Search the Community

I have tried Glad, and a generic plastic wrap at 800W and Premium Saran at 500W for the Microwave Parsley recipe. In all cases the wrap melted through, at 800W much faster than 500W. While I have been successful using parchment paper and a careful eye, the plastic wrap would be much easier. In a brief look at commercial wraps, none seemed suited for the microwave. Any suggestions on a wrap? The generic wrap description in MCAH hasn't been sufficient. -Steve

Bradley seems to be the king, as they are very automated and pretty much hands free. Do you need and external electrical outlet? They seem a tad expensive for the full machine and disks, if I wanted to smoke for 12 hours or more what are my alternatives? Does anyone have a Bradley and what is good or bad, my understanding is that the original is the best and the digital is dodgy? Has anyone used the Bradley smoke engine to build their own smoker out of a plastic garden shed or something? Drew

Hi! I have a question, I cooked sous vide a pice of eye of round, first time I did it, I packed it with a home Food Saver, which does not kmakes much pressure, and I cooked it for about 18 hours at 130 F, was very tender and juicy and pink, just how I like it, the second time I cooked packed it with a professional chamber vacuum machine, for 60 seconds, and I guess was packed under a lot more pressure, cooked it also for about 18 hours, but this time at 135, it came out very tender too, but this time released probably 4 times more liquid, meet was pink, but texture was dry. Can 5 degrees make such difference? Of you think it could be the much higher pressure of the chamber vacuum machine? Thanks!

I´m quite curious when it´s writen low heat in cookbooks. What does that mean. I have never understood this. And when i was reading in the modernist cuisine about clarified butter. In the text about Ghee it says "To make ghee, contiune to warm the melted butter over low heat for 45 min." Can someone please tell me wich temperature low heat are? I think it quite suprising that the authers write in this way in this of scienice based book.

Hi, For those in Australia I have been sourcing ingredients for modernist cuisine and have put together a few kits, which are currently up on Ebay. You can view the kits at the Australian Ebay site. This is not a business, it was just more economic for me to buy in larger quantities than to buy 20g of stuff at a time mail-order. Once these kits go, there will be no more… -Chris

Has anyone made ice cream base in a souse vide? Or creme anglaise? I have a recipe for ice cream that calls for cooking at 82 C. But i want to cook ribs at 80 C. Would 80 C work for the base? Or is that too low?

Me and my wife are flying to Seattle the weekend of September 17th to attend Ryan Matthew Smith's photography workshop. Is MC Cooking Lab open for any kind of visits during that period of time? Thanks

I made the Mughal Curry sauce last night. It was not one of the more successful recipes I have made from Modernist Cuisine. Perhaps I needed to soak the nuts for longer than the recipe called for, but I had the hardest time trying to get my blendtec to grind them into a paste. I added a fairly significant amount of water (didn't measure but at least 1/2 C) but even then it was difficult going. Then when I added the nut pastes to the sauteed ingredients, there wasn't enough liquid to even come close to a simmer. I neglected to check the errata and I see that I should have added 200 g of water at the point. Well, I added well more than that trying to get this to a consistency looser than wet cement. Has anybody else had trouble with this recipe? All that being said, it tasted decent.

The complete recipe for Sous Vide Rare Beef Jus--along with backstory on its creation, tips on selecting the meat, and a step-by-step video that illustrates how to use a centrifuge to clarify the jus--is now available in the Recipe Library. We're looking forward to hearing what you think of the recipe, and what dishes you find go well with the jus.

After cooking several recipes from MC&H (and a few from the big MC) I noticed that the results are a bit more vinegar-y than everyone expects ”” including me. White wine vinegar, red wine vinegar, sherry vinegar ”” it's just too much of vinegar in all the recipes we tried. The only possible explanation that readily jumps to mind is that it is because I live in Russia and use European vinegars which might be more pungent than their American counterparts. For my red and white wine vinegars I use the Kƒ¼hne brand from Germany, my sherry vinegar bottle is Carbonell from Spain. Do my European colleagues feel the same about vinegar? Have anybody tried to figure out proper scaling for European vinegars? Anton.

