mr_meanor

This book is now a steal at £13.50 at Amazon.co.uk! However, I've just spent 20 times that ice cream maker, pretty much so I can try making the Red cabbage gazpacho and pommery grain mustard ice cream, which one of my favorites at The Fat Duck. Book = cheap kit for book = expensive!

I used to live in Fordingbridge and was a big fan of the Ringwood beers. The nearby and new Sixpenny Handley brewery is highly recommended. I now live in NE Hampshire, and am a committed Triple FFF drinker. The brewery tap is only two doors from my house! The owner's a great guy, and has organised brewery tours for my group of friends quite often, including my birthday last year, which was a fabulous day, although my memory gets pretty hazy by lunchtime... *edited for awful spelling*

Yogurt and ice cream do have a point! I love clotted cream ice cream, with coconut yogurt poured over the top. The yougurt provides a sharpness that compliments the richness of the ice cream. Yogurt and foie gras? There's a challenge for someone I guess...

I did a similar thing a few years ago for Christmas Day. The rib went in for 24 hours at 130/55, then 30 mins in a very hot oven at the end, followed by a long rest in a warm place. The results were excellent, and the meat was incredibly juicy, but it was still well browned on the outside. The only problem was that the entire house smelt of beef for the entire day before, and I was sorely tempted to just pull it from the oven and cut slices off for sandwiches!

Ordered mine on Sunday evening from Amazon with free delivery, 7.15 on Tuesday morning I was woken by the postman! I haven't read it all yet, but so far I am very impressed. HB has a way of putting things simply, making it easy to understand, and simple to follow. I am going to try some of the home versions of fat duck recipes, and see how they compare, the chapter on sous vide is a good introduction to the topic, but the lack of detail is not suprising given the intended audience. I also have a piece of belly pork bring, ready for the weekend...

My first (successful) experiments were eggs, fillet steak, and salmon fillet. The eggs were cooked whole for 45 minutes at 66c and served on buttered toast. The steak was cooked at 52c for 3hours and then finished in a hot skillet. The salmon fillet was brined in a 10% solution for 10 minutes then cooked for 30 minutes at 52c. All of these convinced me of the value of sous vide, and were uncomplicated recipes, ideal for a first try!

Glad to hear it was a success! I always like "skin of your teeth" cooking!

Sorry, I was a student - I never even came close to breakfast in the city!

Yes, I see your problem! The two ways to do it would be A: Wait until the core temp is correct in a hotter than required water bath - this would be like a slow version of conventional cooking, so you would still see some gradient across the meat B: If you can maintain a satisfactory water temp, leave the meat in there for long enough that the whole piece reaches the same temperature and is done throughout as you would like I think what you are trying to achieve is "B" - Maybe the best bet is to turn your oven on now, put the water bath in, and see what actual temperature you can maintain in it. If its close then you are good to go, if it gets too high, then perhaps you could "surf" between the 50c and 75c settings on your oven to maintain something between the two? If you leave the meat in long enough, the core temp will match that of the water, give or take a degree...

Both the Black Boy and the Wykeham have a lot of character and are worth a visit, you are also quite close to the Cathedral and the old part of town which is lovely to explore. I would recomend a tour of the cathedral, especially the crypt with the "Sound II" sculpture by Anthony Gormley. (Posted with implicit permission of the University of Winchester, as indicated here.) There are several reasonable places to eat lunch around the Cathedral, especially if the weather is nice. I was a student in Winchester, so my priorities were slightly different while I lived there, but it is a lovely city!

Hi Peter, Even without being able to get an accurate temperature on your oven, you can "fine tune" by wedging the door slightly open - I found this when cooking a forerib for 24 hours at 60c. with a little playing around, I managed to keep the temperature +/- a couple of degrees. The smell that filled the house stopped me sleeping that night though! From my limited experience, I would not sear the meat first, I find I prefer to vacuum seal raw, then season and sear after the cooking, but I know other people prefer to do it as you suggest. I also wouldn't add the stock as I don't think it will need it. Use a large pot of water as your bath, that way the thermal mass will even out any fluctuations in oven temperature, once you have got a steady temperature, you can hold then meat there almost indefinately. If you want medium rare, try to get the thermometer reading 55c (maybe edging towards 60c to allow for the method) in the water, and cook the steak for at least a couple of hours, remove and rest in the bag so it holds on to all its juices, then sear it just before serving to get a nice crust. I am very much a novice, but have had great success with my "Heath Robinson" sous vide set up as shown below, beef is still one of my favourite things to cook this method! The size of my pot means that I can easily cook a forerib in it, as I did for Christmas this year and it came out wonderfully! You'll have a great time when your circulator finally arrives!

Word to the wise - DO NOT try to carbonate white wine, unless you like sticky vinegary smelling walls for weeks afterwards! Soda stream in the UK was the staple for mums trying to economise in the seventies and eighties, but it nearly almost always was false economy and Sodastream disappeared for a while, only to reappear in the past few years with up to date machines. I believe my parents still have an eighties version, white plastic with an orange lever to seal the bottle to the CO2 injector!

I've heard good things about the Black Rat but have never been. I would recomend The Chesil Rectory which is nearby. Before or after a meal at either, go for a walk along the river (on the city side) starting beside the bridge and near the roundabout with King Alfreds Statue on it - follow the river side path until you reach Jane Austins house and then head towards the Cathedral. Definately pop into the Wykeham for a pint, but I don't think the food is that special!