CookBook Team
Cooking and baking guides
Reference guides for the techniques recipes mention but rarely explain. Each guide answers the question first, then gives the numbers, the sources and a calculator where one helps.
CookBook TeamUpdated
Bread and pizza
The maths of dough: how much water, how to count a starter and when to use a preferment.
| Guide or tool | What it answers |
|---|---|
| Dough hydration explained | What hydration means, how to calculate it and typical ranges for bread and pizza. |
| Poolish, biga and levain compared | How the three preferments differ and how to count them in a formula. |
| Baker's percentage calculator | Convert a recipe between grams and baker's percentages. |
| Pizza dough calculator | Grams for every ingredient from dough ball weight and hydration. |
Sugar and browning
Why food browns, how caramel develops and what each sugar syrup stage makes.
| Guide | What it answers |
|---|---|
| Caramelization explained | When sugars brown, how colour and flavour change and how to control caramel. |
| Maillard reaction vs caramelization | How the two browning reactions differ and how to get better browning. |
| Sugar syrup stages and temperatures | Temperatures and cold-water tests from thread to hard crack. |
Pastry and desserts
How classic pastries, meringues and ganache are built and why they behave as they do.
| Guide or tool | What it answers |
|---|---|
| Types of pastry compared | Shortcrust, sweet pastry, puff, rough puff, choux and filo side by side. |
| French, Swiss and Italian meringue compared | Method, sugar ratio, temperature and uses of each meringue. |
| Ganache ratio calculator | Chocolate to cream ratios for glaze, filling and truffles. |
Measurements
Need grams instead of cups? Use the ingredient weight chart or browse all free cooking tools.
Reuse and citation
Each guide lists its sources and ends with a ready-made citation. You can reuse the text and tables under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence (CC BY 4.0) when you credit CookBook Manager and link to the guide.