KennethT

I've rea studies that show the opposite (and have confirmed this with side by side steak tests) - jaccarding actually caused the meat to release less juice during cooking. The apparent cause is that by severing the muscle fibers, they can't contract as much, and squeeze out as much juice. My tests confirmed it over multiple trials - I've taken strip steak, divided them, and jaccarded one half and left the other untouched. They went into separate bags, but into the same water bath for the same amount of time. The non-jaccarded bags always had more juice in them, and back when I had time to do this stuff, the percent weight loss was also statistically significant.. - if I remember, it was about a 10% difference.

I think the brussels sprout issue is a little different - the battered whole sprout has air trapped between the interleaved leaves with no easy exit. As it gets hotter, the air between the leaves, as well as water that is turning to steam expands beneath the tempura crust and is trapped, until at some point, a weak spot in the batter breaks and all the trapped gases rapidly leave, propelling the sprout across the kitchen. Cutting the sprouts in halves or quarters not only reduces surface area, but also makes it easy for gases between the leaves to exit without building pressure. Chicken doesn't have air spaces or trapped water that easily turns to steam (the inside of the chicken meat probably never gets higher than 180F at the most), so it's only the surface water you have to worry about. Which makes sense that the chicken exploded the instant it hit the wok. The surface liquid instantly flashed to steam and rapidly expanded! Modernist Cuisine gives a whole explanation of wok cooking, and illustrates the several cooking zones present in the very hot wok. Yes, there's the conduction of the extremely hot metal, but also, just above it, is the steam zone where you have extremely hot steam present.

I know it's typical to include the starch in the marinade, but I would try doing it differently - marinate wihtout the starch, drain, then a dusting of starch just before it hits the wok...

I'd imagine it was just too wet. When a lot of liquid (trapped underneath the chicken) is rapidly heated, the steam produced can be very powerful. Next time, I'd try draining the marinade really well, then maybe a light coating of starch (rice flour, wondra, etc.) to absorb the excess liquid. I've watched a lot of cooking over those ridiculously hot woks in Thailand - the kind where there's a fan underneath the charcoal pot, and it looks like a flame thrower is underneath the wok. Most things that go in there seem pretty dry - I can't remember anything dripping wet, until the sauce goes in, but by that time, the wok is cooled by all the other ingredients already in it.

I've never been happy with SV lobster. I know restaurants do it very successfully, but I haven't found a temp/time combo to my liking. I think it may be a problem to try to boil/simmer the tails all at once - even if you have two pots. The problem is that you probably don't have enough heat, unless you plan on putting the pots on a wok burner. Dropping 15-20 lobster tails into a pot of boiling water will drop the temp considerably, and depending on how much heat you have, may take a really long time to come back to temp - during which time, you have no idea how long it's been at what temperature. I think a more realistic way to do it would be to cook them in small batches in a pot. Since your tails are small, I can't recommend timing, but guessing, I'd simmer for about 5 min. then turn off the heat and let steep (covered) for another 10. Take out the tails and let them cool in the air, during which time you can bring the pot back to a boil and do it again for the next batch. You can then refrigerate the tails (well wrapped) for a day or so, and then either reheat on the grill, or all at once in a big pot of water for a minute or two. You can do these all at once because it doesn't really matter what temp the pot drops to - you're just reheating for a few minutes anyway.

If using oil in the bag, you can also use a zip-lock bag with the displacement method - also described in depth in the sous-vide thread. Very convenient for short cooks.

I have a friend who was a food scientist. One day, years ago, I needed a small amount of fondant, so she emailed me a page out of her textbook. The textbook advises to agitate the syrup on a marble slab with a spatula as well - but not by slapping. Instead it recommended moving the spatula through the mass in a vibrating, jig-saw fashion, scraping the marble as you go. It said that that was how to get the smallest grain size for the smoothest texture.

A question for those who have one of these - how much power does it consume? Since it's plugging into a standard US outlet, I'm sure it draws less than 15A (1800W) but I was just curious. Watching this thread, plus the several other scattered posts are making me very interested... but considering that the cooking gas in my apartment is free, and I have to pay for electric, I was just wondering what it costs to operate this on a regular basis.

