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My sous vide equipment arrives tomorrow, but my copy of Modernist Cuisine is still in transit. So I'm going to want to try this out before having time to do all the study I'd like. I've been following the various topics on eG but was wondering if anyone might share recipes best designed for the sous vide newbie?

[Moderator note: The original "Modernist Cuisine" by Myhrvold, Young & Bilet topic became too large for our servers to handle efficiently, so we've divided it up; the preceding part of this discussion is here: "Modernist Cuisine" by Myhrvold, Young & Bilet (Part 2)] Since I've received mine I've had little time until this weekend to actually read through it in depth. I've been starting with the history in volume 1, which I find fascinating as I love history. I even looked up some of the original recipe books it references and downloaded them to my kindle through gutenberg as it is a wonderful addition to the whole and its history. Second to that I started sifting tbrough the equipment. Then yesterday I drove three hours north to share the volumes with my family. I don't think their mouths ever closed after seeing them for the first time. We each grabbed a volume, from my 16 year olde nephew to my 70 year olde father and for five straight hours we were consumed and shared with eachother ideas and "finds". In my family cooking and meals are a big part of us "coming together"...this truly added to a family moment for us. Now I've got to find a weekend to bring my 16 year olde nephew down to Massachusetts to cook with me. He wants to get into spherification and I want to experiment with the fish paper. I have a crazy idea to use the paper for and can't wait to start experimenting. ...after that I think the mac and cheese, since everyone has been talking about that on here I can't wait to try it as it brings back fond childhood memories for me.

First off, yes, I realize that a water bath is a water bath. Now that we've taken care of that: how do people cook recipes designed for oven water baths in their SV rigs? Most recipes requiring bain maries report inches of water, boil first or not, temperature of the oven, and time, or some combination of same. I can't quite figure out how to translate those. In addition, it seems that it should be easy enough to get the ramekins or flan mold or whatever to sit on a shelf in the water bath, but I'd be interested to see photos of how people do it.

I'm looking for a way to dehydrate (or transform) honey into a sheet with similar properties to a fruit leather. I've been able to do this with sugary sauces like cocktail sauce or plum sauce just by spreading them on parchment and putting them in the dehydrator for a few hours. However, honey doesn't seem to change much. My guess is that I need to add some type of starch to help draw out the moisture, or use a gelling agent in some way. Ideally, the finished properties of the honey sheet are that it is stable at room temperature, not too sticky to the touch (I'm OK with coating it with a fine power to help with this) and that it will dissolve completely if stirred into hot water. Does anyone have experience or tips for this problem? Thanks, Scott

I saw this article and thought it sounded like a very cool technique. http://nymag.com/restaurants/features/wylie-dufresne-eggshell-2011-4/ I was curious if anyone had any experience working with Kaolin or where to source it. There is some stuff on Amazon, but nothing seems particularly food grade.

"want to go to elbulli ?" That was the subject line of his email. A couple of days ago, Nathan Myhrvold, the author of Modernist Cuisine who is known in these parts as "nathanm," invited me to dinner. In Spain. At elBulli. This weekend. The proposition: if I can get to Barcelona by noon on Friday he's got a van waiting to take us (there are some other folks coming too, and I'll get to them in a subsequent post) to El Celler de can Roca on Friday night and elBulli on Saturday night. Well, sure I want to go, but I can't. We've been renovating an apartment in Harlem and living in a temporary situation slowly losing our minds for almost a year, and our move-in date is Friday. I politely declined. "What are you crazy?" My wife, Ellen, said when I told her about the exchange. She immediately got on the computer and emailed Nathan: My husband is not thinking straight. Let me talk to him about this and he'll get back to you in half an hour. We can move after the weekend, she told me. You don't say no to this kind of offer. What can I say? I have the world's greatest wife. I got on Expedia and booked a ticket to Barcelona. I leave JFK this Thursday at 6pm and will be in Barcelona on Friday morning. I had given up on ever getting to elBulli. This is the restaurant's final season -- soon it will end its run and be reimagined as some sort of culinary foundation (I've read several accounts, like this one and heard Ferran Adria talk about it, but I still need to clarify exactly what's happening there). Reservations are absurdly difficult to get (the number I've heard is 2 million reservation requests for 8,000 seats per year), and the one time someone I know offered me a seat a couple of years ago I just couldn't make the travel arrangements work. But thanks to the eleventh-hour intervention of Dr. Myhrvold, I'll be celebrating our Year of Modernist Cuisine in style. Now I just need to remember where my passport is.

