The art of cooking meat

There are those who love it rare and those who want it well done, but the optimal cooking of the meat is not just a matter of individual taste. There are very specific rules to obtain perfect meat, both from a nutritional and health point of view.

Let’s start with cooking on the grill. One of the certain rules is that cooking too much (or at too high temperatures) until meat burns, as well as any other food (grilled vegetables, etc.), is harmful to health due to the development of substances that can damage our DNA. . Even cooking rare, however, is not recommended, in particular for pork, which must be cooked to the right point to destroy potentially pathogenic bacteria: in this regard we speak of “safety cooking temperature”, which is the minimum temperature for ensure the complete elimination of harmful bacteria. For pork this temperature is 63 ° C, then leaving it to rest for 3 minutes and thus allowing it to be enjoyed at medium cooking, therefore juicy and tasty, but always microbiologically safe.

The other methods (in the oven, frying, boiling, microwave and vacuum cooking), do not show substantial differences in terms of nutrient loss, which is minimal. But frying with breading is not recommended, especially if done at uncontrolled temperatures and with oils that cannot withstand the smoke point, while boiling is the one that causes the greatest loss of nutrients. To contain them, a little trick is to immerse the meat in the already boiling water: in this way the thermal shock causes the coagulation of the superficial proteins, protecting the soluble ones and all the nutrients, which remain inside the meat, obtaining a good boiled.

Very interesting is the vacuum cooking method at low and constant temperature (CBT) which has proved to be the best both for the preservation of nutritional benefits, increasing the bioavailability of minerals, and for enhancing the flavor. It consists in placing the meat in vacuum-sealed bags and immersing it in water at a controlled and stable temperature: all the nutrients of the meat do not disperse, but remain in the cooking bag and you do not even need to use oils and seasonings, because the natural juices will keep the meat particularly tasty.