Knowledge Base > Eric Wynkoop - Ask Me Anything (Office Hours)

Ask Me Anything (Office Hours)

Eric Wynkoop - Ask Me Anything (Office Hours)

This event was on Tuesday, April 08, 2025 at 11:00 am Pacific, 2:00 pm Eastern

Join Chef Eric Wynkoop in his virtual office as he welcomes all of your questions. This event was created for you and we encourage you to Ask Anything – from cooking techniques to co… Read More.

Recorded

Question:

I don't drink alcohol and I read that adding wine to foods retains 40% of the alcohol after cooking for 15 minutes and 25% after 60 minutes. What can I use as a replacement?

— Connie Prince

Answer:

You know, I have heard numbers similar to this, you know, that, um, it just takes a while to drive off the alcohol during the cooking process. And, uh, even then you might have some small percentage that lingers for quite some time. And so, for anyone that is interested in omitting alcohol from a recipe, you know, generally my first recommendation is to simply omit the alcohol. Um, typically alcohol is used as a flavoring ingredient, and it's added in a pretty small quantity. You know, it might be one fluid ounce or two or three fluid ounces, you know, in which case, uh, simply omitting that is not going to, um, alter the flavor in a negative way. Okay? If you were to make two batches of that something and taste them side by side, depending on the alcoholic beverage that's used, or, you know, recommended, you might pick up the difference. I mean, hopefully you would, that's the, the point of using the alcohol. But, um, if you just simply OMI it, you're probably not gonna miss it. Um, just take a look at the volume, uh, that is decreased by the omission and bring it up by the addition of water or stock. Uh, it could be another flavorful liquid. Typically, when we work with, uh, you know, liquids in this situation, we wanna think about a flavorful liquid, uh, to replace a flavorful liquid, or like if you're making soup or stew, uh, we try to use stock instead of water, right? To emphasize the, the richer flavor, um, that will, uh, be the result of your cooking. So, you know, think about using stock first, that's gonna be the easiest, um, solution.
Eric Wynkoop

Eric Wynkoop

Director of Culinary Instruction

rouxbe.com