A food editor from the Washington Post once asked Chef Francois Dionot, founder of L’Academie de Cuisine, to name the most important tool in the kitchen. “Hands,” said he, “hands are the cook’s most important tool.”
Food and cookbook writers rightly champion the virtues of uniformly cut, diced, or cubed meats and vegetables. However, there are many dishes where pulling products apart by hand makes them easier to eat and gives a nicer appearance than diligent knife work. For example, it’s de rigueur for pull-pork and pull-beef barbecue preparations. Less obvious are chicken dishes, mushrooms, and greens.
I suspect many of you grew up on baked chicken and mushroom soup and the many variations of this canonical dish. Old recipes call for whole chicken legs, thighs, and breasts. But there is a better way. When the dish is nearly completed, take the time to tong out the whole chicken pieces and, when cool enough to handle, shred the meat by hand — pulling the dark meat off the bone and breaking apart the white breast meat. Trash the bones and return the meat to the pot.
Now you have a dish that is easier to eat and more refined and attractive. Stew-like dishes such as coq au vin, chicken curry, and chicken pot pies should also be prepared this way.
The mushroom is another case where they’re nicer when broken up by hand. Exotic mushrooms — the chanterelle, morel, oyster, and even the portobello — should be treated with more respect because their tastes are unique, their appearances are distinctive, and they cost a lot.
Less obvious is the improved appearance of greens torn by hand. The tough stems of spinach and arugula should be removed by hand, and so should the tough white midrib of leaf lettuces like Romaine for Caesar salad. Then, pull apart what’s left into bite-sized pieces. Don’t use a knife.
