Virtual Bake Off

What to watch: Step it up in the kitchen with these binge-worthy food shows

Story by: Breanna Bruening

If you’ve found yourself cooking at home more often, relying on pizza, ramen and microwaved meals more than you’d like to admit, you may have realized that making delicious food day after day is a lot more work than you’d thought. We all have our staple meals, but a quarantine kitchen — or any kitchen — is best when it’s stocked with diversity and can be utilized for a variety of satisfying meals. Whether quarantine forced you into your own kitchen for the first time or you’ve always considered yourself a seasoned at-home chef, you can prevent kitchen boredom by expanding your mind with media centered around food and cooking. Here are our editorial picks for food shows that are both entertaining and educational:

1. Salt Fat Acid Heat [available on Netflix]: In this four-part Netflix documentary series, chef and food writer Samin Nosrat explores the four essential elements of good food: salt, fat, acid and heat. The show is based on Nosrat’s book, titled “Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking.” Each episode is dedicated to one of these facets of delicious food, with Nosrat exploring a new corner of the world and highlighting how the culture she visits implements salt, fat, acid or heat in its traditional or popular cuisine. If you’re interested in exploring different cultures through food, this docu-series is for you.

2. How To Cook That [available on YouTube]: Food scientist, pastry chef and dietitian Ann Reardon caters to almost 5 million sweets lovers on her YouTube channel. If you’re always craving a sweet treat but don’t know how to make them yourself, following this channel will bring you one step closer to making your chocolatey, sugary dreams a reality. Reardon focuses her videos on creative desserts, cakes and chocolates, but she provides other cooking-related videos including kitchen gadget reviews and exposés that debunk outlandish food videos. Reardon combines her baking and confectionery skills with an artistic flair to produce massive cakes and treats that are relevant to pop culture. Whether you plan to recreate her recipes or just watch the process, we guarantee the frosting-covered channel will inspire you and wake up your sweet tooth.

3. Four Levels [available on the Epicurious YouTube channel]: This demonstration-based series hosted by media brand Epicurious includes three levels of chefs, ranging from ameteur to home chef to professional chef. Each makes their version of an assigned dish, guiding the audience step by step. When all the dishes are complete, the fourth and final level (hence the name) assesses the dishes and how they came to be. “Level Four” is a food scientist, who delves into the mechanics and chemistry of how each chef went about preparing their dish. Each episode provides tips and tricks for next time you’re cooking the dish at hand, and sometimes a laugh from how the Level One chefs prepare their food. If you like fast facts and cooking tips, check out this YouTube series.