I have tried and failed several times to create a dish that I've had in mind for some time now. I'm looking for advice on how to achieve the texture I'm after. I want to make a hard-set sugar sponge with large (1/4") bubbles, resembling a honeycomb. I don't care about having the bubbles perfectly aligned - rather, I care about creating a texture that is very lightweight but brittle. I've seen techniques for aerated chocolate that result in the texture I want, but I haven't been able to apply them to sugar. What I've tried so far is melting wet sugar until it reaches hard-crack, then quickly adding it to a CO2 siphon, charging it, shooting it out into a vacuum canister, vacuuming to increase bubble size, and letting it set up. I always get stuck at the "shooting it out" part, because the sugar is far too thick to be expelled through my siphon. Usually, I just end up with a bunch of sugar laminated to the inside of my siphon and 2 days of soaking to clean. I've also tried heating isomalt and blowing bubbles into it. This was fun but futile. Is there a way that I can thin out the sugar, but still retain enough surface tension to hold bubbles, and still set up brittle when it cools? Or, is there some other way to achieve this texture with some type of sugar? Thanks in advance for any help you can provide!

Hi all I was wondering if any of you think it would be feasible to make black garlic in a temp controlled water bath? I understand from reading an article on ehow that you need to pack the garlic loosely in a jar and heat them for 40 days at 140 degrees and that the garlic should remain humid. I was thinking of putting them in a sealed bag (not vacuumed) and then floating it on a 140 degree water bath for 40 days.

We've got a Kitchen Consumer topic on chamber sealers themselves, but we don't have a topic on all the stuff you can do with them. Let's get started. Last night, I began learning how to use my VacMaster VP112, focusing my attentions on a watermelon. The compression was only fair to good, sadly, but I did have an excellent experience making my first vacuum cocktail, infusing seedless watermelon cubes with a Negroni cocktail (equal parts gin, sweet vermouth, and Campari). They were excellent. So what are some other fun things you can do with a powerful vacuum? There's much in Modernist Cuisine to mine, I know that....

In his Esquire blog piece of March 18, 2011, John Mariani, the erstwhile restaurant critic, takes on "Modernist Cuisine", modernist cuisine, Grant Achatz, and a lot more. With lines like this... I have to disagree. Because sometimes it is about coaxing the maximum flavor of that perfect ingredient, as when something as simple as a carrot is cooked sous-vide. He then goes on to slam Grant Achatz pretty vehemently, ending by writing... Some pretty harsh words, don't you think? So, is he onto something, or is it all sour grapes for reasons we mere mortals are not privy to?

What can I use to substitute propynel glycol alginate for the gruyere spheres? or where can I buy it, I have been looking in internet and I haven't been able to find it.

