Fire Cooking - Top 10 Trends 2021/22 - thefoodpeople

So let's talk about fire cooking! 

In a world where elements of comfort are key, the hearth has very much become the home. For us, fire cooking sits as part of the broader trend movement - Stand Out. 

Fire cooking may not be new, we've been cooking over fire for millennia. In fact, until about 150 years ago, every household had a fire in it that you could cook over. But the way that we're engaging with fire cooking and the level of sophistication really continues to evolve at pace - both in restaurants and also at home. 

Both cooks and chefs are getting even more creative within the fire cooking sphere. Many chefs that we've talked to around the globe have been inspired by Argentine chef Francis Mallmann and his book, Mallmann on Fire.

Unlike some of the other cooking techniques, such as, sous vide, using a pacojet or even a regular deck oven, fire and wood fire cooking is a sensory experience. Not only for the cook but everyone around it. You see the flames, you smell the smoke - it really feels like cooking.

If you have a fire, either, outside or inside - people gather around it, people connect around fire. And whether it's at home or in a restaurant, there's just something about live-fire cooking, it’s an analogue expression of craft and skill. You've got to tame that flame.

Both at home and in commercial kitchens, we see experimentation going to a whole new level with the different woods. Things like olive, chestnut, hickory or grapevine even - to deliver that nuanced flavour. Temperature, how the embers behave and therefore how you can cook in different ways. And the sophistication of equipment is really starting to ramp up - again, both indoors and outdoors: spits, tandoors, open-hearth ranges, pizza ovens, asado planchas, ocakbasi, binchotan and charcoal grills.

And also fire cooking is going beyond main dishes, into desserts, vegetables, as well as breakfast and brunch.

Last year we all saw the craze around burnt basque cheesecake or grilled bread with an egg yolk and some lardon on the top - which was a dish that popularised by the work that Tomos Parry has been doing at Brat and Climpson's Arch.

But there's also a global grill influence. We're seeing increased cuisine influence when it comes to fire cooking from places like Japan, Mexico, the Middle East, as well as India, Korea and of course, we couldn't forget regional American.

One of the other things that's been happening is layering fire on fire flavour in one dish. We're seeing much more use in one application of things like smoked, burnt, roast, caramelized and charred. Grilled Cornish sardines with burnt ginger vinaigrette was a dish that we spotted recently, or another example, a grilled short rib with fire wilted horseradish, smoked bone marrow.

In this era of comfort, fire cooking is more important than ever before, there's something really special about fire and the role that it plays.

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