Merkinz

Thanks for all the advice everyone... I'm gonna sleep on this one. rotuts: That looks DELICIOUS!

Keith & Chris: If I use the trivet for something like this (my cooker came with one) does the surrounding water need to be touching the bowl / container containing the food? Thanks for the tip Baselerd but I think my pure was unreasonably thick! I'll give the authors the benefit of the doubt though because the scorching in the pan may have had something to do with it. In the end I had the siphon inverted holding my finger over the nozzle and whipping the bottle down with force using my whole arm (like when you try to get the last out of the shampoo bottle). Then when I opened the siphon after getting as much out as I could there was still half of the mixture still stuck to the sides and the bottom of the siphon - nowhere near the nozzle. Out of curiosity does any one know how many chargers you can crack into a 0.5L siphon before it gets dangerous?

My first dish: Refried Bean Foam I was making nachos for dinner and since it is an easy meal I thought why not give this a try, how hard could it be? I got all the ingredients including bottled water. I measured everything out to the gram. I dumped the oil, beans and water in my pressure cooker (Fagor), sealed and brought up to pressure then reduced the heat so there was just a light hiss coming out of the cooker. This cooked for an hour as I prepared dinner... BUT OH NOOOOOO!!! The beans stuck to the bottom of the pan and made a hell of a mess even though there was a little water still in there at the end. There was no hint that this was happening, no smell nothing. I scraped the soft beans out making sure to leave the scalded bean goo behind. I MUST PRESS ON ... I mean how badly can I mess up what is effectively a two ingredient recipe!!! So I blended the beans with my blender and the puree was thhhhhhhhhhhhhick! I blended for about 5 minutes to get as many lumps out as possible. I returned this puree to a new pan, added the cream (with an extra 20g of cream to try to loosen the puree a little morew) and whisked it over a low heat. Once it reached the right temperature (yes I used a digital thermometer!) I passed it though a sieve into my 0.5L ISI whipper... I cannot begin to describe the mess this made but I'm glad I did it because there were a few little lumps that the blender just couldn't manage. These would have easily blocked the siphon. Once in the siphon I charged it with two chargers (is this even safe in a 0.5L siphon?) shook it, inverted it and dispensed it into a large ramekin. It took some interesting shaking and dancing around to try and get most of the puree to the nozzle end and I still left alot behind. The result was delicious! A lovely light tasting (but thick) bean foam. It didn't last very long, maybe 5 - 10 minutes before it started to deflate and lose its beautiful texture. It was still delicious but not unique like it was when it first came out. I have two gripes with this recipe: 1) It's a mess to make. It is effectively a two ingredient recipe, I followed the recipe to the letter using a very accurate digital scale and a digital thermometer and I feel like I still stuffed it up! Are the beans meant to stick to the base of the pan like that? Is the puree ment to be that thick? 2) And my biggest gripe: It's not stable!!! Ok I know that it states this in the recipe but if I'm being instructed to invest in hydrocolloids and other food additives foreign to the home kitchen then surely there must be something I could add to this to make it more stable right? The stability is an issue for this dish because it was difficult enough getting it OUT of the whipper that you couldn't simply siphon to order... Because it's so thick there is no warning about when the bean foam will stop coming out of the whipper and a high pressure jet of air will start! Would I make it again? I'd like to hear other peoples attempts before I try this recipe again; it was delicious and I want to eat it again! But I don't want to go through that hastle again. Can I put extra water in and strain it off at the end? This may dilute the flavor a little but surely it'd prevent leaving a caked on mess in the pan. Onwards and upwards... I look forward to my next recipe!

Thanks nickrey thats a good option and I'll visit my local store to see if they have it in stock and what its like in the flesh. This still a bit of a side step to my original question: Can I use any container? and what are the hazards with using a $15 plastic container from my local hardware store compared to something like this ($63)? Is there any benifit to the extra expense? Cheers.

Thanks Chris, appreciate the input. I might try and nab both for xmas.

I've tried their website with little luck... I've also tried a few other hospitality supplies websites but my lack of luck with these places made me wonder if I could just go down to Mitre 10 (local hardware store) and buy a 20 - 30 L plastic bin and use that? I know they have them, I know they are cheap and I know they will do the job but I just don't know if they are safe! I'll have a look in my local Southern Hospitality store... maybe they have things in stock not listed on their website.

How good would this book be for a beginner? Thanks

Thanks Dexter, this is great!I'm sure I'll have more to add here as I go through the book in more detail.

If you're worried, get yourself a stainless steel deep hotel pan. They are readily available at Kitchen supply stores. You should also be able to get a polycarbonate lid that you can cut a hole big enough for the circulator. Not sure if you meant Sous Vide Supreme as this is the Eades self contained cooker. Thanks! I'll have another search. ... and I have no idea why I said SVS ... I meant the Polyscience one!

A quick question for those in the know: If I buy a SVS can I use ANY plastic container? Are there chemical leeching issues? Will any chemicals leeched out of a cheap plastic container penetrate a sous vide vac bag? Could they penetrate an eggshell and consequently an egg cooked in the bath without a bag? I'm looking at a cheapo plastic tub down here in NZ as I can't seem to source those polycarbonate food containers everyone seems to use... well I found one but they were charging about $140 USD + shipping!

