America's Test Kitchen

-Today on "America's Test Kitchen," Becky shows Bridget how to make the perfect herb-crusted pork roast, Adam reveals his top pick for pot holders, Dan uncovers the science of bubbly beverages, Lisa reviews glass water bottles, and Elle makes Julia roasted fingerling potatoes right here on "America's Test Kitchen."

-Pork loin is like the blank canvas of the meat world, or at least it tastes like one, and that is unless you do something serious to that notoriously lean cut of meat.

But lucky for us, Becky is here, and she's going to show us something special to do with pork loin.

-That's right!

I have a center cut pork loin, and it's sort of the poster child of "The Other White Meat" campaign.

-It's true.

-It's got a compact, uniform shape.

It's attractive.

It makes really nice slices, but it's a little bit on the lean side.

It needs some adornment.

-Right.

It's utilitarian, not necessarily celebratory.

-That's right.

-We're going to change that.

-We are going to change that, and we're going to start by brining the meat.

-Okay.

-So let's make a brine.

We have 1/2 cup of table salt into 2 quarts of water and 1/4 cup of sugar.

So we'll just stir that until it dissolves here.

-Sugar is a great way not only to add flavor, but it's also going to help later on with browning.

-Okay, that's looking pretty good.

So here's our pork roast.

It's a 2-1/2-to-3-pound center cut pork roast, and you'll see this has a really nice fat cap on it.

-Beautiful.

-And we definitely don't want to take that off.

That fat tastes good.

-Right, right.

-So I am going to score it, though.

I'm going to make some incisions here, 1/4 inch apart, trying just to go in the fat and not to hit too much of the meat.

This is going to help the herb paste that we'll be adding later.

It'll give that something to cling to.

-Nice.

-It'll also make the meat a little bit easier to brine.

It'll brine up a little bit more quickly.

-Mmm.

-We like fat.

-I do!

-Okay.

Now I'm just going to go the other direction, 1/4 inch apart again.

-A little diamond crosshatching.

-You got it.

Okay, so we're just about done with our crosshatching here, and now I'm going to create a pocket in this roast.

We're going to make an herb paste, and we're going to put that herb paste inside the roast so that every bite gets some of that yummy goodness.

-Love it.

-I'm going to start 1/2 inch from the end of the roast here, just going to stick my knife in.

-And you're going right into the center, too.

-Yep.

I don't want to cut through this side, but I want to go as deep as I can.

-Okay.

-So I'm just using short strokes here to create this pocket.

Alright.

That looks pretty good, so we're going to be able to put a nice amount of our herb paste in there.

All right, let's put our pork into our brine.

Now, if you happen to find enhanced pork, that's pork that's been injected with a saltwater solution.

You don't want to brine it because then it will turn out too salty.

-Okay.

-And you'll know it's been enhanced because it will say so right on the label.

It will talk about the salt.

So if you buy that, just skip this step, and you can just season the meat right before you brown it.

-Okay.

-So, if you don't mind, since my hands are all full of pork... -You got it.

-...we'll put that in the fridge for an hour, and then we'll make sure to pat it dry when it comes out of the fridge.

-All right.

-Now let's get going and really start some nice flavorings for the pork.

-You weren't kidding.

You're doing some zhuzhing here.

-I have some plans here.

-Excellent.

-Okay.

We're going to start by making a nice bread crumb crust that's going to add a little bit of texture and a little bit of flavor to the outside of the pork.

-Great.

-So I have one slice of white bread.

We'll put this in the food processor, and we just want to pulse this up until it's ground up.

That'll be about 16 pulses.

-Okay.

-All right.

That looks good.

We'll take those out.

So you should have about 1 cup of crumbs.

-Okay.

-So now let's flavor this up a little bit.

-Okay.

-A tablespoon of olive oil.

That'll help it brown.

-Extra virgin?

-Yes.

-Okay.