As we get close to Hanukkah, I can't help but think that there must be a better binder for them than the traditional matzoh meal and egg... something from my modernist pantry that would make the pancakes themselves crispier on the outside AND more well done on the inside. Maybe tapioca starch? I'm still new enough to using the MG techniques that I'm not confident that I can build my own recipe. Does anyone else have one, or have any suggestions?

Love the new book, but somewhat overwhelming. Looking to hear from others what they have cooked up so far that they really love. Especially those that do not require out of the ordinary equipment. Thanks in advance. Gary

Does anyone have experience using a laser cutter to cut or modify food? I will be participating in a "food hacking saturday" at the Madison, WI makerspace this weekend. I will be working with sous vides, centrifuges, LN2, dry ice, modified charcoal grilling, ultrasonic baths, etc...all per MC. My question is: Does anyone have ideas for foods that we could cut with our laser cutter. I have heard that cutting rice krispy treats produced less than ideal results, as the edges were burned and blackened. I would think that thinner and colder would be better for the food to cut. Maybe laser etched creme brulee? Also lower energy dense food would likely burn less. What do you think?

Okay, so yesterday my husband and I spent a fruitful afternoon canning tomatoes and learning the ropes (so to speak)of pressure canning. Now we're wondering, what did we do wrong, and did we just waste 20 lb. of plum tomatoes? Here's what we did: We packed raw tomatoes into one-litre jars, added the recommended amount of lemon juice, filled the jars with boiling water, sealed them, then processed them for 1.5 hr. I think that's an extraordinarily long processing time, but according to Modernist Cuisine, it's a fail-safe to ensure that everything reaches optimal temperature for killing any possible toxins. The instruction book that came with our pressure canner recommends 10 minutes at 10 lb. pressure. Here's what we got: Bottles are only about 3/4 full, and there's evidence of leakage into the canner. After they came out of the pressure canner, the tomatoes were floating near the top of the jars, but have since settled to the bottom. The liquid and tomatoes fill only about 3/4 of the jars. They've also discoloured, indicating, to me at least, that they're seriously overcooked. Okay, so I know that we didn't pack the tomatoes tightly enough. I have another case of tomatoes to can today, so will address that problem. What I need to know is, are the ones we've already canned safe to eat? Or is the air space likely to harbour any nasties, and should we just discard them?

On the gels chapter there is a brief discussion on ricotta, and in the parametric table for cheeses it says that if you want to make dry ricotta you can add 0.7% salt, press it for 2-3 days in fridge, then hang for 2-3 weeks. 0.7% of what weight? The milk? or the ricotta you get? Is it added to the milk? I assume you press it in a cheese basket, with only a little weight? What are the environmental conditions supposed to be during the hanging?

Alright so I am thinking about bottling and selling my own hot sauce. The base is butter and whenever it cools it solidifies. It's not that big of a deal, you can just throw it on whatever you're cooking and it melts right over top everything. But, I would really like it to keep in a liquid form. I know if I used clarified butter, that will increase the shelf life and I wouldn't have to refrigerate it. But, is there anything I can add to it to keep it in a liquid form?? Happy Valley Chow

During much of the first volume, the book discusses specified cooking times and temperatures in order to kill bacteria and other pathogens. When it says for example that a certain bacteria dies at 130 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 minutes, what does that mean? Like for a steak, does it mean the internal temperature of the steak needs to be 130 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 minutes, or just exposed to that temperature for that amount of time? Thank you!

Howdy, Are any MAP-Pro torches available in the market food/kitchen safe? I was browsing at Lowe's and saw the "BernzOmatic TS8000KC Map-Pro Kit", which looks pretty similar to the model that the MC team uses in their books (the cylinder is a different brand). Any comments? This would only be used in the kitchen...

Several of us over at the eG Forumshave tried making the standard wheat pasta listed on volume 3 and have found the dough to be much too firm to use with rollers. Was this dough specifically designed for an extruder? If so, how would you modify it to work with a roller? I think most of us have simply added more water to get to a workable texture, but of course you could add more egg or oil as well.

