Whisked Away

April 6, 2018 8:53 AM

The Science of Cooking: Best Way to Use a Whisk. (SLYT 3 minutes)
posted by storybored (39 comments total)

I'm already upset that one of their test cases wasn't homemade mayonnaise.
posted by poffin boffin at 9:15 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

Neat. I would not have guessed those results.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:15 AM on April 6, 2018 [4 favorites]

Cool, I've always found side to side more comfortable to do.
posted by dowcrag at 9:16 AM on April 6, 2018

update extremely nerdy metronome use has earned my forgiveness
posted by poffin boffin at 9:16 AM on April 6, 2018 [7 favorites]

Huh.
posted by chococat at 9:23 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

I've made mayo, but in the food processor. I don't make vinegarette or whipped cream.. I use a fork to scramble raw eggs.. Maybe it's because I do it wrong, but I've never found a whisk to be good at mixing. (Plus they are a pain to wash.. ). Might have to try again with this in mind - back and forth..
posted by k5.user at 9:24 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

I like to put stuff in a glass, then put the whisk in vertically. Hold it by pressing it between my palms/fingers, and move them forwards and backwards like I’m trying to start a fire with two sticks.

Ideally this is a glass with a rounded bottom, not a flat one.

I have not timed this but given the discussion in the video of the physics of why side-to-side whisking works, I would not be at all surprised to find its pretty efficient.
posted by egypturnash at 9:24 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

I have learned something truly useful. Thank you.
posted by kinnakeet at 9:25 AM on April 6, 2018

I'd kind of assumed that everyone knew that stirring with a whisk was pretty useless. I mean, once you've started the liquid swirling in the direction that the whisk is moving, the whisk is basically stationary relative to the liquid. You might as well just hold the whisk still at the centre of the bowl and just gently slosh the bowl about for all the good it does.

update extremely nerdy metronome use has earned my forgiveness

I was so hoping they'd built a robot...
posted by pipeski at 9:25 AM on April 6, 2018 [4 favorites]

I can't remember the last time I did any of these tasks by hand (this is why we farm electric eels, for crying out loud), but I am surprised that side-to-side is better than the circular egg-beating motion.

(I will admit to making mayo by hand sometimes, though, because I can't be bothered to wash the food processor, and the Kitchenaid is much too big for a single-yolk mayo.)
posted by uncleozzy at 9:28 AM on April 6, 2018 [2 favorites]

Alternate title: “I should warn you, there’s a little whisk involved.”
posted by ricochet biscuit at 9:53 AM on April 6, 2018 [8 favorites]

Whisk Versus: We Warred
posted by uncleozzy at 9:55 AM on April 6, 2018 [5 favorites]

> stirring with a whisk was pretty useless. [...] the whisk is basically
> stationary relative to the liquid
Yeah. Same applies to dissolving sugar in your hot drink - teaspoon should be moved side to site, facing in the direction of movement.

> Kitchenaid is much too big for a single-yolk mayo
Use a stick blender, e.g: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3xx8Bpau0E
posted by merlynkline at 9:57 AM on April 6, 2018 [3 favorites]

I usually sort of do kind of a hybrid side/beat/figure 8's for cream/egg whites. At culinary school they liked to torture you with whisking stuff. Pretty much daily it was all about the bowl on a towel, making mayo or aioli, hollandaise/béarnaise etc. They never did mention the side-to-side method, though, hmm. Cool to see the science behind it.
posted by chococat at 10:19 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

Neat.
posted by RhysPenbras at 10:20 AM on April 6, 2018

Yes, for mayonnaise anything other than a stick blender is silly.

Maybe its just me but I fully expected this video to explore Overhand/Underhand grips of the whisk, not the actual pattern made by the movement.

How is there any surprise that circular whisking is less efficient? I could practically hear my chef-dads voice saying "are you whisking it or chasing it around the bowl" when I watched that clip.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 10:39 AM on April 6, 2018

GOBSMACKED. I always do all the test tasks by hand because the noise of the mixer harshes my cooking mellow, and have been doing the beating motion for so many decades that I wonder if I can make myself do the side-to-side motion! Also, I incurred a wrist injury a couple of years ago and it has made whisking almost impossible for me so I tend to just avoid projects that require it, but I think I can avoid bending my wrist at all with the side-to-side. Awesome. Thanks so much for posting. This is going to improve my life.
posted by HotToddy at 10:58 AM on April 6, 2018 [4 favorites]

Neat stuff, and it might explain why I find it easier to build up foam with a shaving brush by whipping back and forth.