-2 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese, and here's one shallot that I minced, and that's about 3 tablespoons, and then 1/8 teaspoon each of salt and pepper.

Now I'll just use a little fork here and mix that up.

Just want to get that oil distributed.

It smells good already.

So there is our bread crumb topping.

Okay.

Now let's make our herb paste.

-All right.

-Let's start with 1/3 cup of parsley.

You could also use basil.

What we're doing is we're using a good amount of a tender, sort of mild herb, and then we're going to really bump things up with some potent stuff.

And now 2 tablespoons of fresh thyme.

Oh, it smells so good.

-It's an herb paste.

-Mmm.

It's kind of citrusy.

-Yeah, oh, yeah.

-I love that smell, so good, and then we have a teaspoon of fresh rosemary.

You could also use 1/2 teaspoon of dried rosemary if you want, but you don't want to use dried thyme.

When we tried that, it made the spice paste taste kind of dry and dusty and... -Not good.

-Definitely go for the fresh.

Then we have 6 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese, 3 tablespoons of olive oil.

There's one clove of garlic minced up.

And 1/8 teaspoon each of salt and pepper.

So then we'll just pulse this up in the food processor until it's nice and smooth.

That'll be about 12 pulses.

-Okay.

-That looks nice and smooth, and it smells amazing.

Oh, my gosh.

-Oh, wow.

-So good, right, all those herbs?

-If this doesn't do anything to the pork loin, nothing can.

Oh, so fresh.

-Yeah, super fresh.

I love that rosemary.

-Yes.

-All right.

And now let's put this all together.

-Okay.

-Here is our pork roast, nice and dry.

Now I'm going to measure out 1/4 cup of this paste.

Okay, now I'm just going to stuff that pocket that we made earlier.

We're just going to get right in there.

I'm probably going to use my fingers.

You want to get it all the way back into the meat.

All right.

So we'll just push that in there.

-You know, what's nice about this is it's not a big, bulky stuffing.

It's just a really, really potent paste, so we're not going to risk all of that tumbling out later on.

-That's right.

It's going to give you a lot of bang for your buck.

All right.

So our pork is stuffed, and now we're going to tie it up so that when we brown it, we hold all that paste inside the meat.

-Okay.

-I just have some kitchen twine here, and we'll just tie it at about 1-1/2-inch intervals.

-And even if you're not stuffing a pork loin with anything, it's a good idea to tie it up before you cook it.

Pork loins, tenderloins, beef tenderloins, all of these kind of cylindrical shapes, they'll cook much more evenly if you tie it before browning and cooking.

All right.

So this is looking good here, and now we'll just give this a little trim here.

-Got you.

-Get rid of some of the ends.

Okay, so I have 2 teaspoons of olive oil heating up over medium-high heat here.

We're going to use that pan to brown the pork, but in the meantime, I'm going to season the roast with 1/2 teaspoon of pepper.

-It doesn't need any salt because it was brined.

-That's right, unless we were using the enhanced pork.

In that case, we would use 1 1/4 teaspoons of salt at this point.

-Ah, okay.

-Let's get the underside here.

-There's so much flavor going into and onto this pork.

It doesn't stand a chance.

-So good.

-It will relent to the good flavors.

-That's right.

It has no choice.

-That's right.

-Okay, so we're seeing some shimmering happening.

Put the pork in fat-side-down.

That's the part that's going to get the most browning.

-Okay.

[ Pork sizzling ] -Ah!

-Oh, that's good.

-Okay, that means our pan was hot enough.

If you didn't hear that sizzle... -Get it out?

-...take it out and try it again.

Yep.

So this will take about 10 minutes to brown on all sides.

-All right.

-All right.

So we're getting there.

It's been about 7 or 8 minutes, and we just have one more side to brown.

-Geez.

Look what brown can do for you.

-Ooh, doesn't that look gorgeous?

-It's stunning.

Yeah.

-And you see, it stayed nice and compact with the tying that we did, and you can't see that herb paste anymore, but we have that secret that it's in there, so... -Okay.