Greetings, Prepare for a long post. I have been searching all over the internet for an answer to a question and it's starting to appear that I may have to do my own experimenting. Still, I thought to ask someone (you all) who have MUCH more experience with tea than me. I have a doctorate in chiropractic and always got an A in Lab which, like cooking, I love. I also have the equivalent of a doctorate in coffee, yet not for tea....yet. For coffee I use a digital scale, a digital thermometer, stellar water (properly mineralized), make single variations every day over many weeks and record data on a spreadsheet, and incorporate my partner's opinion as well as occasional "outsider's" who say things like "this may be the best cup of coffee I have ever had!" So, here's the tea question, Question #1: Does tea taste better when "fresh brewed" like coffee does? It's well known that coffee that's more than 15 minutes old (20 tops) after brewing is not the same, and is not as good as fresh-brewed. Of course, and as you probably know, there is a LOT more going on than the post brew-time issue (water quality, grind size, type of grinder/mill, brew temp, type of roast, type of roaster, age of roast, weather patterns, dried on earth or wood, wet-dry-hot-cold processes, etc.), still I wonder if the post-brew time is similar with tea? Having just switched to tea from coffee, and while being amazed that I'm not missing coffee, I am learning a lot. How could I have almost 5 decades under my belt and be so clueless about the worlds of tea? I shudder to think of all the tea I have wasted over the decades not having any idea that a second, third or more infusions were possible. My current daily, all-day tea is Ti Kuan Yin. It does not take a Rocket Surgeon to taste the difference between infusion #1 and #5. I lengthen the steep time from the first to last infusions. Aside: I heard that tea gets cloudy when stored in a refrigerator - have not observed that yet. I read that it's a great growth media for micro-organisms. I am not trying to make kombucha - lol. My #1 priority is taste. Since the first infusion has a far fuller taste (some even recommend tossing it and using the first infusion only as a wash), and since the last infusion (#5) is quite thin in the taste department (though still good, just not as...), it occurs to me to mix the five infusions together, and heat what we want as needed over 1-2 days time. Question #2: Is mixing five infusions a good idea? (comments invited) I am mixing infusions now: I am make five infusions of 16 oz, or 2 cups each in an uncovered 4 cup Pyrex pitcher/measuring cup. Since I am using an oolong, my awesome water is heated to between 185 and 190. I am using close to 4 rounded teaspoons of tea, slightly more (a teaspoon) than most recommend. Steep times for each infusion in minutes are 2.5, 3, 4, 5, and 6. This yields a total of 10 cups steeped in 4 teaspoons tea for 20.5 minutes. Question #3: What is the difference between performing five infusions as noted above, or steeping the same amount of tea in 10 cups of water kept at 185 for 20 minutes? {?more tannins released because the tea leaves didn't get a smoke break?} Question #4: What is the effect of over-heating already brewed tea? Asked differently, what effect does taking a couple of cups of the mixed infusion up to 200, or 205, or even 212 degrees have? I'd love to find these answers, and of course, I'd love your input. Thanks in advance, Dr Carl Sir Dr. Carl, DC, OCD, ADD, PTSD, LOL

I just got my Ariste Molecular Gastronomy kit in the mail today. I don't have my copy of Modernist Cuisine yet, but heck if I can wait, so I decided to do a simple spherification. I found a recipe for Red Wine Caviar, from here. All good, until I start dropping the wine into the calcium chloride bath. It simply dissolves! If I drop it very, very gently, some stay in a sphereish shape, but immediately dissolve when I lift them from the water bath. I checked the documentation that came with the Ariste kit, and their water bath had slightly different ratios - 6.5 gr of calcium chloride to a liter of water. So I tried that, and if anything, my drops dissolve even faster. So... what am I doing wrong? My scales could be slightly off, as they're rated only down to 2 grams (got a better one on order), but other than that, I did everything to the letter.

Hi, guys. I am going to mess around with hard cooking eggs sous vide. My goal is getting an egg that's idea for deviled eggs. At a certain point the yolk gets very chalky and dry; my thinking is that by cooking them sv I can get the whites fully set without seriously overcooking the yolk into a sulfery, crumbly mess. Can anyone here suggest a temp to start with? I'm thinking of 176. Given that the whites and yolks have different properties I might have to try sv'ing them for an hour at 160-ish to set the yolks, then a minute or two in simmering water to fix the whites. I'm willling to experiment but I could use a starting point. I realize most of the attention on eggs is focused on soft boiled ones. Those come out pretty well for me. Just looking for a better way to cook eggs hard "boiled."

Even with all the attention being lavished on Modernist Cuisine, I find it hard to believe no one has been cooking from Ideas in Food! The first preparation I made from it was red wine vinegar; before reading the book, I'd been reluctant to use cider vinegar as the starter (even though it's the easiest vinegar to find with a live mother), but they convinced me to stop being such a purist about it. I've been regularly feeding my red wine vinegar over the past few weeks, it's thriving, and I love the flavour. I've used it in everything from vinaigrette to Sauerbraten. Last night I made the macaroni and cheese recipe. The version in Modernist Cuisine calls for sodium citrate and carrageenan; the version in Ideas in Food just calls for evaporated milk, which already has disodium phosphate and carrageenan in it. I think this is a really elegant solution if you don't want to spring for the specialty chemicals. Better still, the recipe worked like a charm, and was fast and delicious. I'm looking forward to playing with different kinds of cheese, but I think it's safe to say I'll be keeping a can of evaporated milk handy at all times from now on. Edit: Society-friendly Amazon link.