I'm sorry I was referring to the LA Times Review mentioned above... and now egullet is not letting me edit my post to reflect that. My Bad. Chris, I guess I should further clarify (and I guess when you get to this level of quality it really just boils down to opinion): Firstly the design of both books is FANTASTIC! And rivals every cookbook I have in my collection. But as you have also noticed there are differences between the two. MC is pure art, I feel like I could open any volume to almost any page and I could hang it up on my wall! There is alot of space for pictures, graphs and concepts to breathe on the page. MCAH is also graphic design bliss but from more of a utilitarian point of view. I agree that they have squeezed as much space out of each page as possible without crowding it. The recipes, the step by step photographs, the fact tidbits, the variations etc. all work in unison on the page but I just don't get the feel that I could hang it on my wall as art. To get the same effect as MC it would have been alot bigger, more expensive and the average home cook (at which the book is aimed) may well have said: "Whats with all the wasted space?" Of course the idea of hanging a cookbook on the wall is silly! But I'm just trying to illustrate my opinion. To say that the design of MCAH was a 'step backward' from MC was a mistake... The design is simply different, more utilitarian with excellent use of space! I prefer the design of MC but that same design may well have not worked for MCAH. I do stand by my comment about the photos though... Although excellent in concept, composition etc. they don't quite reach the near perfect 'technical' quality of those in MC - and I'm only referring to a hand full of photos in the book, not every single one... Did they change the photographer? I didn't check that and I'm at work at the moment.

Cheers. I pre-ordered from amazon and for some reason they started sending them out last week

My first impressions My copy arrived yesterday and I've spent quite a bit of time reading it already and straight off the bat you WILL be disappointed if you compare MCAH to the original MC. However if you are comparing this book to the likes of Heston Blumenthal At Home, Ad Hock at Home By Thomas Keller, The Family Meal By Ferran Adria and other 'cookbooks' (i.e. not scientific compendiums) then this book definitely sits in the ranks among the best! The pages are packed with well written recipes most of which have useful variations appended at the end and tips on troubleshooting tricky recipes. The recipes are both exciting and very approachable with clear guidelines on how long it will take to make, how much it will yield, how easy it is to make and in some cases how long it will last in the fridge (pickles, confit etc.). They make Sous Vide in general very approachable and in a large portion of the Sous Vide recipes they use zip lock bags (which is great because Modernist Cuisine left me feeling like I needed a chamber vacuum). There are quite a few recipes that use a pressure cooker which I am very much looking forward to. Each recipe has step by step photos on how they are made and photos usually have some thought behind them i.e. some of the sauce recipes have a photo where an upturned spoon has been dipped into the sauce, pulled out and had a finger wiped across the back of it giving a good indication of consistency (I couldn't think of a better way to convey this in a photograph). Despite what the NYTimes review says I found the ingredient lists to be very tame! The modernist ingredients they use are usually gelatin, agar agar, sodium citrate, xanthan gum, wandra etc. and with the advent of modernist pantry the only ingredients you might have trouble finding are those that are regional (i.e. we don't get a variety of fresh mushrooms down here in NZ). I am also really impressed and pleased that they use MSG in a few recipes (and only a very few recipes for those who are concerned). I think it is about time someone stepped up and started pushing MSG as a safe ingredient and what better way to do that than publish some recipes that use it. I mean it's all well and good that the likes of Heston and David Chang can go around preaching that it is a perfectly safe ingredient (and I'm glad that they do!) but it is a whole different story to publish some recipes that use it. I really applaud them for this. If you're interested in what and how they use it check out the Korean Chicken Wings on Chow: http://www.chow.com/...n-chicken-wings I have a little graphic design and photography experience from my past so I am usually hyper aware of these things and I think MCAH is a step backward from MC in this area. The pages are much more crowded (in their defense the pages are PACKED with much more information than MC) and the photos (although good) aren't quite to the standard of those in MC with digital noise apparent if a few. These minor gripes however will go unnoticed by 99% of those who open this book and 100% of those who have never thumbed through MC. MCAH is still leaps and bounds ahead of most cookbooks in this area (I'm looking your way Christina Tosi with all your pictures of kitchen staff throughout your book!) and all their photos go some way to either illustrate how your equipment works, describe the best process for preparing a dish or show what your results should/could look like. MCAH is an excellent standalone cookbook in my opinion weather you own MC or not

Thanks Dexter! That is a generous offer and if the others on here are keen then I am in. It seems to come up alot in this book. I've reached out to an american foods store here to see if they are able to obtain it for me but I haven't heard back yet. Modernist Pantry are great for the modernist ingredients but there are odd things like Wondra that they don't stock for obvious reasons.

What is a suitable substitute for Wondra? It's just not available here

Thanks for all the details, very interesting to hear. I also have the power to destroy any pie crust that comes within 10 meters of my presence, so you're not alone!

Eager to hear any thoughts on the book while my copy travels the world (it is currently enjoying the sun in Hawaii!)

I did, and I'm quite excited about this. I mean I love my cookbooks (gotta collect em all right!) but it seems like an exciting new way to learn and improve my home cooking.

Basing the value of a book on "Cents Per Page" is fundamentally flawed, unless of course you get a kick out of how much paper you can collect ... But to each his own I am very much looking forward to the latest addition to the Modernist Cuisine series, cost is not an issue, the structural integrity of my bookshelves is fast becoming an issue

Bahhhh HUMBUG! My pre-order wasn't showing a revised shipping date so I jumped on the Amazon chat help and they said "It's because of your location" ...

Just looked at Amazon.com: IN STOCK!

I rate Bookdepository but their shipping times can be erratic (doesn't help that I live in never never land). I'm going with amazon for this purchase and paid extra to have it delivered asap!

I imagine they made bigger runs of this new book so you may be waiting a while! ... and at least they do provide an erratas page, I'm looking your way Ferran Adria

Good point! I might explore the pdf idea ... Nice job jfrater! I might have to have a crack at those ribs when I next get access to a smoker

Looking forward to photos and hearing whats good