Chemistry in Your Kitchen - by Matthew Hartings (Paperback)

About the Book

Introducing basic chemistry through everyday foods and meal preparations, this book is a fascinating read for anyone interested in the science behind cooking.

Book Synopsis

Whether you know it or not, you become a chemist any time you step into a kitchen. As you cook, you oversee intricate chemical transformations that would test even the most hardened of professional chemists. Focussing on how and why we cook different dishes the way we do, this book introduces basic chemistry through everyday foods and meal preparations. Through its unique meal-by-meal organisation, the book playfully explores the chemistry that turns our food into meals. Topics covered range from roasting coffee beans to scrambling eggs and gluten development in breads. The book features many experiments that you can try in your own kitchen, such as exploring the melting properties of cheese, retaining flavour when cooking and pairing wines with foods. Through molecular chemistry, biology, neuroscience, physics and agriculture, the author discusses various aspects of cooking and food preparation. This is a fascinating read for anyone interested in the science behind cooking.

From the Back Cover

Whether you know it or not, you become a chemist any time you step into a kitchen. As you cook, you oversee intricate chemical transformations that would test even the most hardened of professional chemists.

Focussing on how and why we cook different dishes the way we do, this book introduces basic chemistry through everyday foods and meal preparations. Through its unique meal-by-meal organisation, the book playfully explores the chemistry that turns our food into meals. Topics covered range from roasting coffee beans to scrambling eggs and gluten development in breads. The book features many experiments that you can try in your own kitchen, such as exploring the melting properties of cheese, retaining flavour when cooking and pairing wines with foods.

Through molecular chemistry, biology, neuroscience, physics and agriculture, the author discusses various aspects of cooking and food preparation. This is a fascinating read for anyone interested in the science behind cooking.

Review Quotes

Chemistry in Your Kitchen is without a doubt a delicious book. Hartings serves up a marvellous mix of recipes and chemical explanations that can really whet your appetite. His writing is engaging, and he uses storytelling as the vehicle to explore various foods. There are molecular diagrams and reaction explanations throughout. If you are a chemistry teacher and enjoy the kitchen, then this book is for you.

About the Author

Matthew R Hartings is an Assistant Professor at the American University, where he runs a chemistry of cooking class that is very popular with non-science majors.