Anonymous Modernist 3323

Hello, After having a lot of success making stocks and risottos in my pressure cooker I turned my attention to the marinara recipe in MCAH. Unfortunately, it turned out quite burnt. Does anybody have any tips to prevent this from happening? I'm not sure what I can give for details - I followed the recipe pretty closely, and kept the pressure cooker from being over pressured.

Picked up my VP-112 and played around with it over the weekend. As others have said, I need to push down on the lid (in my opinion, I have to push quite hard on it) in order to get it to seal. I've ran some tests over the weekend, and the most that I've been able pull on it is -60 cmHg. Considering the air pressure around where I am is roughly 75 cmHg, that means that I'm only able to get about 80% vacuum. It hasn't affected anything so far, but it does bother me a bit. All in all, though, I'm pretty satisfied with it. The chamber size is plenty big enough for my needs. I'm strictly an amateur cook, so I don't think that I need the fine control of some of the more expensive machines. I haven't had a problem with bags not sealing, or not removing enough air when I cook sous vide.

The difficulty of getting the 210 in Canada made my choice a lot easier. I've ordered the 112, and once I've had it for a bit I'll give you as much of a review as I can. It'd be nice to have a baseline to compare it to (I've never owned a vacuum sealer of any sort), but I'll do the best I can.

Thanks for the tip. (Un)fortunately, I didn't take into account that Amazon might have a problem with international shipping - it won't even ship the 210 to Canada, and shipping on the 112 (along with import taxes etc) is close to 40% of the price. I haven't crunched out Webstaurant's price, but I imagine the shipping/import will be similar. So far, it seems like I might just have to get the 112 from SousVideSupreme, which has slightly more reasonable rates (or possibly Webstaurant, depending on what the final price is.) If anyone else out there knows of a reliable way to get an affordable chamber vacuum sealer in Canada, I'd appreciate you letting me know. My internet searches are not being productive.

Hello all. I'm a home cook looking to get into Sous Vide cooking. I'm getting ready to order some of the equipment and I have a question regarding chamber vacuum sealers. I know that in MC's gear guide they recommend the VacMaster VP210C, while in his 2011 Gift Guide Scott recommended the VP112C. A week ago they were only about $75 difference in price, and since footprint isn't really an issue for me I was just going to get the VP210C. However, when I looked today, Amazon has the VP-112C on for only $646.30. That's starting to be a substantial amount of savings. Both seem to be well reviewed items and I'm relatively certain that I won't go wrong with either, but I was hoping that I could find someone here who has used both and get there advice. Is the 210C worth the extra $250? Thanks in advance.

My go-to source for spices is http://www.silkroadspices.ca/. I'll admit that I've never ordered anything online from them (I'm fortunate enough to live in the area), but my understanding is that they do quite well in that regard as well (at least if you live in Canada).