fill the chicken or to cover it with aluminium foil for most of the cooking time, then to remove and grill at the end.

Rack of lamb

Cook to 55° in a 200° fan-forced oven, about 30 minutes.

Roast pork

Conventional wisdom is that pork should be cooked to 80° to 85°. I find that a little high; 78° is probably better. I still need to check how long that takes; my first guess was about 50 minutes per kg at 180°, but on 19 February 2011 I tried that with a piece of meat weighing 500 g, and it took nearly an hour. This was in a compact oven without recirculation, so I raised the temperature to 200°, but it still surprised me. More investigation needed. Given my experience with Kassler (below), 80 minutes per kg might be better.

Kassler and ham

Kassler and ham have already been processed, and the general recommendation seems to be to cook them less hot than fresh meat. I'm going for 74° at the moment, and the last time I tried it, with a piece weighing 880 g, it took me 66 minutes at 180° oven temperature. Interpolated linearly, that's 75 minutes per kilogram—a surprisingly long time.

Thawing times

Ayam lemak

Microwave oven level 2 (at maximum). Level 3 melts the container. Try 5 minutes.

Hamburger patties

For two patties (240 g): 5 minutes at 220 W, rest a minute or two, 5 minutes at 110 W.