[Moderator note: The original "Modernist Cuisine" by Myhrvold, Young & Bilet topic became too large for our servers to handle efficiently, so we've divided it up; the preceding part of this discussion is here: "Modernist Cuisine" by Myhrvold, Young & Bilet (Part 1)] I wouldn't pay much attention to the Amazon estimated shipping dates. It is unclear to me that they have any real basis. All of the books in the first printing will ship from China to in the US, Canada or Europe in the next 3 weeks, and a few thousand are currently somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. So far about 2/3 of the first printing has been pre-ordered. So everybody currently on order ought to get books from these shipments. A second printing is being ordered. You'd think that traveling thousands of miles by boat would be the majority of their journey. But that isn't really the case. So far they have had several snafus in getting the books out. Some distributors shipped books to the wrong distribution center. Some decided to ship books by train from Seattle to various places in the middle of the country. Some shipped to one distribution center, then decided that the books were too heavy for the equipment at that center, so they proceeded to ship them by truck to another distribution center. One distributor seems to have lost track of 150 books - hopefully this is just a computer error. It is frustrating, and I am trying to get it all fixed for future shipments. As as result, the first batch of books has been in the US since early February but took another 3 weeks or so to reach customers. I'm sorry about that, but there is not much I can do. In principle the remainder of the books ought to reach customers in March, but I suspect that it will take until some point in April due to various silly delays in the book distribution system.

In anticipation of my copy of Modernist Cuisine and based on comments from other egullet members I went ahead and ordered a VacMaster VP210. I'm picking it up today and once my significant other sees the size of this thing she'll immediately start looking for a receipt so I need to be armed with all the wonderful things, both cooking and non-cooking related, that we can now do with a chamber vacuum machine. My current list includes: Much easier to package food for sous vide cooking in SVS Canning is a snap Instant Pickles Preserve the shelf life of proteins and sauces in the fridge and freezer Buy larger cuts and vacuum pack individually Vacuum Pack all sorts of things around the house to keep them organized and conserve space (maybe a bit of a stretch?) Marinating foods on steroids I'm going to be buying those meat dry aging bags and that would have required a new suction vacuum anyways so I'm really saving money! Anything else to build my business case? It's not getting returned so this is more about stopping her from immediately heading off on an epic shopping spree of her own... rg

Recently in the Washington Post, I came across a farmers market favorite called, " Gelatina Encapsulada" is anyone in Northern New Jersey teaching, how to make this mexican delicacy? Jan

Does anyone with a copy of the book remember what it said about centrifuges--what the recommended capacity and RPM capabilities are?

Q&A with the Modernist Cuisine Team The Society for Culinary Arts and Letters is thrilled to be able to offer this Q&A with the team behind Modernist Cuisine: The Art & Science of Cooking. This ground-breaking multivolume work has spawned two discussion topics, one focusing on the book and one devoted to cooking with the book. In this topic, we will have the unprecedented opportunity to explore the book's development, design, and production with the team that made it happen. The book authors -- Nathan Myhrvold (Society member nathanm), Chris Young, and Maxime Bilet -- worked with editor-in-chief Wayt Gibbs to answer several questions we posed. The team also shares for the first time a multipage arc of content that traverses several volumes across a crucial content area: how understanding the weirdness of water can benefit your understanding of cooking. (Please click on the thumbnails of each page below to see a larger image.) What follows provides an opportunity to get to know Modernist Cuisine that much better, a book that many are hailing as one of the most important publications in the history of cooking. In addition to the excerpts and initial Q&As, Wayt Gibbs will respond on behalf of the MC team to your questions. We hope that you enjoy this opportunity to take a glimpse at this remarkable book.

