Sous Vide: Recipes, Techniques & Equipment, 2012

[EnriqueB]

Hello, has anyone had any experience with this: http://www.sousvidetools.com/sous-vide-chef-thermal-circulator ?

I would prefer a portable unit that would require less space, and I can't afford the polyscience controller.

I am surprised at the high price on this site (300 GBP, about 363 EUR) when the recommended price at the maker site is only 270 EUR, see http://csc.vac-star.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=81&Itemid=105〈=en

On the other hand, the absolute price is excellent for a circulator, I'm looking forward for people to evaluate it.

[pep.]

Which is why I would recommend buying at http://www.allpax.de/product_info.php/info/p9937_Sous-Vide-Geraet.html. It's the same circulator, but much cheaper (and inside the common EU customs area, whereas Vac-Star's seat is in Switzerland).

[rotuts]

In the gadgets thread the other day there was a 'gadget' for holing open a plastic bag.

re SV: Ive done this for a long time and assumed everyone did: cut the bottoms off various sized heavy plastic containers that then fit in the SV bags:

for the 6 x 10 " bag I use a minors base container, and for the 8 x 12" a standard yogurt container. Use anything thats 'sturdy'. Its a little more difficult to cut the bottoms off than at first glance. I use a band-saw. . Then carefully defrag that edge. This is important later as the 'funnel' you just made will not accumulate food at that edge when its smooth. Make as many of these as you like. then set them in another yogurt container ( or anything else thats stable ) and use these bases as your 'fill up' station.

When I SV a lot, I have many of these set up first. Your hands are clean and dry at this point and it helps keep the sealing surfaces also clean and dry. If you dont have enough OK, just wash and carefully dry the ones you have along with your hands and set them up again.

Makes for very easy and efffective sealing. Ive been told by An Authority that this does not count as a gadget.

Edited January 11, 2012 by rotuts (log)

[Paul Bacino]

Rotuts..

Nice Idea.. Thanks

Paul

[rotuts]

and thanks to you for theThanks!

I thought every-body might do this.

im very sorry its not a'gadget'

but it works for Me!

[GlowingGhoul]

Re-use is the best form of recycling!

[PedroG]

Very elegant method, rotuts! Thanks for the idea.

So far, instead of using a funnel, I folded the sealing region of the bag outside and downward to keep it clean, as Nathan described in MC 2.219, see my post on sealing liquids using an edge sealer. Needs no additional gadgets.

BTW thawing a flattened bag of frozen leftovers like the one shown in the post I mentioned just takes a minute or two in warm water in the kitchen sink.

[Jen Rehm]

DISASTER!!!!!!!

I was hoping someone could shed some light on an epic SV fail last weekend.

I picked up some beef shank. Removed the marrow bone and tied it in a nice little package. A little seasoning and in the bag they went. I got a good seal in the vac bag. I plugged in my new polysci circulator and set it at 53c. I made 3 bags so I could test the meat at 24, 36, and ultimately my planned time of 48 hours. At 24 hours the water smelled a little funny. The bags had not broken and it looked like there was still a good seal, so I drained the water and added new thinking that the cambro was dirty or something. The meat at 24 hours was still unchewable, but was fine otherwise. I went to bed. The next morning I came down stairs to the WORST smell. I mean like week old road kill in the sun. I opened the door to the room the sv was in and almost fell over from the stench. The bags did not rupture, but 1 was filled with a substantial amount of air. I immediately took the offending equipment outside (at the demand of my family) and opened the bag. Whoa........ Puke.

I've sv'ed before without incident, beef, fish, chicken, lamb, all just fine. Obviously the meat spoiled, I'm just curious about when and why. Do you think the meat was bad to begin with? Did something go wrong with the cooking process?

What do you think?

Oh and p.s. my family will not let me sous vide again for a long while. It was that bad.

Jen

[mgaretz]

Very elegant method, rotuts! Thanks for the idea.

So far, instead of using a funnel, I folded the sealing region of the bag outside and downward to keep it clean, as Nathan described in MC 2.219, see my post on sealing liquids using an edge sealer. Needs no additional gadgets.

BTW thawing a flattened bag of frozen leftovers like the one shown in the post I mentioned just takes a minute or two in warm water in the kitchen sink.