Greetings, Chefs - Attempting to make both brezen and fresh ramen, and curious to know if anyone's used baked baking soda (a.k.a. sodium carbonate) as an unequivocally successful substitute for food-grade lye (a.k.a. Sodium Hydroxide) in making those bavarian knots or to switch-hit well for kansui (a.k.a. 55% sodium carbonate, 35% potassium carbonate, and 10% sodium biphosphate dodecahydrate) in making ramen. Baking soda is far easier to acquire - but accurate authenticity is of course key, and perhaps never more so with specific elements when engaging them in fusion recipes. Thanks for any insights you may be able to provide! Going to experiment a bit myself, and will post gathered results as they come in.

I made the recipe for Strawberry Gazpacho (5-277) a couple weeks ago. It calls for both citric acid and malic acid. I found citric acid (organic, even) at Whole Foods in the bulk section. Malic acid was trickier to acquire, but I did eventually find some at a store in Kirkland that sells beer- and winemaking supplies. I had no luck finding a local source of fructose or glucose syrup DE40, so substituted ultrafine sugar and corn syrup. The soup turned out great.

In the recipe for the marinated pork loin in volume 5 you marinate for 48 hours. If i was to use a vacuum marinator (which i purchased after reading MC) how long will i need to put it in for? The vacuum marinator that i purchased uses the Grovac process (salt and citric acid) to remove bacteria from the food as well. Can you recommend the quantity of salt and honey powder marinade to add to this machine. Normally i buy marinades already made up from Creative Culinary Solutions. I hope you can help.

Hello, I have been studying the first book in depth over the last few months and I have a few questions regarding the safety of cooking sous vide (as well as a few other issues). Firstly I wanted to ask a couple of questions on the table on page 193-1 "Extended & Simplified 6.5D Salmonella Reduction Table"; This table is referring to the killing of salmonella in different meats. I wanted to know if using these time and temperatures for all farmed meats would successfully eliminate ALL pathogens that we need to be concerned with, thus rendering it "safe" to serve to a customer? You have also stated that the interior of meat, so long as it's not punctured, should be sterile. I got the impression that this is not the case for chicken, and that chicken needs to be cooked to the times listed in the table. So why would the interior of chicken be inherently different to other animals? Not that I would want to serve chicken raw, I am just curious as to why this would be different to searing the outside, and eating a raw interior, as you can with beef etc? I understand that wild game is a little different, as you are more concerned with parasites and the like, which shall bring me on to my next question; I have seen restaurants serving Venison carpaccio, and I would love to make a venison tartare, but would that be foolish considering this animal is classed as "Wild Game"? It is served raw all over the country, so I am interested to learn how this differs to farmed beef for e.g.? Next, I would like to learn a little about the reheating or "regenerating" of meat. If, for e.g., I was cooking chicken sous vide, and I cooked it at 54ºC for 2h17m to achieve a 6.5D reduction, could I then chill in an ice bath and reheat it to order? In the UK, legislation states that cooked meats need to be reheated to 86ºC to be safe. Now obviously this would ruin a chicken. A restaurant that I know cooks Venison at 55ºC, chills it and then "regenerates" it at 50ºC to order. Is that safe? I am interested in cooking/reheating options. And finally, the last question I have is regarding fish. Now I understand that if I cook fish to the time/temp listed in the chart on 193-1, I will likely result in fish that is overcooked to most peoples liking. However if I freeze it to the suitable time/temp, that renders it safe to serve raw, correct? Now using the current freezer I have, which sits at about -20ºC, I think that freezing in this way will be of detriment to the quality and texture of the flesh. Is that a fair comment? And how could I bypass this stage? Is that just a risk that restaurants take and, much like serving raw salad, occasionally someone might get sick from it? Apologies for the length of this text, and I hope the questions I ask are interesting for you to answer. I look forward to hearing back from you. Thanks very much advance. Iain

Thanks for putting up this forum 🙂 I would like to bake using a combination of sous vide and a conventional oven. Would it be possible to put the dough in a vacuum bag cook it sous vide at 37C for the dough to raise optimal and then put it in a conventional oven? Thanks

I just made a recipe of brown beef stock using the pork variation. I accurately measured the amount of meat that went in (I used pork spare ribs as indicated) and the amount of the liquids. When all was said and done I had barely 2 c. of stock. This is the second time I've made either brown or pork stock and the yield has been less than half of what's indicated. Is this normal? How on earth are you supposed to get 4 c. of stock from only 3 3/4 c. of starting liquid? Neil