nickrey

I'm with you on this. Out of all the people who bought the Anova on eGullet, how many have posted here with problems? Not many. My sympathies are with you but this does not seem to be a high failure rate. As people, we have something called a confirmation bias which means that we pay particular attention to things that confirm our beliefs and ignore things that don't. I was reading an article today about someone who researched the incidence of adverse police events on days with a full moon. As a police officer, the author was sure that more incidents happened on a full moon day. He was disappointed that his research showed that there was no difference to other days. Now you have had something go wrong with your Anova, you will focus on the number of complaints on the Internet (which, by the way, is not large) as a way of confirming that it is a bad product. I bought one of the industrial strength Anovas when they were first launched. Mine had some issues with temperature control so I contacted Anova and they paid for return postage from Australia for the faulty unit and sent me a brand new one. No fuss, just replacement. I have around five circulators of one type or another. The Anova (one) is the one that I use most often. If this thread had heaps of complaints about the product, I'd be concerned. It doesn't so I'm not. Sometimes if a product fails, you have to suck it up if it is out of warranty. Judging from the unstated experience of everyone else, the next one you buy may last you many years more; particularly if it is the upgraded model. ps. a friend had horrible issues with his polyscience circulator so don't think that it is without faults -- it's just more expensive.

Well that's not it then.

Penetration is not linear. It does a random walk through the molecules. As such any estimation of penetration cannot be described precisely through a linear equation. Martin perhaps the term mushy was too extreme. There may also be a difference in the meats we use as most of our meat is grass fed, which has less marbling fat than your corn fed equivalent. The pieces I used in the experiment described above ve were individual pork leg muscles butchered in the European style used to make bacon. I was going to do a taste test but the texture was obviously different - the longer cured piece flaked when sliced. The other sliced like normal bacon. I would have liked to see the penetration from the web site referred to repeated with salt added to the other penetrating agents. Such a mix could possibly increase penetration through some of the other molecules hitch hiking along with the salt's osmotic process.

It showed up as a Kindle book for me.

As part of the EdX science and cooking course, I used an equilibrium brine on a control piece and an extended duration brine. They were identically sized and identically cooked. The extended brine piece of meat was much mushier in texture than the control. No acid in that one, only sait, water, a bit of sugar and pink salt. This experiment indicated that time in cure affected texture. I can't see how extended time in a marinade would not do likewise, even if it were due to the salt rather than the acid. Have you tried parallel tastings of extended and non-extended marinades Martin? It is likely to be very difficult keeping texture in memory to get a valid comparison.

Acid in marinades breaks down the protein (think of the 'cooking' that happens with a ceviche). The salt in a marinade enters into the meat through a process of osmosis, in which the aim of the process is to reach equilibrium so if the marinade has saltier liquid than the liquid in the meat, it will penetrate to meat until equilibrium is achieved. For this reason if you have over-brined a piece of meat, you can put it in a water solution and the process of osmosis will work to draw the salt out of the meat. If you leave the meat in a marinade for too long, the salt will reach equilibrium but the acid will continue to eat away at the protein, causing mushy meat. The movement of elements through the meat depends on the permeability of the barriers and the structure of the meat, including the water content. Because you have cooked the chicken in the first instance, this means there is less available liquid in the meat, which will change the rate of osmosis, although perhaps not the effect of the acid on the protein. Therefore, it will be different in at least one way. In the second instance, one difference is the heat that is involved in sous vide cooking. This could have an effect on the penetration. The thing that will affect the marination most, however, is the loss of water during the cooking process. Given that many elements of the marinade will not penetrate into the meat anyway (fat for example) the penetration is limited to molecules that are small enough to hitch a lift with the salt. For example, cloves will bleed through sealed plastic bags in a sous vide so it is highly likely that their flavouring elements will penetrate with the salt through osmosis. This is a bit ramble; however, to answer your question directly: Yes the loss of water from the meat in both instances means that there will be a difference in both cases on penetration of the marinade because it changes the diffusion coefficient. Whether this is noticeable from an organoleptic perspective is a matter for experimentation.

3 hours at 59C works perfectly. Was the squid fresh or frozen and thawed? If the latter, poor freezing could result in a mushy texture that would be exacerbated by cooking sous vide.

I remember posting about Pork fillet wrapped in pancetta cooked sous vide. After cooking give it a sear on both sides in a very hot fry pan to brown the pancetta.

