Masala Lab: The Science of Indian Cooking

It is a great enjoyable read with mild humour to make the read more interesting and enjoyable.... some did make me smile. If you are looking for a cookbook of recipes, then this is not it. There are loads of them elsewhere. But, if you are looking for the why and how to do it better with valid reasons, then this is that book. I always wanted to know why this order or that and why sometimes my cooking goes bitter. I learned that Indian cooking has layers of flavour to give that depth. Now, it makes sense. And now I can use this with all my other cooking ideas and cookbook recipes and adapt it with what I have now learned to make it taste better than before.

I had this sent to my daughter in England. She'll read it first. My turn will be in November. I heard the author talking on BBC radio and thought the book might be interesting, and not just applicable to South Asian food.

Pros, well written amusing book about the science of food cooking generally. The downs, well that's my own fault, I fell for the news story that making biryani is a science, not the authors fault as that's not what is promised by him, what he does do is explain the science and mechanics of a good biryani and many other dishes but sadly not the magic recipe, but that is hard as there will be many versions of it. Hopefully my pursuit of the perfect biryani will be helped by the science I have learned. Great for beginners, but I think old hands in the kitchen know this through experience( I am an old hand), but you are never too old to learn something new. Buy it to understand the cooking process of all food items, don't buy it for the magic biryani recipe if that's all you are looking for.

Any cookbook that quotes Douglas Adams gets my vote.

Writinen in a funny way. Interesting information is there

Just waffle and total theory (some call it bollocks?). This is just a waste of money and valuable life wasted if you even bother to read this all the way through. You'll never get that time back. Better curry books out there tbh. Sent back.

Superb book … but I got to page 164 and instead of page 165 it went back to page 5! I got pages 5-36 then it jumped to page 197.

This author PROMOTES GMOs and other things like unfermented soy on his social media, then when people tell him they were personally harmed by soy, he says this is a question for your doctor. Hard Pass

A fascinating book that’s definitely worth buying and owning.

Somewhat detailed, but really interesting

Book Review Finished reading Krish Ashok's sensational book Masala Lab which delves into the Science of Cooking and how it can help us save time, hone our cooking skills, bust some myths and cook that Perfect Biriyani, our most prized invention and the highest ordered item in Indian restaurants. Krish employs a mix of chemistry and equations but also tries to lighten it with his trademark humor and wit and links it with the practicalities of cooking in an Indian kitchen. I was quite relieved to know microwave cooking is perfectly safe and that I can continue to cook rice in a microwave (always wonder why more people dont do it), which is how I have been cooking rice for quite long now. The various chapters in the book deal with the various methods of cooking, why we soak lentils and rice, the wonders of pressure cooking and how to make the perfect idli/dosa batter and even chapatis. I learnt that kneading can actually be done away with when it comes to soft chapatis (wish I knew this years back when I started out!). Why meat requires finesse when it comes to cooking and the ideal temperatures is again something new I learnt as is the importance of BRINING meat, a new revelation. Like this there are several tricks and tips throughout the book. There are illustrative tables of spice combos, diagrams of fleshy onions and dancing molecules and smoking points for oils. Finally Krish introduces us to his algorithm approach to making basic gravies, raitas, rice and even the perfect mouthwatering biriyani. What else can you expect from a guy who is a software engineer and not a chef?! Thoroughly enjoyed the book and while there are no fail proof recipes and neither will you be churning out delicious food just yet, it will surely help you to modify your cooking process for the better and discard some wrong or useless practices. Because as Krish rightly says making the tastiest dish can differ from person to person, house to house, where you sourced your meat or vegetables, the temperature of the city where you are cooking and the temperature when it hits your tongue! I hope Krish will write Part II and cover some more areas: seafood for eg which is not covered much and help answer some more of my queries like why I still struggle to make a decent cup of coffee consistently? But he does answer a lot of viewer queries on his Instagram page which you should definitely follow if you want more food science enlightenment. Apart from the book of course!

Good content, it’s not a reading book, it’s a studying book so the book needs to be much bigger to be practical, double of the size, to make easier to compare and to see better the many charts provided.

The sheer writing style and elegance that Krish Ashok has in conveying food-related topics is fascinating. Great read for evenings after a long work day.