I know there was a thread on this a few years ago, however it seems these scales are no longer made or newer better models are available. As I've become more serious about my baking, I've decided to get a kitchen scale. I'm debating between the My Weigh KD-8000 http://www.amazon.com/My-Weigh-Digital-Weighing-Scale/dp/B001NE0FU2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297958394&sr=8-1 or the EatSmart Precision Pro Digital Scale. http://www.amazon.com/EatSmart-Precision-Digital-Kitchen-Scale/dp/B001N0D7GA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1297958443&sr=1-1 Originally I wanted the Taylor Salter High Capacity Scale because it looked cool, but I've noticed it received many mixed reviews. http://www.amazon.com/Taylor-Salter-Aquatronics-Capacity-Kitchen/dp/B004BIOMGU/ref=sr_1_24?s=home-garden&ie=UTF8&qid=1297958465&sr=1-24 Here are my requirments: -Minimum capacity of 11 lbs -Minimum resolution of 1 g -Measure in Kg, lb, oz, g -Tare feature -Preferably have seamless buttons I want to get a nice scale. I don't want to get a scale with minimum features only to find in two years that I do enough baking/cooking that requires me to have something more sophisticated. Here are a few other questions: 1. How important is it to have a scale measure fluid ounces? 2. What about measuring lbs. oz (for example 6 lbs and 4.2 ounces) 3. Is it important to have a scale measure in bakers %? I'd like to learn how to do these and have a cookbook that shows them next to the measurements. I'm not sure if this is something most people can figure out on their own or it would be handy to have them on a scale. The MW KD-8000 does this. The only problem with the MW-KD-8000 is it appears to be big and bulky and I don't have a lot of counter space so I'd probably keep it stored most of the time. The Eat Smart just seems to minimal. The Salter seems like an expensive scale for what it offers and somewhat of a risk. Thanks for any help in helping me choose the right scale. I do not know why this is becoming a chore to purchase! I just want to make sure I choose the right one right off the bat.

Im doing a really intense cheese dish and want to pair wines to the cheese using a thermo reversable gelatine. The idea is that the cheese sits on top of the gel, and when the guest puts a bit of the cheese, and the wine gel into their mouth, it reverts back to a liquid due to the heat of the guests mouth. I need to find 2 things. 1 - what gelatine will reverse back to a liquid with a not so hot temperature. 2) is anything lost in a wine by gelling it in regards to flavour, mouth feel, etc. Would be really excited to hear from anyone about this. Alex

I would like to purchase a Sous Vide Immersion Circulator and Vacuum Sealer for our small restaurant (78 seats) but not sure what to buy. I have several dishes that I think can be improved by the use of sous vide so anticipate that it will be in constant use but cost is a huge concern. I have looked at the PolyScience Professional and like this the most thus far but the SV Supreme is much less and for the price could be running two machines simultaneously (of course counter space might become an issue and I'm not sure it is large enough for our needs). I would love your suggestions as to which machine you recommend as well as which Vacuum Sealer would be appropriate in a professional setting (unfortunately the chamber sealer is out of my price range). I will be sealing/cooking bone-in chicken so it needs to be able to seal the product and offer thicker bag options. Thanks in advance for your help.

I just got the "Artistre" kit from Amazon, which is a pretty nice starter collection. It's got about 50g of: Tapioca Maltodextrin Kappa Carageenan Sodium Citrate Sodium Alginate Calcium Lactate Gluconate Glycerin flakes Methocellulose F50 Calcium Lactate Calcium Chloride Xantham Gum Lecithin Agar Agar All told it's a pretty nice starter kit (though I wish it had Iota Carageenan so I could make the Macaroni and Cheese in Modernist Cuisine). Has anyone else bought this one, or any of the others out there?

Egullet folks, I've been trying to track down recipes and techniques for making luminescent (glowing) dishes and drinks. Google searches and even egullet searches haven't turned up much. Obviously there are plenty of substances and materials that are luminscent or can be made luminescent, but almost none of them are edible. I'm not necessarily looking for a way to make a dish that is luminescent in normal lighting conditions (which may not be possible at all), it will probably be reduced light or completely dark (glow-in-the-dark). The only thing I've managed to find so far is the glow-under-blacklight (ultraviolet) method of using quinine in drinks. I also recall Heston Blumenthal making a glow-in-the-dark jelly tower, but that, too, may have used a blacklight. If so then these would both be florescent techniques. Everything that is phosphorescent seems to involve chemicals that aren't safe to consume (zinc sulfide, strontium aluminate), but I can't find solid sources to confirm this. The same goes for chemiluminescent materials (like the stuff in glow sticks). The most promising approach might be to find a bioluminescent bacteria or algae that is safe to consume. As a matter of fact, you might even be able to cook and kill the bacteria/algae and have it retain its bioluminescence for some time afterward. Has anyone experimented with any of these approaches? Any thoughts?