Sadly I can't seem to find it in Australia. But I suspect that we get a wider range of good quality pasta than many of you can source. I'm really fussy about what I buy; the brand names mentioned above are not even on the radar. Yet the most important thing to me is still the seasoning and cooking. If I do it right, I can eat the pasta by itself -- no sauce, nothing else, and totally enjoy it; overcooking or undersalting makes it less edible. If the dried pasta is proper durum wheat plus water made with a brass die it should be good. My suspicion is that it is similar to the difference between Wonder bread and a loaf that is made with real flour.

Try a bit without the cheese as well, it sounds more like a Béchamel with parsley rather than a mornay sauce with parsley. The earthy, subtle cheese flavour could well have been cultured butter used in preparing the roux.

The pizza crust is a good analogy. Obviously the basic ingredients have the same flavour. It is more cooked but I think it is the texture that is influencing your experience of flavour. It may be a definitional issue as I strongly suspect we are saying the same thing. How does "If you get good dried pasta and cook it in an appropriate concentration of salted water, it will be something that you will want to eat either by itself [my words]" differ from what you have said?

I can't say that flavour is one of the things I look for in dried pasta. Instead, the most important thing is texture: both the roughness caused through extrusion through a brass die to which sauce will stick and the al dente nature from gluten in the durum wheat pasta. While I love making pasta from scratch with eggs and flour, it will never replace dried pasta for a number of classic dishes. It simply does not have the structure to support the sauce. I think in non-Italian countries, we mistake the sauce as the hero of the dish. In Italy, it is the opposite. If you get good dried pasta and cook it in an appropriate concentration of salted water, it will be something that you will want to eat either by itself or with a simple drizzle of olive oil and a powdering of parmesan. We've had this discussion on a number of forums previously where the sauce needs to be seen as a condiment to the pasta. Moreover, the sauce needs to be chosen to fit the pasta. Having spaghetti with bolognese sauce just gives a pile of sauce in the bottom of the bowl. If it is served with Tagliatelle, the sauce will cling to the pasta and give a satisfying eating experience.

I'd definitely start with the Sous Vide Index. After a few years, you can move on to something else

Sounds like excess sugar melted and caramelised too quickly for the structure to become established. I'd try less sugar and more egg white, perhaps whipping a part of the egg white and folding it in to give additional structure to the cookies.

As a short answer, yes. Check out this link for how to adjust recipes for your altitude.

Now studying wine formally, I have come across MR as it is referred to in the wine world: Pompe Bicyclette.

Just don't be tempted to cook it rare. The fat needs to melt.

I've got both. Would go with the Anova. Vac-Star is older technology and a bit more clunky. I've cooked for 40 people with the circulator and a 20 litre tank is more than enough. No point going for specs that you will never use.

I've come across a few papers claiming to show a link between Neural development, Autism, and BCM7, which is a peptide produced from cow A1 protein as a result of metabolism or processing. Superficially one would take this as strong evidence for using A2 milk. However, on a 2015 paper on this topic, the acknowledgements at the end of the paper were as follows. "This work was supported by research grants from the Autism Research Institute, The a2 Milk Company, and the National Institute for Drug Abuse (R21DA030225)." [emphasis added]. Another paper published in the area had an employee of the A2 Milk company as one of the joint authors. And I thought the pharmaceutical industry was the doyen for publishing papers with suspect independence that increased their profits.

Perhaps you could just have steak tartare. Saves all the fuss.

I have a lot of cookbooks (1456 according to Eat Your Books, which doesn't list all of my books) and it takes a lot for a book to stand out for me. One such book was Dominique Crenn's "Atelier Crenn: Metamorphosis of Taste." Check it out, I think you'll like it.

Martin Benn does an extreme version of this which cures the egg with salt and sugar for five days and then takes the yolk and dries it in the refrigerator for five days. This removes all the water from the egg (cures it) and allows you to grate it over dishes as a garnish (am sure soy and mirin would have the same effect).

A few days ago, I made some Vitelli Tonnato for 40 people using marinated Veal Girello that had been cooked sous vide at 69C until core temperature was 55C. The meat was cut on my meat slicer. There was some left over so last night we had home-made Thai beef veal salad, as pictured.

It does affect the moistness. Poultry in particular is far more moist than if it is done traditionally. I normally dislike Turkey as a dry and unappetising meal but if it is cooked sous vide, particularly with a milk and apple juice injected brine, it is deliciously moist. Try cooking chicken breast sous vide at 60-62C and you (and, more importantly, your wife) will see the difference.

Oops. this was a reply to 26th January post. Let but hopefully not useles. Hi Shelby, Try putting the chicken breast between two lots of saran wrap and hitting them with a meat tenderiser to make them more thin. It's not for tenderisation but rather to make the rolling easier. They looked good. I probably would have given them 2 1/2 hours rather than 3 1/2 but it shouldn't have affect the taste overly.