Which order of work makes cooking faster?

What shortens the time is not working faster but overlapping the jobs. The job that takes longest and has to wait is started first; while the water boils, the oven heats or the legumes cook, the chopping and the sauce fit in between. That way the total time is not the sum of the jobs but the length of the longest one.

Why does the time pass like a sum of jobs?

Recipes are written step by step, and while reading they look as though they will be done in that order. Yet some of the steps ask for your attention and some only for time. The oven heating, the water boiling and the lentils cooking are steps that need no attention, and while those steps wait in the queue the kitchen stands idle.

Every idle minute gets added to the end. Starting the chopping after the water has boiled adds the chopping time to the meal; chopping while waiting for the boil makes that time invisible.

So the issue is not speed but order. The same jobs, at the same speed, done only in a different order, bring the meal to the table noticeably earlier.

Which job starts first?

The rule is one sentence: the job that takes longest and moves along by itself is started first. The oven goes on, the water goes on the stove, and if the dried legumes have been soaked they go into the pot. None of these needs you standing over them.

Then the preparation jobs get in line. Chopping, grating, mixing the sauce, taking measures; they all fit into the waiting stretches. Because these jobs can be interrupted, they suit being fitted in between.

Left to the end are the short jobs that need attention. Sautéing, frying and cooking eggs are jobs you have to stand over, and once they are started it is better that no other job is running in the kitchen.

What fits into the waiting stretches?

The oven's heating time is usually enough to prepare the tray. The time the water takes to boil is enough to chop the salad, mix the sauce or set the table.

The washing-up fits into these stretches too. Washing the board and the bowl you used while you wait means that when the meal is done, only the serving dish is left on the counter; that noticeably shrinks the job at the end of the evening.

Slipping in a job that will not fit into the stretch backfires. Starting another dish or tidying the refrigerator does not fit into a waiting stretch; it is left half-done and two jobs start running at once.

So the job you put into a stretch has to have one quality: it must be interruptible. An interruptible job can be left when a signal comes from the stove and picked up again where it was; a job that cannot be interrupted means either it or the meal suffers.

Where does the order break down?

The most common breakdown happens when two jobs that need attention fall at the same moment. If something is being sautéed on the stove while a tray has to come out of the oven, one of them will certainly wait. The way to prevent this is to put the jobs that need attention in a queue and take a waiting job in between.

The second breaking point is the ingredients not being ready. However well the order is set, if the ingredients are still in the refrigerator, every step stretches by the time spent looking for them. So the order of work starts with getting the ingredients out.

The third is a step you learn about in the middle of the recipe. If there is an ingredient that has to wait, rest or be soaked beforehand, it belongs at the very start of the order; learned in the middle, it invalidates the whole plan.

What can you do today?

Before you start cooking this evening, ask this: which is the job here that takes longest and does not need me standing over it? Start with the answer and fit the rest into the time it spends waiting.

Also read the recipe through once from start to finish and look for a step that needs waiting. That reading takes a short time and usually gets skipped; yet the information that sets the order of work sits exactly there.