-...it's going to be good stuff.

It's been about 10 minutes.

I think we're looking good here.

Oh, yeah.

-That looks beautiful.

-That's beautiful!

So I'm putting the pork on a wire rack on a baking sheet that's lined with aluminum foil.

Now I'm just going to snip off that twine.

We just needed that while we were browning it.

All right.

There's the last one.

So here's the rest of the herb paste.

Remember I used 1/4 cup, and now we have some left over.

We're going to spread that on top of the fat cap.

That has the Parmesan cheese in it to attach all those bread crumbs.

When it hits the hot pork, their aromas start to come out, right... -Absolutely.

-...the oils?

Okay, yeah, that smells amazing.

Okay.

All right.

And here's our bread crumbs.

We're just going to pack this on top.

We're going to just press it on there to make a nice crumb crust.

-Ooh, yeah.

You're turning this into something very special.

-Yeah, this is for company.

-I hope I'm company.

-Of course!

You want to come over?

-Yes, exactly.

-You know what we're having.

You know it's going to be good.

Okay, so this is ready to go.

We're going to put it in a 325-degree oven for 50 to 75 minutes until it hits 140 degrees.

-Okay.

-There we go.

All right.

So it's been about an hour.

Let's grab the roast.

-Ooh!

-Doesn't that look pretty!

-Yes, it looks incredibly beautiful.

I'm following the aroma.

-Oh, my gosh, so good.

So let's take a check here of the temperature.

We're looking for 140 degrees, and there it is.

Nailed it.

-Nice.

-Okay, so this needs to rest for 20 minutes.

You just need to hold on 20 more minutes.

-Ah!

-Hands off!

-Very crispy on the top.

-Yeah.

I know, right?

I know.

I want to touch it, too.

All right.

20 minutes, and then we'll dive in.

-Okay.

-All right.

So it's been 20 minutes!

-Oh, I... -You're inhaling it.

You're taking it all in.

-I am, and I know I had to wait, but really, especially for something like pork roast that's so lean, you want to let it rest for a good 20 minutes so all those juices can be reabsorbed by the meat.

-And I promise it's still nice and hot.

-Okay, good.

-So I'm going to carve this into about 1/2-inch slices.

-Okay.

Oh, wow.

-Isn't that gorgeous?

-That's kind of amazing.

-You want to be a little bit careful when you carve it.

You don't want all that herb paste to go gushing out, so just take your time.

-I mean, I know that you put Parmesan cheese in there as acting kind of like a glue... -Yeah.

-...but I half expect it to all squish out.

I should have had faith in you.

-Oh, you can see it's juicy, too.

See all the juices?

-Oh, yeah.

-So good, okay.

Smells amazing.

-All right.

Take a look at that.

Juicy.

I mean, it's super juicy.

-Yeah.

It really is.

You can see all the juices.

Mmm!

-Mmm!

-[ Crunching ] Can you hear me crunching?

-That first bite was delicious, and even though I got a little bit of that herb paste, you can actually taste the pork, too.

-Yeah.

The pork has a really nice flavor.

It's nicely seasoned.

It's beautifully juicy.

-It's really juicy.

-And we have just the right amount of those potent herbs, the rosemary and the thyme and then all the parsley to give it some bulk.

-Pork loin that's beautiful and juicy and fully flavored.

Whoever said it couldn't be done, they didn't know that you were around.

-That's right.

I did it.

Meat, who knew?

-Becky did meat, exactly!

Yay, Becky!

Well, there you go.

If you want the best-dressed-up roast pork that's really easy to do, score the fat cap on a pork loin.

Create a pocket, and then brine it.

Create a crumb topping with bread crumbs, Parmesan, and shallot, and an herb paste with parsley, garlic, and olive oil.

Spread the paste inside the pocket.

Tie it all up, and then brown that roast all over.

Remove the twine.

Coat the top with more herb paste and crumb mixture, and then roast it.

