Duvel

I know this might not be what you are looking for, but after spending many years working on „my duck“, I now do legs & breasts, both sous vide. Convenient to prep, very reliable in taste & consistency and easily scalable. Pretty good sauce based on reduced bag juices & whatever tickles your fancy in an instant. In that case one leg (350-400 g) per adult (and per super hungry 7 yo, too), or about 2/3 of a 400g breast (all weights precook). Edit to add: you can of course trim your whole bird(s) down, and get a free gallon of duck stock plus some duck carnitas out of your carcass ...

I think this might be another misunderstanding on terminology. The manual talk not about the setting of the absolute humidity, it talks about steam injection. Under 100 oC the setting seems indeed to be interpreted as a humidity selection (as this corresponds to the SV mode, where the humidity is monitored via WBS), above 100 oC it is just the channel usage (hot air / circulation vs. steam inlet), as in the absense of a pressurized cell a humidity selection above the partial pressure of water at the selected temperature would not work.

Finally a useful application for 8 long years of studying thermodynamics 🤗

I think there is a small misunderstanding here. Yes, a professional combi will allow you to set the temperature & steam% independently, but not in any combination. The volume of steam generated per time unit depends on the power of the evaporator, and while these machines certainly have impressive specs, they have limitations. Besides, there are very limited applications to „cook“ at say 200 oC and 100% humidity. Please do have a look this, taken from a manual for the machine that @rotuts posted upthread ... Temperatur is - well - temperature and Feuchte means humidity. You can see that the limitation will be around 130 oC at 100% humidity, which in a preheated closed* system is well achievable ... *Edited for clarity: a closed (self-)pressurised system, as the vapor pressure of the steam (water) will exceed ambient pressure.

That might be a USP in the US ... YMMV. Just to add:

I got my two IKEA enamelled cast iron ones about 15 years ago, and they are in heavy use. I can wholeheartedly endorse them. Given their basic composition I would not foresee any wear and tear taking them out of service in the next decades, except if I really try to physically damage them. That would be no different to a Staub or Le Creuset. The loss of vapour is minimal. In the beginning I used the technique of sealing the rim/lid additionally with some dough (when a stew gets finished in the oven) once or twice, but found it is hardly worth the effort. The lid is heavy and well fitting and prevents moisture loss well. And just for completion sake: they do have these little condensation seeders in the lid as well ...

Thanks! I was not aware of that (or any other details on Popeyes). I liked the taste quite some, and will keep the frying in lard idea in my notes - that could be pretty easily accomplished here in Germany.

Buffalo Trace, but only for the cook 😜

By accident the little one found a suggested video in my Youtube list from Joshua Weissman on a copycat Popeye‘s chicken sandwich and decided that he wants to eat that. Now, neither him nor me have ever been to a Popeye‘s, and my experience with this kind of southern fried chicken is purely theoretical. And so I tried ... Chicken breast pounded, marinated in buttermilk with spices and coated in seasoned flour (and a bit of cornstarch). A bit of Bourbon to get me into that feeling ... Chicken fried up in plenty of oil ... Assembled on toasted brioche with a spicy mayonnaise, a generous layer of pickles and accompanied by fries ! We still don’t know how the original tastes, but this version got full approval 🤗

Mettbrötchen - the start of every good weekend ...

From my experience you need to render the fat properly (preferable after giving it some means to escape, e.g. scoring or piercing the skin). This can be achieved by slow roasting in an low oven or by sous vide. If using the latter, an additional drying step (fridge overnight or brushing with salt water) helps drastically. Then application of high, yet distant heat (broiler at full, but quite some distance to the meat) to allow proper blistering without premature scorching.

You can see the matrix ..?!

Faux „dry-aged“ ribeye (SV 2h@53 oC, finished in my gas grill), creamed spinach and Kenji‘s crunchy oven potatoes. Served with two compound butters: one based on roasted onions (as decided and mixed by the little one) and Gorgonzola (mine). Yummy !

The little one had a field day today. After gladfully assisting lunch prep, he volunteered to take over the frenching of the SV goose legs I made three days ago (12h @ 80oC). So, once more ... goose legs. With braised red cabbage (pear, juniper, cinnamon & clove) and a lovely intense sauce based on roast veggies & SV bag juices. Two kinds of (commercial) dumplings: Brezel dumplings and „half/half“ potato dumplings with roasted rye bread stuffing. Yum (and behold the frenched bone 😜) ! Little one ate an entire leg. He was more than stuffed and essentially floated, when I put him into the bathtub later ... I was stuffed as well but added more pear to mitigate the feeling. It worked well 🤗

How about a riff on (or of ?!) Sauce Foyot, so a basically a Sauce Bearnaise in which you incorporate the reduced pan juices of the roasted duck ... should work pretty well for a rare/medium rare duck breast.

Japanese lunch with a little helper: Menchi-katsu ... Mixing ... Being proud of producing a proper panko coating ... The hardest part: letting them rest for an hour 🤤 With side salad and sauce ... Piping hot and juicy ! Helper was delighted, too ...

Rou Jia Mo ...

That was my initial thought, but if that’s an industrialised product found in every supermarket it is hard to imagine that it has not been pasteurised. Good luck with your sausages - I am looking forward to your report how they turned out and how the flavour profile was. You certainly have a lot going on (orange zest, red wine, blue cheese ...). Best of luck !

Thanks - but what is the function of the cheese ? Flavor ? I assume that would not be a cheese with live cultures ?

May I ask: you are not using any nitrate source ? And where does the yoghurt comes into play ? And finally: what is the purpose of the frozen blue cheese (and which one do you use) ?

That is quite a long time for using a baking stone - and yet a pretty tasty looking pie! How do you preheat the stone, how long and what is your distance to the broiler element, if I may ask. I was actually wondering why your paper at the uncovered parts was not burnt ☺️ My pizza cooks in about 3.5 min and the trick was actually also a necessity, because the excess paper would start to carbonize under „my“ conditions ...

I do exactly the same, but remove the parchment after about 50 sec., when the base has firmed up. Gives much better spotting on the base ...

Frequently, yet now that my little one turned 7 he gets more sensible 😉 ...

Brisket (salt & pepper rub, liquid smoke, SV 36h@69 oC), roasted brussel sprouts and Heinz bbq beans (because weekdays I am a lazy cook) ...

The pumpkin (and onion) was roasted as the base of the soup, the pear accentuated the sweetness nicely. I added some creme fraiche to get a bit of acidity and the blood sausage for umami. All in all a good combination. It went into my “keep” file 😉