Pedro, the video in the post you linked looks like it is no longer threre. Can you repost the video?

[jmolinari]

DISASTER!!!!!!!

I was hoping someone could shed some light on an epic SV fail last weekend.

I picked up some beef shank. Removed the marrow bone and tied it in a nice little package. A little seasoning and in the bag they went. I got a good seal in the vac bag. I plugged in my new polysci circulator and set it at 53c. I made 3 bags so I could test the meat at 24, 36, and ultimately my planned time of 48 hours. At 24 hours the water smelled a little funny. The bags had not broken and it looked like there was still a good seal, so I drained the water and added new thinking that the cambro was dirty or something. The meat at 24 hours was still unchewable, but was fine otherwise. I went to bed. The next morning I came down stairs to the WORST smell. I mean like week old road kill in the sun. I opened the door to the room the sv was in and almost fell over from the stench. The bags did not rupture, but 1 was filled with a substantial amount of air. I immediately took the offending equipment outside (at the demand of my family) and opened the bag. Whoa........ Puke.

I've sv'ed before without incident, beef, fish, chicken, lamb, all just fine. Obviously the meat spoiled, I'm just curious about when and why. Do you think the meat was bad to begin with? Did something go wrong with the cooking process?

What do you think?

Oh and p.s. my family will not let me sous vide again for a long while. It was that bad.

Jen

53 is essentially where pasteurization stops. Most people in the forum don't recommend going below 55. It could be that your calibration was off and you were just below 53 and the meat essentially rotted because your bath wasn't hot enough to kill the bacteria.

[GlowingGhoul]

This can also happen if any part of the bag was out of the water. I use retaining grids on all my long cooks to make sure this doesn't happen. I had a short rib that got lodged against the wall of the vessel, and the top stuck out. Yech.

[PedroG]

Very elegant method, rotuts! Thanks for the idea.

So far, instead of using a funnel, I folded the sealing region of the bag outside and downward to keep it clean, as Nathan described in MC 2.219, see my post on sealing liquids using an edge sealer. Needs no additional gadgets.

BTW thawing a flattened bag of frozen leftovers like the one shown in the post I mentioned just takes a minute or two in warm water in the kitchen sink.

Pedro, the video in the post you linked looks like it is no longer threre. Can you repost the video?

The video still works, at least with Firefox and IE9. Here is a direct link:

.

[PedroG]

DISASTER!!!!!!!

I was hoping someone could shed some light on an epic SV fail last weekend.

I picked up some beef shank. Removed the marrow bone and tied it in a nice little package. A little seasoning and in the bag they went. I got a good seal in the vac bag. I plugged in my new polysci circulator and set it at 53c. I made 3 bags so I could test the meat at 24, 36, and ultimately my planned time of 48 hours. At 24 hours the water smelled a little funny. The bags had not broken and it looked like there was still a good seal, so I drained the water and added new thinking that the cambro was dirty or something. The meat at 24 hours was still unchewable, but was fine otherwise. I went to bed. The next morning I came down stairs to the WORST smell. I mean like week old road kill in the sun. I opened the door to the room the sv was in and almost fell over from the stench. The bags did not rupture, but 1 was filled with a substantial amount of air. I immediately took the offending equipment outside (at the demand of my family) and opened the bag. Whoa........ Puke.

I've sv'ed before without incident, beef, fish, chicken, lamb, all just fine. Obviously the meat spoiled, I'm just curious about when and why. Do you think the meat was bad to begin with? Did something go wrong with the cooking process?

What do you think?

Oh and p.s. my family will not let me sous vide again for a long while. It was that bad.

Jen

At 53^oC pathogens won't multiply, but (thermophilic) spoilage microbes may thrive well above 55^oC. See FOOD AND INDUSTRIAL MICROBIOLOGY. I experienced this once with factory-marinated and vacuum-sealed spare ribs.

[Toufas]

I have decided to order the freshmealsolutions kit, but since I am in the uk the airpump will not be included. From what I understand any cheap aquarium air pump will be fine and I place the hose under the heating element?

Also, can someone recommend a vacuum sealer for home?

and on cooking questions now:

I have bought the sous vide dash app, and since I ve been seeing this a lot here, I understand that the thickness of what we are cooking is part of the calculation. If I have a whole piece of meat lets say 2-3 kilos the thickness is measured regarding how thick it is. If that piece is a lets say a loin, and I cut chops/steaks out of it, the thickness is measured on the other side now?