Slice it and serve.

So from "America's Test Kitchen" to your kitchen, a fabulous company-ready herb-crusted pork roast.

So I'm coming over on Monday and Tuesday.

-Okay, I know just what to make.

-And Wednesday... and Thursday.

-Well, let's not go overboard.

[ Both laugh ] -I've known a few macho cooks who think that pot holders are for wimps, and, in fact, I remember years ago, Adam, I don't know if you remember... -I do remember.

-We were at a dinner party, and Adam slid a pair of contraband pot holders to the spouse of one of these macho cooks.

-You know, I have some pretty tough kitchen hands, but I believe in pot holders.

-Me, too.

-You know, you do not want to trifle with protecting yourself against painful burns and screaming-hot pots, and we are here to tell you which pot holders to slide to your friend the next time or slide into your own pot holder drawer.

We tested nine different sets of pot holders.

The price range was $7 up to $60 for a pair.

-Ooh!

-And there were a few different materials involved.

Down there, we have just plain old cotton.

-Mm-hmm.

-Next to it, we have silicone-coated.

The red one is Nomex with Kevlar.

The yellow one is suede.

-Mmm.

-This one has silicone dots.

This one is just neoprene.

-That's cool.

-Neoprene rubber, believe it or not.

There was a lot of testing involved.

Testers included people with more and less kitchen experience, different-sized hands, and what we had them do is maneuver bakeware into, around, and out of the oven.

That included cake pans, pie plates, and cookie sheets.

They also used the pot holders to carry a really heavy cast-iron Dutch oven filled with 4 quarts of simmering water.

They used them to pull a skillet with a 4-pound roast chicken out of the oven, and they also held on to cast-iron pans that had been heated to 350 degrees for as long as they could.

Durability and appearance is always an issue, so we tested that by staining each of these with marinara sauce that had been spiked with turmeric... -Oh, my goodness.

-...and then washing it five times and inspecting them for any lingering stains.

So as you can imagine, some of these protected their hands against heat.

Some didn't.

Two that were not great were this one here and the green one down at the very end.

-Old standard.

-You know, they were okay for bakeware with inner rims, not great for heavier cookware.

Testers wanted to get a more complete idea of what was going on sort of technically speaking, and so what they did was they rigged each pot holder with thermocouples.

They put them in where the user's hand would go.

They put a 350-degree cast-iron skillet on each one and used temperature-tracking software to chart the temperature rise.

-Oh, wow.

-And it was interesting.

It mirrored the kitchen experience perfectly.

So these three and that red one down by you did a great job protecting hands against heat.

In fact, the temperature rise was only up to about 85 to 95 degrees, whereas the worst performers in the group, the temperature rose to 163 degrees.

-Ooh, that's a hot hand!

-That was a seriously hot hand, but it didn't have to do with material.

What it had to do with was the thickness of the pot holder, which makes sense.

-Yep.

Testers found that if they were about 4.4 millimeters or thicker, there was good heat protection.

However, there was also a problem because the thicker it is, the less maneuverable it is.

-Absolutely.

-For instance, that guy is 9.3 millimeters thick.

-Mm-hmm, it's a little mitt-like.

That wouldn't be able to grab a handle very securely.

-If you're pulling a cake out of the oven or a pie with delicate edges, and you're using that, you might just end up denting it by accident because it's not as maneuverable as it should be.

In the end, there were two winners.

The overall winner is this guy.

-Ooh.

-This is the OXO Good Grips silicone pot holder, $28 for a set of two.

It's a pocket style.

So you have silicone on one side.

You have fabric on the other, and you can slide your hand in like so.

Great heat protection.

One caveat -- It did not bounce back from our durability test.

Both the silicone and the fabric remained stained after all those washings.

-So it's how it looks, not how it performs.

-Exactly.

The performance was great.

It just looked a little stained.

If you are not a pocket kind of girl... -I'm not a pocket kind of girl.

