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I don't agree with this. You want as much as possible. There is a benefit in having fast moving water over a gentle stir. If you look up thread at some of my posts there is existing discussion about using fish tank pumps. A swamp cooler pump is the best I have used so far. They are desinged for long running periods and can be had in the $20 range. Submersible pumps for fish tanks are questionable over time given temps much higher than they expect.

Circulation is important if you want short bath times or very accurate temps. Sure you can slap some things together and get a very good setup for 100-150. For kicks I am testing the Auber unit and a swamp cooler pump for circulation (see posts up thread). Realistically, knowing the cost of the parts and business overhead (liability insurance etc) I'd put a low end pupose built counter top self contained unit with tank/bath at about $250-$300. Businesses like large profit margines though so early prices might have to be a bit higher. I paid maybe $100 for a very good used lab model. It was over $2500 new. The used supply of lab equipment cannot sustain the needs of consumers if this method was desired by the average home chef. I am sure there will be complete turnkey solutions as well as a number of "kits" coming out. The "kit" approach is good for small businesses as it off-loads a lot of liability to the kit "builder". Water + Electricity + microbes and bacteria = a fair amount of risk.

The ones I have will not work with the controller. They reset when you interrupt the power. Too bad.

For those interested in the PID approach Auberins is now selling its first rev of a turnkey Sous Vide controller. http://auberins.com/index.php?main_page=pr...&products_id=44 I'm told future versions will be stainless or at least more what the western kitchen expects. It's one hell of a deal at $99.

I don't think glopping a bunch of stuff together with alginate is anything like gluing proteins together. If you are making a slury of proteins and want to make a patty I am sure it's fine. What do you want to do with it?

I love them. I just steam them and roll them around in butter and grind black pepper and sea salt on them. I'll eat a pound or two in one sitting. Yum.

Yes, it is a really long topic. If you look at the bottom the screen under the last post on the left there is a search box that allows you to search within the topic. You can put the word "ziplock" there and you will only get post results that contain ziplock from this topic. Yes, you can use a ziplock. No, its not really important have vacuum. You just want to get most of the air out of the bag and make sure its sealed well enough to keep the food in and the water out.

Massive pressure. Check out the whole raw shelled lobster picture near the bottom of this page. http://www.secretlifeoflobsters.com/blog/2...bster-redux.asp I've been trying to find one of these locally. A whole shelled lobster SV would be amazing.

Looks great, Chris. I'm sure your Sous Vide lime turned out better than my Sous Vide racquetball. I like your non electric version better. Those Vacu-Vin's are only $10 as well. Call me crazy, but I'd rather have something non electric that can also keep my wine fresh

Yes, it does. In addition there is a fair amount of room in the rubber stopper cup. I'm only suggesting that people with a Food Saver or Wine Saver can use the Reynolds bags without having to purchase yet another device.

Here is how I use the Reynolds Handi-Vac bags without the Handi-Vac tool. In this case I am using a Wine Saver hand held vac and a disassembled Wine Saver stopper. You can use a Food Saver tube attachment instead of the Wine Saver vac. I just don't have it in the picture.

heh..there was just water and no food coloring in the bag when I did the squeeze test. Matte walls in the kitchen would never work for me. Lots of things explode on a regular basis. I worked out an easy way to use the Reynolds bags without buying the Reynolds device (if you already have a vac machine). Even though they are only $10 I resisted buying one since I have way too many gadgets. For those that have Food Savers and at least one Wine Saver stopper you can easly simulate the Reynolds device. I'll post again with some pictures. What you do is disassemble the Wine Saver stopper by peeling the rubber off the hard plastic. Be careful not to lose the spring that may or may not have made it in there during manufacturing. There is also a metal ball bearing in there. Now, take the rubber end and place the fat end down on the Reynolds bag and take the accessory tube from your Food Saver and insert it into the small end of the rubber fitting. If there is a loose fit you can wrap some tape around the plastic fitting. Now hit the vacuum on the Food Saver and hold the rubber stopper down tight on the bag. The air will be sucked out of the bag. If you have one of the hand held Wine Saver vacuum machines it works even better. You can just insert the business end of the Wine Saver vac into the small end of the rubber stopper and hit the vacuum. Works great. If you were really crazy you could probably use a vacuum cleaner on the bag ...sort of like those space saver bags

I filled it with water and blue food coloring and put it in a pot for a while. The water in the pot came out clear. The first test was filling it with water and sqeezing it until ..well..I was wiping water off the wall.

