Science + cooking: Free online culinary school from Modernist Cuisine authors

“Modernist Cuisine” authors launch free online cooking school

Modernist Cuisine encyclopedia will have an online version in form of a free online cooking school.Called ChefSteps, the educational platfom is the idea of a group of alumni from Modernist Cuisine. The future students will master techniques of traditional and modernist cooking through practical, hands-on demonstrations with detailed step-by-step explanations.

Unlike at other culinary schools, said the ChefSteps’ team, the “cooking enthusiast,” will also learn the why’s behind the how’s from experts who bring the science of cooking to life in a compelling and practical way.

Chris Young, Grant Crilly, and Ryan Matthew Smith—all alumni of the Modernist Cuisine team, built their own experimental kitchen (and photo studio) lab based in Seattle’s famous Pike Place Market. The first online ChefSteps course the team dedicated to sous vide cooking and the sous-vide machine, molecular gastronomy’s favorite cooking tool.


Chris Young
is the principal coauthor of the acclaimed six-volume work Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking, which was named both the 2012 Cookbook of the Year and Best Professional Cookbook of the year by the James Beard Foundation and has been a worldwide best seller.

Grant Crilly was the first development chef hired by the Modernist Cuisine team. Prior to this he was chef de cuisine at Busaba in Mumbai and Mistral in Seattle, and served as head development chef at Delicious Planet. He has cooked for Pascal Barbot at L’Astrance, worked with Pierre Hermé’s team at Grégoire-Ferrandi, and practiced butchery at Bajon Jean Pierre in Paris.

Ryan Matthew Smith was the principal photographer and photo editor for Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking.

High-end cooking can also be achieved online via Escoffier Online International Culinary Academy, the digital cooking version of famed Escoffier School of Culinary Arts. The Escoffier Certified diploma can be yours for $5,000 USD.