I was roasting some whole beets rubbed with oil and salt in my toaster oven at 400F. About twenty minutes into roasting, they let out a rather chilling squeal. What would cause that?
I also notice that roasted potatoes faintly squeal when I take them out of the oven.
Have you had foods that have surprising sounds coming from them?
Steam escaping between the skin and the baking pan would be my assumption.
The only thing my food ever says to me is “eat me.”
My food also says, “Yes. Yes, you do want seconds…”
I think the answer is stop cooking and eating the anthropomorphic vegetables, and their death cry won’t be heard. Wow, I’ve never had my roasted veggies speak to me (potatoes and beets included). I wonder if it’s the way your toaster oven is heating.
Potatoes whistle a lot-- especially when nuked. The steam sounds a bit like a tea kettle.
When you nuke a baked potato, it whistles.
Beans usually speak to me after I consume them. Ancient Egyptians believed that was the souls of the dead being let loose. I’ve let a lot dead souls go into our atmosphere. Love them beans, though.
tmi🙂
Bubble and Squeak!
and Fajitas!
Many Canadians like it when their cheese curds are squeaky. also called Squeaky Cheese.
Taking a fresh sourdough loaf out of the oven, it crackles of its own accord. Janeane Garofalo’s character in Ratatouille was right. Good bread “sings”.
You know when stuff has started to brown in the pan when the sound changes from the high pitched, whispery sound of water boiling off into the drier, more crackly sound of fat.
And certainly, one can always tell from the sound how close the water is to boiling, no watching the pot needed.
A soft-shell crab I was shallow frying made little popping sounds. So did some romano beans, same prep.
I noticed a lot of popping sounds when I was blanching the haricots verts.
The tea kettle squeal in roasting happens with dense veggies because a pocket of steam is building up inside and escaping through a fissure all at once, instead of diffusing out more uniformly like in softer foods. Same reason most people poke potatoes before baking or microwaving them, to make vent holes because otherwise steam buildup can occasionally explode them.
Anything with bonito flakes on top makes a spooky rustling sound.
I thought so when a professor of mine in college presented this idea to us. Still, I was intrigued by the belief.
My aunt wrote out a recipe for stovetop biryani for me that literally says “cook over a low heat until you hear the pot make a ‘chit-pit-chit-pit’ sound”. Apparently that is the sound that signals the rice is perfectly done.
Sometimes they very LARGE popping sounds
when browning butter, you know it’s getting there when it stops talking to you
chocolate bars can make little popping sounds as they contract and release from the molds - especially in colder weather when that happens more rapidly
From back in my childhood, the sound of popcorn kernels pinging off the lid of a tall pot on the stove as we took turns shaking the pot back and forth over the burner.
Turn on the hot water tap. When it is cold at the start the sound is lower than once it turns hot