-If you're just a plain square kind of girl, this neoprene number here is the San Jamar UltiGrips Hot Pad, $18 for a set of two.

Looked great after the testing, and it doesn't have that pocket.

-So there you go.

If you're in the market for a new set of pot holders, check out the OXO Good Grips Silicone Pot Holder which is about $28 for two or the San Jamar UltiGrips Hot Pad which is about $18 for two.

-This bottle of champagne has been sitting in an ice bucket.

It registers about 32 degrees.

Now, I'm not opening it to celebrate but actually to prove a point.

Now, Joe here is also opening a bottle of champagne, but his has been sitting in a 93-degree water bath.

So here's the thing -- All of these champagne bottles contain the same amount of carbon dioxide, but temperature and pressure affect how much of that gas can be dissolved in the wine.

Warm liquids can't hold on to nearly as much gas as cold ones.

So when the bottles are opened, and the pressure is released, the warmer ones contain a lot more undissolved gas which expands instantaneously, propelling the champagne all over Joe.

Thanks, Joe.

Meanwhile, in this nice, cold champagne, the CO2 stays right where we want it -- in the wine.

So you can use this information in two ways.

When making your own seltzer water at home, always start with the coldest water possible for the bubbliest beverage, and when it comes time to open any carbonated beverage, you want to get those bottles as cold as possible or prepare to get wet.

-Glass water bottles are popular because they keep water tasting good, and some people want alternatives to plastic or metal.

We tested six, priced from about $8 to $38.

We put them through a bunch of tests.

We filled and drank from them.

We opened and closed the lids a million times.

We tried to stain them.

We shook them upside-down.

We washed them a bunch, and we even dropped them, and we gave them to testers to take home.

These bottles went to yoga classes, and then we took them on trains, in cars, into the grocery store.

The good news -- None of them leaked, and many even survived the drop test.

The real differences came down to design.

This one, gorgeous, but what a pain to fill this little narrow neck, and this lopsided loop makes it extra hard to put the lid back on straight in one try.

This one makes a hideous scraping sound when you screw the metal cap onto glass.

[ Cap scraping ] This sleeve trapped dirt, and this one has seven parts you have to hand-wash. Now, our winner is this one.

It's called the Lifefactory 22-ounce glass bottle.

It costs about $23, has a rounded bottom edge and thick walls that actually kept it in one piece when we dropped it three times, has the widest mouth, so it's easy to fill.

The lid is easy to grab, and it went on and off with minimal effort, and the whole thing goes right in the dishwasher.

It's our new favorite.

-Purple Peruvian, Ruby Crescent, and Russian Banana are all varieties of fingerling potatoes, and while the range of colors, sizes, and shapes are fun, they represent a basic cooking problem because they won't all cook at the same rate.

So Elle is here today to show us a universal way to cook them, one and all.

-That's right, and you can't just throw fingerling potatoes on a roasting pan in a hot oven.

-Nope.

-It won't work well.

As you said, fingerling potatoes vary in size.

So the key to cooking them is making sure that they've all reached the same doneness at the same time.

-Yeah.

That's not easy to do.

-Not at all.

Fingerling potatoes are often mistaken for new potatoes when, in reality, they are a mature variety of potatoes that offer a beautiful, earthy nuttiness.

-Mm-hmm.

-So in the Test Kitchen, we've tried cooking these on a sheet tray tossed in oil at 450 degrees, but they dried out because the temperature was too high, and the oil had a tendency to clump up on the sheet pan.

-That's right.

The oil stains the sheet pan, and no matter how hard you scrub, you can't get that off.

-You can't get it off, but we found that steaming the potatoes worked well for the skins and for the proper doneness, and the way we did that was by using a 13-by-9 baking pan.

So first we're going to put the potatoes in the pan.

This is 2 pounds of fingerling potatoes, scrubbed clean.

To them, I'm going to add 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil.

