17 replies to this topic

[areselle]

I have a Gaggenau steam oven in my home kitchen that cooks as low as 85F and 30-100% humidity. I experiment a lot, but I'm having difficulty finding recipes for cooking with steam (not in a stove-top steamer). Any clues out there? I've found one book by Jacques Maniere, but his recipes are all stove top. Also, I've wondered if my steam oven could function as a sous vide oven. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Reg

[inductioncook]

Yes, definitely. This is how sous vide was handled before people started using water circulators. I use my Gaggenau this way. Good luck. I'd be interested in knowing how it works. (The thermostat will not be as precise as on a water circulator but it does pretty well.) I use 100% humidity.

Incidentally, there is a Gaggenau book in French on using the oven that is quite good.

[inductioncook]

By the way, Jacques Maniere was a very talented chef who worked with steaming before such precise temperature controls were available. What book do you have?

[kbjesq]

I have a Miele steam oven and I do sometimes use it for sous vide, especially I like to cook lobster in butter w/herbs. I use a food saver bag. Quite nice results IMHO.

Also on the Miele.com website there is a whole set of recipes for all Miele products, including steam ovens. That make it easy to scroll through a large collection of recipes just for home steam ovens.

Note that on Miele.co there is an "ask the chef" feature which allows you to ask specific questions about your product (e.g., steam oven). I have asked this chef quite a few questions! One of my favorite uses for the steam oven is canning, and I've had to ask quite a few questions in that regard. I made probably 30 pints of green tomato chutney last year and wow, the few that are left still test great (I used a Martha Stewart recipe that I found online).

Good luck and hope you enjoy your oven.

[inductioncook]

Note that the Miele is a little different (doesn't heat above boiling point) but for sous-vide cooking at lower temperatures would be the same.

[areselle]

I have "The Art of Cooking With Steam, tr. Stephanie Lyness, forward by Barbara Kafka (1995).

Edited by areselle, 29 July 2010 - 08:03 AM.

[areselle]

I have "The Art of Cooking With Steam," published in 1995, translated by Stephanie Lyness.

Edited by areselle, 29 July 2010 - 08:03 AM.

[inductioncook]

What Jacques Maniere book do you have? Does it address steaming at below the boiling point, such as one would do sous-vide or sous-vide style?

[areselle]

The implements that he discusses are all familiar stove-top pieces that have mesh, screen, or colander-like holes for steam to pass through. As far as I can tell, there is no discussion of any method that doesn't involve steam (212 degrees F). When using stackable Chinese-type steamers, he says, for instance, 'if using one rack, steam for 3 minutes, if using 2, 6 minutes. I'm not sure how one would cook using these implements with water that was below boiling. He gives steaming times, but you have to know when the product is cooked. He has several pages of charts of steaming time for various things -- for instance, Duck (5 pounds, whole) 60 minutes with lid closed, 15 minutes with lid ajar, and 10 minutes browning in oven. He has hints like: "Most standard recipes tell yo to cover the poultry with foil and let stand in a warm place. The steamer works better: After steaming the poultry, turn the heat to very low and set the lid ajar; the poultry will stay warm without continuing to cook." I'm assuming that this is a sort of 'sous vide' principle of low moist heat doesn't continue to cook.

Reg

[inductioncook]

This is interesting. What's the name of the book and when was it published?

Maniere was a master. I remember having a chicken breast at his restaurant in Paris in 1978 that was incredibly moist and delicious and unlike anything I'd had before; nowadays the same effect is obtained with sous vide. (He was also a shellfish master, and kept oysters alive in special water tanks in the basement of the restaurant.)

Of course with his sort of apparatus if the water is below 100 degrees C there will be little cooking going on; the beauty of your steam oven is that by pulsing steam based on the termostat's instructions the oven can maintain a moist environment at or just above the final temperature you want for the food.

[inductioncook]

Sorry--I notice you answered the edition and title question earlier. I'll look for that book. I didn't know he had a book translated into English.

[areselle]

The ISBN is 0-688-10507-6. My copy was obviously sold to the used book market by the Bowertston, Ohio, Public Library. It may be hard to find. I might trade you the English for the French if you can get a copy. It's interesting (as one who's done a lot of translation myself), the frontispiece says "Translated and Interpreted by Stephanie Lyness." I don't know who she is, but she obviously knew his cooking very well,, as she comments on how he sometimes used various recipes, or even mentions substitutes of familiar products for less familiar ones.

Reg

[inductioncook]

she seems to have done this edition some time after he died. Amazon has some other information on her books and teaching, including those on Indian cooking.

http://www.amazon.co...81544588&sr=1-3

[inductioncook]

I've ordered her version of the book.

[inductioncook]

I have the book now. Fascinating!

[areselle]

Yes, it is fascinating. For me, it's a bit like speaking a foreign language in which I'm not completely fluent. I'm having to convert the procedures and principles into terms that are familiar to me, and I have to confess that I don't feel I'm on top of it. I will eventually try to convert the stove top steamer to my steam oven and cook something using his method and recipes, but as I sit back and contemplate it, the stove top steamer seems like a totally different beast than my Gaggenau, not to mention, first off, that the Gaggenau steams from temperatures from 80degrees to 400. I might go get a bamboo steamer just as a dry run.

[inductioncook]

You shouldn't need the bamboo steamer; it's purpose is to hold in the steam created by boiling water at the bottom, but you have a whole chamber filled with steam. If you set for 100% humidity and then 100-110 degrees C you should have the same interior Maniere had inside his bamboo steamer, non?

[inductioncook]

Sorry. Its purpose. Auto-correction got the better of me.