Remember to leave some room for more! 🦃

A full American Thanksgiving Dinner set on a table with a turkey in the middle. A plate of mushrooms, a plate of cheese, grapes, and other food surround the turkey plate.

What's cooking this holiday season?

Whether you’re a master chef or made restaurant reservations weeks ago, be sure to leave some room in your appetite for learning. Harvard Online has food-centered courses fit to fill your plate this season:

Food Fermentation: The Science of Cooking with Microbes

What’s living in your food? Many of the foods that we consume daily owe their distinct characteristics and flavors to microbes, specifically through a biochemical process of fermentation. Gourmands and everyday consumers can quickly name some of the most popular fermented foods we consume—beer, yogurt, pickles—but, what about that coffee you drank this morning, or the chocolate bar you are saving for later?

From chemistry to microbiology to your dinner plate, Food Fermentation: The Science of Cooking with Microbes will analyze the role of microbes in production, preservation, and enhancement of diverse foods across a variety of culinary traditions.

ENROLL NOW

Science & Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science (chemistry)
In Science & Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science (chemistry), chefs reveal the secrets behind some of their most famous culinary creations—often right in their own restaurants. Inspired by such cooking mastery, the Harvard team will then explain the science behind the recipe. You will also have the opportunity to become an experimental scientist in your very own laboratory—your kitchen! By following along with the recipes of the week, taking precise measurements, and making skillful observations, you will learn to think like a chef and a scientist.

Topics will include:

How molecules influence flavor
The role of heat in cooking
Diffusion, revealed by the phenomenon of spherification, the culinary technique pioneered by Ferran Adrià

ENROLL NOW

Science & Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science (physics)

In Science & Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science (physics), which investigates physical transformations in food, we will be visited by world-famous chefs who use a number of different styles and techniques in their cooking. Each chef will demonstrate how he or she prepares delicious and interesting creations, and we will explore how fundamental scientific principles make them possible. You will also have the opportunity to become an experimental scientist in your very own laboratory—your kitchen! By following along with the recipes of the week, taking precise measurements, and making skillful observations, you will learn to think like both a chef and a scientist.

Topics will include:

How cooking changes food texture
Making emulsions and foams
Phase changes in cooking

ENROLL NOW

Play with your food and earn a professional certificate in The Science of Cooking
In The Science of Cooking, you will not only examine scientific concepts that are essential for everyday cooking, but you will also learn how biology, chemistry, and physics change food flavor, texture, and preservation — making our food nutritious, delicious, and safe to eat. By the end of this program, you will have gained a comprehensive understanding of how a foundation in food science can be vital to cooking, preparing you for culinary exploration in the kitchen and beyond!

ENROLL NOW

Interested in knowing more about the global food and agricultural industry?

Global food systems in emerging economies were once geared largely towards tourist populations and exports. But, as food security, nutrition concerns, and agricultural sustainability continue to be primary drivers for opportunity in these economies, the focus has shifted; a better understanding of the fundamental dynamics in these countries is therefore needed to solve core problems.

In Food Systems Live!: Entrepreneurship in Emerging Economies, you will gather each week with fellow entrepreneurs, both to learn from Harvard faculty and global leaders in the fields of food, agriculture, and nutrition, and to identify opportunities to build scalable solutions for food safety, security, and nutrition in emerging economies. By engaging with peers and experts in real time, you will be prepared to answer “what’s next?” for the global food and agricultural industry.