-And now, again, you could use any variety of fingerling potato here, such as Russian, Peruvian, or Ruby Crescent.

-That's right.

-Okay.

-All right.

So the oil is in.

I'm just going to give it a toss.

We just have to make sure they're fitting snugly in the pan and flat to the surface.

-Yeah, so it's a single layer, but they are cramped.

-This cramping is actually going to work in our favor because they're going to bathe in the steam of their friends that they're so close to, and the steam is going to give us even doneness.

So I'm just going to cover it tightly with foil.

It's going to go in the oven at 450 degrees on the middle rack for 15 minutes.

-Okay.

-All right.

It's been about 15 minutes.

We'll take this foil off.

-Hmm.

-Those are beautiful.

-Oh, look at all that steam.

-All right.

So these look great.

I'm just going to give them a shake.

These need to go for another 20 minutes.

I'm going to come back and give them a shake about halfway through, and they'll be ready when they're spotty brown.

-Okeydoke.

-Yeah.

So let's work on the extra special part of these fingerling potatoes.

That's the herbs.

I have fresh sage.

I'm going to chop it.

We're looking for about 2 teaspoons of sage.

So I also have some thyme here, and I'm also looking for 2 teaspoons.

All right.

That looks great.

So I'm going to put these herbs together, and I'm going to cut into it 1/2 teaspoon of salt.

-You're making seasoned salt.

-That's right.

-Chopped fresh herbs can really stick to your fingers, but with that salt in there, it'll make them easier to sprinkle.

-All right.

Perfect, so I'm just going to put these in a bowl and set them aside for our potato.

-So today we're using fresh sage and thyme to flavor our salt, but we have lots of other flavoring variations which you can find on our website.

-Okay.

It's been 20 minutes.

-Ooh.

-Let's take a look.

-Those smell like really good roasted potatoes.

-Oh, they're beautiful, nice and spotty brown.

-They're gorgeous.

-I'm just going to test these for doneness.

I'm going to use the tip of my paring knife, starting with the larger ones, and if the knife goes in easily, as it has, then they're done.

So I'm just going to go into the bowl with these, and I want to use all the oil that we had in the pan.

That's going to help for our herbs to stick.

-Okay.

-All right.

I'm going to sprinkle our thyme and sage and salt.

All right.

Give it a good toss.

-Oh, that smells good.

-Yeah.

It's divine.

-Oh, goodness.

-Okay, so let's platter them up.

I know you'd be tempted to eat these right now, but... -I very much am tempted.

They're beautiful.

They need at least 5 minutes to cool.

-Okay, hot potato.

-Yes.

All right.

So it's been 5 minutes.

I am ready to eat these potatoes.

-Me, too.

-I don't know about you.

I'll give you a few.

-This is my kind of meal -- just potatoes.

-Okay.

-Oh!

Look how fluffy the insides are!

-Oh, yeah.

-That skin is so thin.

-Wow.

-You almost can't detect it.

It's barely there.

-And the potato is so tender.

-Perfectly cooked.

-All the way through.

-It's like a mini baked potato, but the skin is nice and tender.

-I think this is my favorite herb combination.

-They're not overpowering.

They're just fragrant.

-That's right, and every potato has flavor.

-Mm-hmm.

Elle, these are terrific.

Great recipe.

-Thank you so much.

-So there you have it.

If you want to make the best roasted fingerling potatoes, crowd them into a baking pan, toss them with a little oil, and cover tightly with aluminum foil.

Put them in a 450-degree oven for 15 minutes.

Then remove the foil and let roast for about 20 minutes longer.

Before serving, simply toss with a mixture of fresh herbs and salt and let them rest for 5 minutes.

From "America's Test Kitchen" to your kitchen, the final word on roasted fingerling potatoes.

You can get this recipe and all the recipes from this season, along with our tastings, testings and select episodes, at our website, americastestkitchen.com.

These are great.

-Thanks.

-I mean, really great.

-Let us help you with dinner tonight.

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