I bought some of the Reynolds bags today at Walmart. I wanted to see how they are doing the seal. There was a pallet of the $10 Handi-Vac's in the isle, but no pallet of bags. I located the shelf for the bags and there was only one box of quart size. After playing with the bags I'd say they are a good cheap alternative to a Foodsaver if you like to get into the bag a lot and re-seal. The bags are Polyethylene so they should be as safe as the FoodSaver bags, but they are not nylon on the outside so they are not intended for boiling. You will find that nowhere on the Reynolds Handi-Vac site do they mention heating the bag except that you can defrost in the open bags at 30% power in the microwave. I doubt these bags are as good as the Food Saver like bags as an oxygen barrier. I did a test on the zipper and it holds pretty good. Not sure I would trust it for 12 hours under heat though. This will probably be a great choice for doing seafood and other delicate items.

Doc, Thanks for the swamp cooler pump reference. Looks like a good solution for a dedicated bath that has some room. The concept is the same as my lab unit. Do you think you can add a rheostat on a motor like this? Even the small ones say something like 2500 To 5500 CFM. Wow. Aquarium pumps and circulators are low voltage. Nobody would use them if they were 120 AC. Ornamental fish are expesive

I'm picking up a pid unit that is designed for sv early next month and will be doing some testing. I'm going to be using a steam table for the heating source along with the pid and thermistor probe. One thing I mentioned earlier in the thread is how I might try an inexpensive aquarium circulator. I’m curious if they can handle the temps. I'm also thinking trying a simple aquarium air pump as the circulator. The air pump will be external to the bath and would not be affected by the water temp where a submerged motor could suffer. The idea is to set an aquarium style bubble wand in the bottom of the bath under a Cambro drain shelf and just let the air pump percolate the water from below. Sort of a low temp boil. My theory is that the bubbles will circulate the water enough to keep the temp consistent. I imagine that the air will act to also cool the water which I think may actually help to correct any overshot of the temp. I’m getting this theory from the design of my current circulator that has a cold water system designed to be used in tandem with the heating element to stabilize the temp of the bath quicker. If the air pump bubbles circulate enough water and an all-in-one PID solution with probe is under $100 I’d imagine using a crock pot or rice cooker would be a practical alternative to a lab unit.

I've been adding powdered green chili (hatch) to my green chili near the end of cooking. Gives it a nice body and cool green look. I have hot powder so I use it to dial up individual portions as needed.

Pielle linked to Auber Instruments. Looks like great stuff. http://auberins.com/index.php?main_page=pr...1&products_id=1 If this doesn't have a plug on the back I am sure a person could call him and ask for the addition. It's only $45 plus a probe. I use a Alfa FW9000 countertop steam table for my "tank" using a Julabo unit, but I've been wanting to play low tech. The steam table was only $100 and has a spigot for draining. Using the PID and just the steam table for heat might be enough. I also thought of getting a Hydor Koralia #1 fish tank circulation pump just to see if it can handle the heat. I'm really curious.

Let me get this straight. Your user name is FerranHomaroHestonWylieGrant and you are asking about what to do with pectin and Xanthan?

I think the most interesting advantage to using a bag other than enclosing the flavors is that you can transfer the bag to icewater for a quick chill and then pop a small hole in it and drain/strain out the stock easily.

This might be interesting for people who want to use a slow cooker or just like free stuff... Slow cooker liners. http://www.alcoa.com/reynoldskitchens/en/p...200&cat_id=1337 They are basically smaller oven bags. I'd imagine they are good size if you wanted to do the stock in a slow cooker. Free sample offer: http://www.alcoa.com/reynoldskitchens/en/p...ns/scl_main.asp

Gotcha. You want something like Cryovac then? http://www.sealedair.com/eu/en/products/food/bags.html

http://www.dougcare.com/

A good box of Mac with a can of Rotel (original) instead of milk is pretty tasty. I've been throwing an extra can of diced green chili's as well.

Sashimi