Food & Cooking — B2 English Lesson

Welcome to Muse English! I am Maya.

Exactly. We have ten great new words for you today, all from the kitchen, and we are going to use each one again and again, so by the end of this episode they will feel completely natural.

Honestly, a bit of both. But lately I have been cooking more at home, and I discovered something amazing. If you marinate chicken before you cook it, even for just one hour, the flavor is completely different.

That sounds delicious. When you marinate food, the sauce actually gets deep inside the meat, so it stays juicy instead of drying out.

Quick break here, because if you like learning this way, you will love the Muse English app. Every day you get ten new words with beautiful photos, you can hear every pronunciation, enjoy this podcast, practice with shadowing stories, test yourself with quizzes and grammar lessons, and even climb the leaderboard by collecting points. It is completely free to install, and your English grows a little every single day. You can find it wherever you get your apps.

Yes! That is exactly why I love to braise meat. When you braise something, you cook it slowly in a little liquid, usually in one pot, and after two or three hours it becomes so soft it falls apart.

That is the magic of a braise. You do not need expensive ingredients. Tough, cheap cuts of meat are actually the best ones to braise, because the slow cooking makes them tender.

Oh yes, and the first time I failed terribly. I cooked them on high heat, they burned, and I learned my lesson. To caramelize properly, you have to go slow. You cook the onions on low heat for about forty minutes until they turn sweet and golden.

It does, but it is worth it. Once you caramelize onions, they become sweet and soft, and you can put them on pizza, in sandwiches, or on a burger. And here is a fun fact: onions are not the only thing you can caramelize. You can caramelize sugar for desserts too, like on top of a creme brulee, or you can caramelize carrots in a hot pan to bring out their natural sweetness.

Exactly. The heat slowly changes the sugar, and that is what gives caramelized food that deep, rich color and sweet taste.

She is right. If you whisk eggs and sugar together until the mixture is thick and pale, you add air to the batter, and that air helps the cake rise in the oven.

Yes, exactly. Whisk with energy for three or four minutes. And it is not just for eggs. You can whisk cream until it becomes fluffy, or whisk a vinaigrette so the oil and vinegar mix together. Honestly, learning to whisk well changed my baking completely.

It really does look like art. To drizzle means to pour a thin stream of liquid, so you drizzle olive oil over a salad, or drizzle honey over warm bread, or drizzle chocolate over ice cream.

Absolutely. And because you only drizzle a little, you do not add too many calories either. A thin drizzle is enough to change the whole plate.

And we are back. Lena, do you ever cook eggs? I mean really gently?

That happens to everyone at first. To poach an egg, you bring the water to a gentle simmer, not a wild boil, then you slide the egg in carefully and let it cook for about three minutes. The result is a poached egg with a firm white and a soft, runny yolk.

Usually in water, but you can also poach fish in milk, or poach pears in sweet wine for dessert. The idea is the same: gentle heat, no rushing. Poached food stays delicate and light.

It sounds fancy, but it just means cutting vegetables into very thin strips, like little matchsticks. When you julienne carrots or peppers, they cook faster and they look beautiful in a salad.

That is true. And julienne cuts are perfect for stir-fries, because thin strips cook in just a few minutes. Once you can julienne an onion quickly, you will feel like a real chef.

I love leftovers! Honestly, some dishes taste even better the next day. I always cook extra rice and chicken so I have leftovers for lunch.

That is smart. And here is a great rule: if you marinate extra meat on Sunday, you can cook it on Monday, and then you have leftovers for Tuesday. One cooking session, three easy meals.

A glaze is a shiny coating, usually sweet, that you brush over food. You can make a simple glaze from honey or sugar and water. You glaze a ham before it goes in the oven, or you glaze a cake with a thin layer of apricot jam, and suddenly it looks professional.

Exactly. A chocolate glaze on a cake, a honey glaze on carrots, a sweet glaze on cinnamon rolls. It adds shine, sweetness, and flavor all at once.

Me too. Chewy means the food needs a lot of chewing, like a chewy caramel, chewy bread with a thick crust, or chewy dried mango. It is a great texture word. Some people love soft food, but I love that chewy bite.

Okay, let us do a quick review of our ten kitchen words. To marinate means to soak food in sauce before cooking. To braise means to cook slowly in a little liquid.

To poach means to cook gently in hot water. To julienne means to cut into thin strips. Leftovers are the food that stays after a meal.

And remember, you can caramelize onions, whisk your eggs, drizzle oil over your salad, poach an egg for breakfast, and julienne vegetables for a stir-fry. Your kitchen vocabulary is growing.

Thanks for listening to Muse English. We will see you tomorrow with ten brand new words.