But I wonder at the use of the metronome a little--they're this measuring which is the most efficient at these tasks per movement of the whisk, but I can imagine lots of instances where a cook can move the whisk faster for longer in a circular motion than back and forth.
posted by pykrete jungle at 11:17 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

"Maybe it's because I do it wrong, but I've never found a whisk to be good at mixing. (Plus they are a pain to wash.. ). "

I use a dishwasher, but before dropping in the dishwasher I'll often put water in a bowl, and whisk the water for a couple of seconds, which will clean it off quite well.
posted by el io at 11:21 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

I assumed the metronome was so that they could get consistent times between techniques - i.e. the whisk wasn't being moved faster in one test than in another, which would throw off the comparative times. Surely in practice the speed of movement is up to the cook. And it may be that side-to-side is so much more efficient than circular that being able to keep up the circular motion for longer isn't even necessary (though that's just speculation).
posted by Greg_Ace at 11:28 AM on April 6, 2018

Foley Forks work really well with this sort of motion.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 11:40 AM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

I had to take out my whisk and a bowl to try what it is I usually do. It seems I beat it. Good thing I have electrical appliances then.
posted by mumimor at 11:43 AM on April 6, 2018

I've always thought of Wisk as a brand of detergent and wondered why they used it to refer to a kitchen tool. (Ignore the "h" after the "w"... but then my last name starts with "w" and many people have mistakenly added an "h" so I am biased) Anyway, it's interesting to learn that Wisk's parent company is currently phasing out the brand name in favor of their Persil brand. They should've just started making detergent pods.
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:12 PM on April 6, 2018

Same applies to dissolving sugar in your hot drink - teaspoon should be moved side to site, facing in the direction of movement.

TIL there's some difficulty in getting sugar to dissolve in a hot drink which requires specialized spooning technique to solve.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 1:17 PM on April 6, 2018 [3 favorites]

While we're on the subject, if you ever see a whisk like this one, buy it immediately. They're so much better than the standard balloon whisk. When I got mine 25+ years ago, it cost almost nothing, but you'll pry it from my cold, dead hands...
posted by pipeski at 2:45 PM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

Anyway, it's interesting to learn that Wisk's parent company is currently phasing out the brand name in favor of their Persil brand.

It's also interesting that Persil is French for 'parsley'. Why the hell would you want your clothes to smell of parsley?
posted by pipeski at 2:47 PM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

Given that mayonnaise is an emulsion, like a dressing, I bet the side-to-side results are just as valid.
posted by timdiggerm at 3:02 PM on April 6, 2018

It's also interesting that Persil is French for 'parsley'. Why the hell would you want your clothes to smell of parsley?

Not parsley, but German sensibility: The first “self-acting” laundry detergent was launched on June 6, 1907, and was given the name “Persil”. The name derived from the two most important chemical raw materials in the product, perborate and silicate.
posted by Iris Gambol at 3:05 PM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

I am glad they pointed out the difference between beating and stirring. The whole point of whisking an egg white is to add air, so you have to move the whisk in and out of the liquid.
posted by soelo at 3:29 PM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

For coffee I’ve always gone in a circle but just switched directions every few rotations. Keeps things nice and churny.
posted by freecellwizard at 3:33 PM on April 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

That's a great channel! This video is also good: what is gluten, and what does it look/feel like? The guy extracts a solid ball of gluten from dough and then blows up the gluten like a balloon.
posted by tickingclock at 1:35 AM on April 7, 2018 [4 favorites]

For beating egg whites or cream to stiffness, a spiral whisk (like this), which is used in an up and down motion, is highly effective. They seem to be not very popular anymore, though.

TIL there's some difficulty in getting sugar to dissolve in a hot drink which requires specialized spooning technique to solve.

Judging from working in restaurants, as a lot of coffee cups are returned with a layer of sugar at the bottom, this seems to be a real problem. I got espresso cups which try to address the problem by having a small bump in the middle.
posted by ojemine at 5:52 AM on April 7, 2018

Yes, for mayonnaise anything other than a stick blender is silly.

i have an extremely tiny whisk, like maybe 6 inches long, that i make very tiny amounts of mayonnaise with, regardless of how long it takes me, because i love my stupid tiny whisk.
posted by poffin boffin at 6:45 AM on April 7, 2018 [1 favorite]

I was expecting a humorous video and got 3 minutes 27 second of earnest kitchen nerdery. Thank you. I kind of think I have No Life, but this guy.

Of course I loved the video.
posted by theora55 at 7:56 AM on April 7, 2018 [1 favorite]

Also, storybored, thank you for putting the length of the video in the very good post.
posted by theora55 at 7:59 AM on April 7, 2018

Metafilter: 3 minutes 27 second of earnest kitchen nerdery
posted by ninazer0 at 3:44 PM on April 7, 2018 [1 favorite]

I'm honestly surprisded that a kitchen version of that old laboratory workhorse, the magnetic stirrer and hot plate doesn't seem to exist. They take all the labor out of basic stirring tasks and you could easily make a whisk-like stir bar for one. Need to heat something very precisely while stirring it continuously so that it stays mixed and doesn't burn? That's what these guys do, effortlessly and reliably. Tell me that doesn't sound useful in a kitchen.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 7:44 PM on April 7, 2018 [3 favorites]

Last time I had that thought, I looked at a bunch of catalogs and all of them wanted several hundred dollars for one. I don't know if that's just the Fisher Sci tax, or if there's something intrinsically expensive about them.

I'm also suspicious that they wouldn't have enough torque, and that the magnetic field wouldn't work well with a steel pot. Totally speculating, though.
posted by d. z. wang at 9:50 PM on April 7, 2018

They're definitely low torque but they would work for a lot of things, especially if you used stronger magnets than the rather pitiful ones that they tend to come with. I'm pretty sure they would work through a steel pot just fine. I think part of the price issue is the Fisher Sci tax, and part of it is fact that the hot plate goes from ambient temperature up to about 550°C in accurate one degree increments, which is a level of precision that's generally not found in kitchen appliances.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:03 AM on April 8, 2018