I know what you are thinking. Ben makes the recipes he writes about sound easy. It seems like understanding the science behind what I’m cooking will help. But I can’t really make that. Can I?
I know. I feel the same way. I feel it worse. Ben is my brother and I know just how talented and intuitive Ben is in the kitchen. Could I really recreate his food? Rephrase that question and I think we have a testable hypothesis.
So, we put it to the test. Working only from the focaccia recipe card, I tried to recreate his focaccia and have posted pictures from the process of a successful independent replication on my tumblr:
A frequent problem with both science protocols and cooking recipes is that the written procedure doesn’t let a non-expert (or anyone who wasn’t the person who wrote it) replicate the results. So, I tested Ben’s focaccia recipe using only what was written on the recipe card and present my results for your consideration. Well, your visual consideration. You’ll just have to trust me on the fact that it tastes A-MAY-ZING!
Independent replication makes for good science and good cooking.
The Finch and Pea 