Cooking guides
How to run several kitchen timers at once
A simple order for timing a whole meal: what to start first, how to name your timers, and how to stop three clocks from becoming three problems.
In short
- Start the slowest task first and count backwards from the time you want to eat.
- Name every timer, so you know which alarm is which.
- Keep one job in your hands and let the timers hold the rest.
- Leave a couple of minutes between finish times so nothing waits on the counter.
Work backwards from the time you want to eat
Most meals have one slow part and several quick ones. Write down how long each part takes, then count backwards from serving time. The slowest part starts first and the quickest starts last.
Say dinner is chicken thighs, rice and a salad. The thighs take 35 minutes in the oven. The rice needs 15 minutes on the stove and 5 minutes to rest. The salad takes about 10 minutes to chop. Put the thighs in first. Start the rice 20 minutes before they finish. Chop the salad while the rice cooks, and everything is ready together.
Name every timer
“Timer 2” means nothing when three alarms go off in the same minute. Name each one after the job: rice, thighs out, rest. If your timer lets you name it, do it before you press start.
Decide what each alarm means
Some alarms mean “take it off now”. Others mean “go and check”. Decide which before you start, and give resting time its own timer. A steak that rests for five minutes is still part of the meal.
Stagger, do not stack
If two things finish in the same minute, one of them will wait. Give yourself two or three minutes between the jobs that need your hands, such as draining, carving and plating.
Leave room for the unexpected
Onions take longer than the recipe says. Rice sticks. It is easier to add a minute to a running timer than to reset it and lose your place, so use a timer that lets you extend it.
Keep the screen and the sound on your side
On a phone, the usual reasons for a missed alarm are a screen that locked and a phone on silent. Before you start:
- turn off auto-lock while you cook, or use an app that keeps the screen awake;
- check the volume and the silent switch;
- keep the phone where you can hear it over the extractor fan.
Where ChopCue helps
In ChopCue, every step that has a duration comes with a “Start timer” button. You can run several named timers at once and pause, add a minute or reset each one on its own. Timers keep counting when you move to the next step or another recipe, and they send a notification when they finish. Cook Mode can keep the screen awake while you cook; it is a setting you can turn off.
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