Science & Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science (chemistry)
Learn how chemistry and cooking are interconnected.
Top chefs and Harvard researchers explore how everyday cooking and haute cuisine can illuminate basic principles in chemistry, physics, and engineering. Learn about food molecules and how chemical reactions can affect food texture and flavor.
2-3 hours per week
What You'll Learn
During each week of this course, chefs reveal the secrets behind some of their most famous culinary creations — often right in their own restaurants. Inspired by such cooking mastery, the Harvard team will then explain the science behind the recipe.
Topics will include: how molecules influence flavor; the role of heat in cooking; diffusion, revealed by the phenomenon of spherification, the culinary technique pioneered by Ferran Adrià.
You will also have the opportunity to become an experimental scientist in your very own laboratory — your kitchen. By following along with the engaging recipe of the week, taking precise measurements, and making skillful observations, you will learn to think like both a cook and a scientist. The lab is certainly one of the most unique components of this course — After all, in what other science course can you eat your experiments?
The course will be delivered via edX and connect learners around the world. By the end of the course, participants will learn:
- The scientific concepts that underlie everyday cooking and haute cuisine techniques
- How to apply principles of physics, engineering, and chemistry to cooking
- How to become an experimental scientist in your own kitchen
- How to think like a chef AND a scientist
Your Instructors
Michael Brenner
Glover Professor
of Applied Mathematics
and Applied Physics
and Harvard College Professor
Read full bio.
David Weitz
Professor of Physics and Applied Physics,
John A. Paulson School of Engineering
and Applied Sciences
and the Department of Physics
Read full bio.
Pia Sörensen
Preceptor of Science and Cooking
and HarvardX Fellow,
John A. Paulson School of Engineering
and Applied Sciences
and the Department of Physics
Read full bio.
Course Outline
Includes a discussion by Daniel Humm of Eleven Madison Park in NYC on flavor, pH, and the secret tohis famous duck sauce, and scientific discussions on the major molecules of food, flavor, moles, and pH.
Includes a welcome drink by Dave Arnold of Booker and Dax in NYC to toast the course, and a scientific discussion of how to cook a perfect egg. This module will focus on one of the most commons ways to cook - adding energy in the form of heat to increase the temperature of a food andthus change its internal structure.
Joan and Jordi Roca of El Celler de Can Roca, recently voted thebest restaurant in the world, will explain how they manipulate phase transitions when cookingthrough techniqueslike sous vide and rotovapping. The scientific discussion will focus on what causes phase transitions in foods from a macroscopic and microscopic perspective.
José Andrés, chef and owner of minibar, Jaleo, and The Bazaar, will introduce us to the remarkable dishes he creates with gelling agents. Dominique Crenn of Atelier Crenn in San Fransisco will make carrot jerky, and America's Test Kitchen will show us their secret to making excellent scrambled eggs and coleslaw. Scientific discussions in this module will include gelation, modernist thickeners, and diffusion, which make some remarkable dishes possible.
Carme Ruscalleda, chef and owner of restaurant Sant Pau, will cook steak and other culinary specialties that illustrate the special attention chefs pay to heat diffusion when cooking food. Nathan Myhrvold will share his method for cooking the perfect burger, and America’s Test Kitchen will show us their secret to cooking perfect French fries. The scientific discussion in this module is about heat transfer, and explaining why it is so hard to cook a perfect steak from both a microscopic and macroscopic perspective. We will also explore heat-dependent chemical reactions, and how they impact food taste and texture.
In the final module we will discuss solubility and the science of candy and chocolate. Joanne Chang, from Flour bakery, will talk about the stages of sugar, and Enric Rovira from Xocolaters de Barcelona in Spain will show us some marvelous chocolate creations and we will discuss the underlying science of chocolate tempering and the different phases of chocolate.
Ways to take this course
When you enroll in this course, you will have the option of pursuing a Verified Certificate or Auditing the Course.
A Verified Certificate costs $249 and provides unlimited access to full course materials, activities, tests, and forums. At the end of the course, learners who earn a passing grade can receive a certificate.
Alternatively, learners can Audit the course for free and have access to select course material, activities, tests, and forums. Please note that this track does not offer a certificate for learners who earn a passing grade.