Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 897, Cooking a Meal.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 897.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
Our website is eslpod.com.
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This episode is a dialogue between Rachel and Emeril about cooking something to eat.
Let's get started.
Can you hand me that pan?
This pot?
No, that pan over there.
I need to pan fry these vegetables.
Wouldn't it be healthier if we steamed the vegetables or grilled them?
Maybe, but for this meal, I'm frying them in this pan.
Okay.
Do you want me to heat the sauce in this saucepan?
No, I'm going to microwave that right before I serve it.
Have you considered simmering it in a saucepan to get a better consistency?
We don't have time for that.
Slice this meat and marinate it before I broil it.
Maybe we could bake it at a lower temperature so that the meat won't get dried out.
We'll try that another time.
Can you get that cutting board and chop these carrots and dice these onions?
Sure, but don't you think...
What I think is that there will be six hungry children coming through that door in an hour and I need to finish dinner.
You're here to help, right?
Yes, of course.
That's exactly what I was trying to do.
Emeril begins by saying to Rachel, Can you hand me that pan?
To hand, H-A-N-D, someone, something, means to give it to them with your hand.
A pan P-A-N is a metal object with a round bottom that we use to cook food on what we call a stove.
A stove.
S-T-O-V-E is where you have a small fire or heat that comes from below and you put something on top of that heat in order to cook it.
Usually on a stove, we use what's called a pan.
Rachel is a little confused.
She says this pot.
A pot.
POT is a kind of pan, but it's got very long sides so that it holds a lot of liquid, a lot of water.
If you're going to make soup, you would use a pot.
If you are going to make some eggs, fry some eggs, you would use a pan.
Emeril says, no, that pot over there.
I need to pan fry these vegetables.
To pan fry.
F-R-Y means to cook something with a little bit of oil in the pan over a very high heat.
Rachel says wouldn't it be healthier, wouldn't it be better for your body if we steamed the vegetables or grilled them?
Emeril wants to fry the vegetables in a pan with oil.
Rachel wants to steam or grill the vegetables.
To steam S-T-E-A-M means to cook something, especially vegetables, not in water, but in water vapor.
So what happens is you have water that's boiling, that's very hot, and it's giving off heat.
It's giving off water vapor.
And you use the heat from that vapor to cook the food.
You don't put the food in the water.
You don't put the food on a metal object like a pan.
To grill G-R-I-L-L means to take the food and put it over an open fire so that the food isn't directly on a pan.
It's on a piece of metal that is over the heat source, is over the fire in this case.
You can grill lots of different kinds of food.
We often associate grilling food with cooking food outside over open fire, over a source of heat.
Emeril says maybe we could steam or grill the vegetables, but for this meal I'm frying them in a pan.
Emeril is not going to change his mind.
He doesn't want to steam the vegetables over water.
He doesn't want to grill them directly over the heat, but He wants to pan fry them, put them in a metal object called a pan and put that over the heat and add a little oil.
Rachel says, okay, do you want me to heat this sauce in this sauce pan?
To heat means to make hot, to warm something up.
A sauce pan is small pot that you use typically for making what are called sauces, which is a liquid that you would eat with your food.
That's a saucepan.
It's not big enough, for example, to make pasta in, but you can put water or other liquid in a saucepan.
It's a small pot that you can use to make other kinds of food.
Emeril says no.
No, he doesn't want Rachel to heat the sauce in a saucepan.
He says, I'm going to microwave that right before I use it.
To microwave, as a verb, means to cook something in A kitchen appliance called a microwave oven.
It's a special kind of oven that cooks using, you guessed it, microwaves.
Almost every American home, every American kitchen has a microwave oven.
They're very, very common here.
Rachel says...
Have you considered, have you thought about simmering it in a saucepan to get a better consistency?
To simmer S-I-M-M-E-R means to boil something, but at a very medium heat, not too high of a heat to simmer.
Usually, you simmer a liquid over a long period of time in order to get a better taste from it.
Rachel is asking Emeril if he has thought about simmering this sauce, this liquid he's making, in order to get a better consistency.
