I agree entirely with the basic kit described here, particularly about the necessity of a calibration thermometer. Without it, you really should steer clear of temperatures below about 56.5°C, since your controller could easily be out by a couple of degrees. And some of the best things that sous-vide can do happen around 54 or 55. Since I'm a complete cheapskate, but am careful and have lots of patience, I took an old-fashioned approach to calibration, by buying a $30.00 laboratory mercury thermometer, accurate to 0.1°C. Unlike a digital thermometer, it has no way of falling out of calibration, other than something disrupting the mercury column. There is one major caveat with this approach. These are very delicate indeed, and if you break one, you're facing a very significant spill of a highly toxic substance. You won't be able to use a Swiffer to clean up after that. To just try out sous-vide, you can put off the controller for a while, but if you take to it, a controller will be in your future. For the first year or so I cooked sous-vide, I didn't yet have a controller. I used an old (probably 1950s) thermostatically controlled deep fryer. Temperatures in the deep-fry range were written around the thermostat, but it would turn down all the way to room temperature. It would take hours of setting, measuring, and adjusting to set the temperature, but once set, it would regulate to within a couple of degrees, so it was useable. As I said, though, you'll soon be asking Santa for a controller of some kind. Mine's one of the early Sous Vide Magic models, and it's still going strong. (I've gone through a few thermistors for it, but that's all it has needed)