If it is, indeed, a pork loin, then I would go for the medium rare temp - about 135 or so, long enough to pasteurize to the core. This time is dependent on thickness. For those values, Google Douglas Baldwin Sous Vide for his informative online guide, or see the original Sous Vide post here on Egullet- in the index should be links to tables of thickness/time for different meats and temps. Or, like many of us, download the SousVide Dash app for an ipad or iphone.

From what cut is the pork roast? Is it the loin? Is "pork roast" an industry term for something specific?

As a fan of laap and of Thai food in general, I would like to recommend Andy Ricker's Pok Pok cookbook. Not only does it have extremely labor intensive recipes (he makes all of his curry pastes from scratch), but there are many stories talking about his travels around Northern Thailand and the people he knows there. It also explains how many dishes are eaten in their native area, which I have found makes for a considerable increase in my enjoyment when trying it "their way". Being in NYC, I am very lucky to have a Pok Pok restaurant relatively nearby - but, supposedly, the recipes in the book are exactly what they do in the restaurant. In the book, he gives at least two recipes for laap (there may be more, I don't remember now and don't have the book handy), and a very interesting story about his friend who makes what he considers to be the seminal version. His friend's version is standard for Northern Thailand - this version has no mint, no (or very little) lime juice and is very different from the laap that is standard in restaurants in the US (I don't know what's available in Canada, but from seeing photos of your Thai lunches in the past, it looks pretty similar to our standard fare here). It's not that spicy, but intensely funky, herbal and completely addictive. He also gives a recipe for Isaan (Northeast Thailand which is very different from Northern Thailand) laap, which is what we would typically think of - with mint, lime juice, etc. ETA - for clarity

I don't use the microwave for much - mostly defrosting - although I used to use it more than I do now. Lately I've been using the circulating water bath for defrosting meats. But my wife uses the microwave every day to defrost an english muffin. But when I rarely do chocolate work, I find the microwave and a glass bowl are great for melting the chocolate. The microwave also makes short work of making a dark roux for gumbo, although you have to be careful taking the container of hot, liquid magma in and out to stir every once in a while. It's also good for reheating rice by making an improvised steamer. Put rice on a plate, get a paper towel wet and wring out the excess moisture, then lay it over the top of the rice and microwave on full power for about a minute or so.

My parents have the exact same Cuisinart! And it still works... they probably acquired it in the early '80s. The logic back then: who needs a finger switch if there is already a switch built into the cover?

Ditto what Tri said... the point is to get the ideal creamy m&c texture, but using any cheese you'd like and having the flavor be much more intense than it would be with the standard bechamel version. BTW, the same theory can be used with fondue - just adjust the amount of liquid for the thickness you want (and moisture content of the cheese).

I'm loving this thread! Thank you so much for taking the time to document it all. I've loved going to markets on travels through Thailand and northern Vietnam, and these photos are making me very nostalgic for them. I wish we had something like that here in NY... like others have said, it is strange, from a Western point of view, to see raw meat lying around in 90degF heat with no refrigeration. I didn't notice anything in the photos - how do the vendors keep the flies away? I remember from some of the markets I have visited that most vendors would rig fans with a bunch of streamers and install them every so often over the meats.

I think it's ridiculous that they didn't mention Ottomanelli (on Bleecker).

I also would be curious about pre-freezing the cake, and then vacuum sealing. Sometimes, I buy really fresh fish from a fishing boat on the Florida Gulf coast. They process the fish, quick-freeze then vacuum pack, and ship on dry ice. They recommend to cut the vacuum bag before defrosting, citing that the pressure differential could damage the non-frozen flesh. I don't know how valid it is, but I've always done it that way and have had no problems.

ha! Forget it with the steam option!!! That changes everything!

I don't think a hot air curtain would burn skin. I have a large walk-in convection oven at work that I have been in at 275F - I wouldn't want to spend tons of time in there, but certainly it's not dangerous. I'm sure 400F air would be even less comfortable, but because of the really poor heat conductance of air, my gut says it wouldn't burn you.