Consistency, when we're talking about food, is how thick or thin or smooth the food is.
For example, you can have a soup that has a very thin consistency.
You can have a soup that has a thick consistency.
A thick consistency would be heavier.
It would... feel like there was more in your mouth if you took a spoonful and put it in your mouth.
Emeril, who's not very interested obviously, in Rachel's opinions, says no, we don't have time for that.
Slice this meat and marinate it before I broil it.
To slice, S-L-I-C-E, means to cut with a knife.
Typically to cut food, usually in thin pieces.
Americans typically buy bread that has already been sliced.
It's already been cut by a machine.
To slice then means to cut.
Emeril is asking Rachel to slice this meat... and marinate it.
To marinate M-A-R-I-N-A-D-E means to place a piece of meat or some vegetables, usually in some sort of liquid, for a long period of time, so that the meat or the vegetables has a better flavor, a better taste.
Marinate can also be a noun meaning that liquid you use to give it a better taste.
Emeril wants Rachel to marinate the meat before he broils it.
To broil B-R-O-I-L means to cook the outside of some food by putting it directly close to the flame or the fire or the heat source.
It's similar to grilling, but broiling, at least in an American oven, is often done on the very bottom of the oven.
There's a separate section called a broiler.
And the heat source is usually above the food.
And you put the food in underneath the heat to cook it.
Grilling, you're typically putting the meat or the food over the open flame, on top of the heat.
Rachel, who still wants to give her opinion, says maybe we could bake it at a lower temperature so that the meat won't get dried out.
To bake, B-A-K-E, means to cook something inside of an oven, surrounded by hot air.
Rachel wants to bake the meat so that it won't get dried out.
To be dried D-R-I-E-D out means that most or all of the liquid has left the food and it doesn't taste very good.
It tastes dry.
It tastes hard.
Not like it should.
Emeril says, we'll try that another time, meaning we'll try that in the future someday.
He's not interested in Rachel's opinion, as I mentioned earlier.
He tells her, can you get that cutting board and chop these carrots and dice these onions?
A cutting board is a flat rectangular or square piece of wood or plastic that you use to cut on.
If you're going to be cutting something, you don't want to hurt or damage your kitchen, the tops of your what we would call counters in your kitchen, the space that you have to prepare your food.
So you use a cutting board, a piece of wood or plastic you put underneath the food, in order to cut it.
Emeril wants Rachel to use a cutting board And chop carrots.
To chop C-H-O-P means to cut usually a fruit or a vegetable into smaller pieces.
To dice D-I-C-E means also to cut fruit or vegetables into small pieces, but even smaller than chopping.
So chopping, you're cutting the food, the vegetables or the fruit into large pieces.
Dicing means to cut them into very small pieces.
Rachel says, sure, but don't you think... She wants to offer another opinion.
Emeril says...
What I think is that there will be six hungry children coming through that door in an hour and I need to finish dinner.
You're here to help, right?
Rachel says, yes, of course.
That's exactly what I was trying to do.
Emeril is getting a little impatient with Rachel.
He's telling her that...
She should stop offering her opinions and just do what Emeril says.
Emeril obviously has never been married.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Can you hand me that pan?
This pot?
No, that pan over there.
I need to pan fry these vegetables.
Wouldn't it be healthier if we steamed the vegetables or grilled them?
Maybe, but for this meal, I'm frying them in this pan.
Okay.
Do you want me to heat the sauce in this saucepan?
No, I'm going to microwave that right before I serve it.
Have you considered simmering it in a saucepan to get a better consistency?
We don't have time for that.
Slice this meat and marinate it before I broil it.
Maybe we could bake it at a lower temperature so that the meat won't get dried out.
We'll try that another time.
Can you get that cutting board and chop these carrots and dice these onions?
Sure, but don't you think?
What I think is that there will be six hungry children coming through that door in an hour and I need to finish dinner.
You're here to help, right?
Yes, of course.
That's exactly what I was trying to do.
Her scripts always taste wonderful.
I speak, of course, of our own master chef, Dr. Lucy Say, chef of the dialogues.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2013 by the Center for Educational Development.
