Tier 1 · Prep

TO POUND

Flattening a piece of meat to one even thickness with a mallet or a heavy pan, so that it cooks through everywhere in the same time.

Why it works

Heat moves in from the surface, so a cutlet that is 2 cm at one end and 8 mm at the other is either raw at the thick end or dry at the thin one — there is no temperature that cooks both. Pounding fixes the geometry rather than the heat: a breast taken to an even 6 mm cooks in two or three minutes a side and can be rolled around a filling, as Chicken Kiev is. The blows also break some of the muscle fibres and connective tissue, which is why a pounded cutlet eats more tender than an unpounded one of the same cut. The force wants to be flat and spreading, not chopping — a flat mallet face or the base of a pan, through plastic or paper so the surface does not tear and shreds do not fly. Work from the centre outward; the middle is thickest and the edges are already thin.

How to tell

• Run a flat hand over the whole piece and feel no step — the thickness is the same at the centre as at the edge.
• Held up to the light there are no holes or thin windows; the meat has spread, not torn.
• The piece has grown to roughly twice its area and still lifts off the plastic in one sheet.
• For a filled roll like Kiev, the cutlet drapes and overlaps itself without cracking.

When it goes wrong

Holes and ragged tears in the cutlet, shreds stuck to the mallet.

Struck with an edge or a corner instead of a flat face, or with no plastic between — the blow chopped instead of spreading. Cover the meat and hit flat.

One end is paper-thin while the middle is still thick.

Started at the edges, which were thin to begin with. The first blows belong in the centre, working outward, with the fewest blows where the meat is already thin.

The meat has gone mushy and pastes together when rolled.

Over-pounded. Past even thickness every blow only breaks more fibres; stop the moment the thickness is uniform.

Pounded to the right thickness but cooked unevenly anyway — the edges dried before the centre was done.

The pan was crowded or too cool, so the cutlet steamed and took twice as long. A thin cutlet wants a hot pan and space around it — the pounding bought you speed, spend it.

Recovering it

A tear is patched, not thrown out: overlap the torn edges, chill for ten minutes so they hold, and bread the piece — the crust carries the seam. Too thin at one end is recoverable by folding that end under to double it before it goes in the pan. Mushy over-pounded meat is not recoverable as a cutlet; roll it tightly around a filling and cook it as a roulade, where the texture is hidden, and stop earlier next time.

Where to practice it

It carries to

Recipes using it

Generated from recipe step verbs and ingredient preparation forms. It is never authored, and it cannot drift from the recipes.