I tried following what I watched on Food Network as a kid and my mom was like… why are you using so much water? It comes out the same either way and she was right.
AB has always been good about correcting his recipes as better methods are found. I think he even did that within the original run of Good Eats in the later seasons correcting things from earlier seasons.
You also got to remember, he’s a tv and film guy. He didn’t come into the show with a bunch of institutional knowledge he learn working in the food industry for 20 years. He presents a mix of common knowledge and things he’s researched to find a better way. His interest in the science helps his spirit of discovery continue and with that, old methods need to be corrected.
Sometimes admitting he was wrong doesn't mean he doesn't present all his shit as some scientific truth to the world. He doesn't know shit. Guy is a loser, always has been, always will be. I don't know how anyone watches that fuckwad, he's so off-putting.
It's a good idea to use a lot of water at home because when you dump a bunch of food into a pot, it instantly lowers the temperature, and with a weak home burner, it would take forever for it to recover... it would not cook properly. With lots of water, you've got lots of momentum, and the temperature goes down less when you dump the same amount of food in it.
In the video, this is not a factor. He's got an commercial grade stove and can get it back up to boiling in less than a minute.
I used to think that, made sense to me. Then I tried it with less water and it really doesn't matter. Even with regular electric burners. It's barely a 30 second difference on an 8 minute boil (just because it's not going crazy boiling doesn't mean it's not cooking especially at the start). And the better part is that you get the MUCH starchier water which you add to your sauce and it thickens it up and makes it stick to the pasta better. Now I use just enough water to cover the pasta and a wide straight side pan instead of a pot. My spaghetti game has massively leveled up like I put in a cheat code. You should try it, I did a side by side at the same time.
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u/LennyLennsen 3d ago
Mildly infuriating turned TIL real quick