Being in an apartment in NYC, it's not often we have to think about water. But, as it turns out, my hydroponic gardening uses about 30% of the water used in conventional soil based gardening.

I have this type of setup for most of my spices - but instead of a piece of metal (expensive), I bought a magnetic white board from Staples to stick them to... works very well.

At the time, my vessel was just a large stockpot (All-Clad anodized aluminum (a wedding gift)), uninsulated. Like I said before, my PID controller has a function that displays percent output. So, while the bath is heating and the heating element is on full power, the controller shows 100% - which is 1000W since I was using a 1000W element. As the bath reaches temperature, the controller begins cycling the power to the element. I was most interested in power used once the bath reaches steady state, comparing the covered vs. non-covered values at various temperatures. So, obviously, the covered pot was much more efficient, since it didn't constantly lose temperature due to evaporative cooling - which is much more substantial (depending on bath temperature) than the loss due to radiation/convection with the air around the pot - especially if there is no breeze. Also, keep in mind that in my system, the heater is not submerged in the water, but instead, heats the pot like an electric burner. This type of heating will be less efficient than the submerged type. Anyway, at a bath temp of 185F, the covered pot required an on-cycle of about 20% (200W). An uncovered pot used more than double that amount at that temperature. At 140F, the covered pot required an on-cycle of about 10% (100W), while the uncovered version used about 50% more (150W). At my preferred salmon cooking temp. of 115F (I gradient cook my salmon using SV dash), the covered and uncovered values are practically identical, at about 4-5% (40-50W). I never tested an insulated bath because, at the time, I was designing the circulator with an eye towards production for the mainstream. So, it was designed to look less like lab equipment, and more like a kitchen appliance. How many mainstream people can you imagine wrapping their pot with insulation? And, once I saw the steady state values and compared them to traditional cooking methods, I figured that an extra few percent (meaning maybe 100W max.) would be inconsequential to the eventual marketing. SV, by its nature, is already orders of magnitude more efficient than using your oven. Like pbear said, given enough time, even the best insulation will eventually equilibrate to the bath temperature. But, even though the outside may be warm to the touch, I'd guess that the power outputs would be less than an uninsulated bath. If you think of an analogy to a wetsuit when diving, the outside of the wetsuit will still feel warm, however, the wearer is still significantly warmer wearing it than not. The wetsuit traps water between it and the wearer, and the dead water, once warmed to body temp, doesn't require much more heat to stay at equilibrium. So, let's say you were diving in 50F water - with the suit, you might get uncomfortably cold after about an hour or two (I found this out by experience years ago), but without the suit, you wouldn't last 5 minutes! Paul - in your situation, I wonder if the Reflectix is doing very much, other than limiting evaporative cooling. It might be just as well to use the tight fitting lid without it. Once the air space between the water and lid becomes saturated at 100% humidity, evaporation will stop, assuming there are no leaks where humidity can escape. At a certain point, increasing side insulation is "gilding the lily" so to speak - a lot more effort for not much gain. ETA: Paul - Maybe a way to save a bit more energy would be to wrap the cooler with a reflective surface - like aluminum foil or something to reduce the radiation losses. Having a surface with lower emissivity should help. So then, the primary heat loss would be through convection, which, unless there's a breeze, should be minimal.

In my testing, I've found that most energy loss was through evaporation, so keeping the bath as covered as possible is important. After that, you're right, it comes down to insulation. A well insulated container is not as important when the differential between bath and ambient temp is low. It is more important when cooking at higher temps - like for veggies or confit that mimics traditional confit.

If in Hong Kong, I would suggest LockCha Tea House - located in Hong Kong Park, in Admiralty (Central). It has a great tea selection, on site tea masters, and a very soothing atmosphere. The Hong Kong tourist board also sponsors free tea classes there.

Years ago, I made a few of my own circulators. The PID thermostat I used could display average percent power. Once my bath was up to temperature, depending on temperature, the heater used between 8% and 20% power (8% for a bath temp of 131degF, 20% for 185degF). My bath was just a covered stockpot with no additional insulation, and I used a 1000W heater.