(Part 1) The Science of Cooking: What's Happening to Your Food | With Ben Ebbrell & David Weitz

What's actually happening to your food when you cook it? Harvard physicist David Weitz and Sorted Food's Ben Ebbrell reveal the science hidden inside everyday cooking — from why mayonnaise becomes a solid, to how meringue defies physics, to what a martini has in common with a bag of salt. Watch Part 2 here: https://youtu.be/XIf83okkgiU This talk was filmed at the Ri on the 18th April 2026. --- In this lecture — the UK premiere of Harvard's celebrated Science and Cooking series — Ben cooks live on stage while David explains the physics and chemistry behind every step. You'll never look at an emulsion, a foam, or a loaf of focaccia the same way again. This is Part 1 — covering herb oil, emulsions, and the science of mayonnaise. Part 2 covers focaccia elasticity, baked Alaska, and cocktail physics. --- Join this channel to get access to perks: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYeF244yNGuFefuFKqxIAXw/join Subscribe for regular science videos: http://bit.ly/RiSubscRibe --- David Weitz is the Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at Harvard University, where his research focuses on the physics of soft condensed matter. A member of the National Academy of Science, the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, and the National Academy of Engineering, he is the founder of Harvard's Science and Cooking public lecture series — a programme that has drawn over 45,000 live attendees and more than six million YouTube views worldwide. --- Ben Ebbrell is a co-founder of Sorted Food, one of the UK's most-loved food YouTube channels with nearly 3 million subscribers. A trained chef, he won the Good Food Channel's "next celebrity chef" competition and was named in The Guardian's 30 Under 30 for digital media. Sorted Food has released 7 cookbooks, a popular app, and a range of live shows dedicated to making great cooking accessible to everyone. ---- Chapters: 0:00 Introduction – Harvard's Science & Cooking course 1:49 How it all started: Ferran Adrià comes to Harvard 3:04 Designing the course: chefs meet scientists 4:04 Inside the lab: you can eat your experiment 5:37 The molten chocolate cake and the diffusion equation 7:15 Meet Ben Ebbrell – Sorted Food 13:38 Why chip pan fires are so dangerous (live demo) 15:07 Making herb oil: extracting chlorophyll with heat 19:15 Two liquids become a solid: the science of mayonnaise 22:48 What is an emulsion? Oil, water, and lecithin explained 24:07 Why emulsions turn solid: volume fraction and elasticity 26:12 The equation of the week --- The Ri is on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ri_science and Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/royalinstitution and TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@ri_science Listen to the Ri podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ri-science-podcast Donate to the RI and help us bring you more lectures: https://www.rigb.org/support-us/donate-ri Our editorial policy: https://www.rigb.org/editing-ri-talks-and-moderating-comments Subscribe for the latest science videos: http://bit.ly/RiNewsletter Product links on this page may be affiliate links which means it won't cost you any extra but we may earn a small commission if you decide to purchase through the link. #scienceofcooking #sortedfood #benebbrell #davidweitz #royalinstitution #harvardscience #foodscience #cookingchemistry #emulsionexplained #howmayonnaiseworks #bakedAlaskascience #cookingphysics #rilecture #whathappenswhenyoucook #kitchenscience