[Neil Smith]

I have decided to order the freshmealsolutions kit, but since I am in the uk the airpump will not be included. From what I understand any cheap aquarium air pump will be fine and I place the hose under the heating element?

Also, can someone recommend a vacuum sealer for home?

Yes, any old air pump will do. Don't use an airstone on it, though. Instead, cut a few large-ish holes in the end of the hose. The large bubbles are better at circulating the water. (I stop the hose floating by threading it though the rack I keep on the base of the pot.)

I use a cheap JML sealer I bought on eBay. It works fine and replacement bags and rolls are easy to come by.

I have bought the sous vide dash app, and since I ve been seeing this a lot here, I understand that the thickness of what we are cooking is part of the calculation. If I have a whole piece of meat lets say 2-3 kilos the thickness is measured regarding how thick it is. If that piece is a lets say a loin, and I cut chops/steaks out of it, the thickness is measured on the other side now?

That's my understanding. The 'thickness' is the minimum distance from the edge to the centre, as that's what limits how fast heat can get to the centre.

[jmolinari]

That's my understanding. The 'thickness' is the minimum distance from the edge to the centre, as that's what limits how fast heat can get to the centre.

Thickness is edge to edge..not edge to center. I would assume sous vide dash app takes into account heating from all sides.

[Toufas]

yes but with a steak, we are measuring the thickness on the small side, not how long the steak is.

[mmille24]

Has anyone ever tried making chicken stock sous vide?

Not that I think it would necessarily be beneficial, but I don't have a large regular pot. However, I do have a very large rice cooker pot that I use for sous vide. I don't think I'd vaccuum seal anything, just use the pot and the PID.

Anyone think this would work? What temperature should I set it at and for how long?

Edited January 13, 2012 by mmille24 (log)

[vengroff]

That's my understanding. The 'thickness' is the minimum distance from the edge to the centre, as that's what limits how fast heat can get to the centre.

Thickness is edge to edge..not edge to center. I would assume sous vide dash app takes into account heating from all sides.

Yes, you are correct on both counts.

[vengroff]

yes but with a steak, we are measuring the thickness on the small side, not how long the steak is.

Correct.

[Anna N]

Posting this only because I couldn't find any answers and so did the experiment. I wanted to cook some whole small potatoes (1.5-2 inches in diameter)and then quickly saute them in sugar and butter to make Danish potatoes. So I bagged them with a little goose fat and some salt and put them in the S-V at 84C for 2 hours. They are perfectly cooked and ready to be glazed.

[ScottyBoy]

Indeed that is one technique I really love to use.

[rotuts]

do you feel SV potatoes have more of a 'potato' flavor and that flavor leeches out into the water when you boil them.

would these potats be 'pasteurized' ie one might be inclined to make several bags and cool rapidly then keep in a cold refig.

reheat with the SV meat?

would their texture be 'decent?'

Im a big fan of SV now and eat later.

[vengroff]

Posting this only because I couldn't find any answers and so did the experiment. I wanted to cook some whole small potatoes (1.5-2 inches in diameter)and then quickly saute them in sugar and butter to make Danish potatoes. So I bagged them with a little goose fat and some salt and put them in the S-V at 84C for 2 hours. They are perfectly cooked and ready to be glazed.

Sounds great. I have always done SV potatoes in a large dice, but I will definitely try this.

[Anna N]

do you feel SV potatoes have more of a 'potato' flavor and that flavor leeches out into the water when you boil them.

would these potats be 'pasteurized' ie one might be inclined to make several bags and cool rapidly then keep in a cold refig.

reheat with the SV meat?

would their texture be 'decent?'

Im a big fan of SV now and eat later.

I don't notice a huge difference in flavour but in texture as these don't fall apart as potatoes often do even when gently boiled/steamed.

I know very little about the safety of potatoes cooked and then stored in an anerobic environment. I am a big chicken as far as food safety goes so I wouldn't store them for more than 24 hours before reheating and serving.

For Danish potatoes which will be sauteed in sugar and butter I am guessing they would be sufficiently re-heated in this process to not need anything more. All of this is conjecture as I took the ones I just did and immediately sauteed them still hot from the water bath.