Is cryosearing possible with dry ice?

[Anonymous Modernist 1843]

Can dry ice, easier to find for home cooks, be used as an alternative to liquid nitrogen for cryosearing? I want to make a try for the "perfect hamburguer". Any issue that I should anticipate?

[Anonymous Modernist 2882]

I think the recipe relies on the low surface tension of the LN2 to get into every microscopic surface possible on the burger to freeze it. Dry ice does not exist in a liquid state, it sublimates directly into a gas - so it would be impossible for dry ice to achieve this effect. Happy to be corrected if MC staff think otherwise.

[Anonymous Modernist 4797]

I think it depends on the surface that is being chilled. They use dry ice for duck skin since it is pan seared, the cooling is applied in a similar manner as the heating.conversely the hamburger is deep fried, and a dunk in ln2 would be theoppositemethod of chilling to submerging something into extremely hot oil. So if you pan seared one side of the burger at a time after chilling it on a block of dry ice you could possibly get similar results. I doubt that it would work out as well though.

[Anonymous Modernist 1843]

Many thanks Keith and Milk for your answers!

[Anonymous Modernist 8822]

You could put the dry ice into pure ethanol (everclear maybe?) which would create an ethanol/dry ice bath at -72 degrees Celsius. Of course, this is much warmer than liquid nitrogen which is ca. -200 degrees Celsius, and there is the obvious disadvantage that you are in ethanol won't evaporate away immediately upon removal from the bath. However, it might be fun to play around with. At the very least, you could probably make some interesting frozen alcoholic fruit with it.

Presumably, you're having difficulties finding liquid nitrogen. I recommend contacting someone in the local universities chemistry department. Tell them you are making liquid nitrogen ice, which is easier to explain then 'cryosearing a hamburger patty'. It is, generally, not heavily regulated, and with a little luck, I'm sure you can find some.