Sous Vide entire whole inside top round roast?

[FeChef]

Anyone tried it? It weighs 14lbs and is 4 1/2 inches thick at the highest point but is mostly 4 inches in height. I would like to cook this to 132F but i am concerned about getting it up to pastuerized temperatures quick enough. I have always followed Baldwins guide to pastuerization but i believe his charts only go up to 2 and 3/4 inch thickness.

 

Is there a safe approach using Sous vide method with such a large piece of meat? Should i combine cooking techniques like quickly submerging in boiling water? It is still in the cryovac bag in the fridge but i need to decide on a method soon. I know i could roast it in the oven but i want it med rare thoughout.

 

Need some good advice here. With how high beef prices has gone up lately, a 14lb hunk of beef is expensive. Cant afford to mess this up.

[gfweb]

I don't think one can safely do low temp sv on a cut that thick. Steps like a dip in boiling water would fix the surface but not any bugs inside the meat. And who knows if a butcher put a non sterile hook or a knife into your chunk?

It would be interesting to know what temp big chunks of commercial lunch meat is cooked at. Roast beef seems always "well-done " and pumped with salty fluid so it will seem moist.

[gfweb]

Although there are those who do whole turkeys in the cryovac and lived to tell of it.

[pbear]

For what it's worth, here's a link to the FSIS compliance guidelines for conventional low temp roast beef.  My understanding is that this is generally done in large steam ovens.  Notice the long holding time AT temp for product in the low to mid 130s.

 

Personally, I'd just split the roast lengthwise and cook in two bags.

[FeChef]

I had really good results with equilibrium brining a beef roast a few months ago so i went that route this time but i am not sure what percent my brine is. Can someone tell me what this comes out to?

 

6218 grams beef

3702 grams water

101 grams salt

10 grams msg

[FeChef]

I am finding conflicting calculations. 6218 + 3702 x 0.011 (1.1%) would be 109g salt but 1% is msg which has a lower sodium content. I am guessing my equilibrium brine is close to 1% sodium but if i ony count the water + salt it is closer to 3%. I want to shoot for 1.5%-2% but i am confused at this point. Some help would be really appreciated. Thanks.

[Smithy]

I went through all the calculations of the amount of sodium you have in that recipe (1.1% by mass) before I realized that I was probably off track. I think your actual question is this:

Which is the correct way to calculate brine concentration?

(a) percentage of sodium alone {total sodium / water mass} in your example, 1.1%

(b) percentage of total salt {(sodium chloride + MSG + any other salts combined) / water mass} 3.0% in your example

Have I stated the question properly?

If so, these two web sites suggest that (b) is correct: you should count the total mass of salts, not just the sodium, in your brine calculation:

Blog - the Meat Case

ChefSteps - Equilibrium Brining

Here's hoping someone with direct experience can give a definitive answer.

Edit later: struck out incorrect results above to prevent years-later confusion. Calculations above did not include mass of meat in the brine calculation, and they should have. See later posts.

[pbear]

There are several ways to do brine calculations, but the one I usually see for an equilibrium brine is that reflected in Smithy's ChefSteps link.  Thus, combined weight of meat and water times desired concentration equals amount of salt needed.  Or, for a given amount of salt, divide by combined weight to calculate concentration.  Bear in mind the object is to determine how much salt will end up in the meat.  I assume the reference to sodium was casual, i.e., that FeChef really meant salt.  One could do the calculations based on sodium, of course, but then the desired concentration would be much less.  For which it may be helpful to know salt is 38.33% sodium by weight.  A better approach, in my humble opinion, would be to adjust non-salt sodium sources (e.g., soy sauce) to a salt equivalent.  Here, where we're talking about a very small amount of MSG, I wouldn't bother even with that.

 

Also, I will second ChefSteps' suggestion that the desirable concentration for roast beef is quite low.  I'd say 1% or even 0.7%, whereas 1.5 to 2% would be more like corned beef (just not pink).  Also, I agree it takes a heck of a long time, weeks not days, to equilibrium brine a large piece of meat by immersion.  Halving the roast lengthwise as I suggested above would bring the curing time down to about a week, but if left whole it seems to me essential to use injection to achieve equilibrium in a safe time frame, which in my understanding is how this is normally done by commercial processors.  Because of scale, they use machines that inject multiple sites simultaneously, but home cooks can get by using a single injector applied repeatedly.

 

Hope that helps.

Edited September 13, 2015 by pbear (log)

[FeChef]

Yes i am using salt. Kosher salt. I know you guys mean well but i am more confused now then before. I just want to know what salt concentration i am using with those amounts of meat + water + salt i mentioned above. I was planning to inject the solution at some point in the next day to speed up the process but i am afraid if my amounts of water + salt are too high. I was shooting for a finished ratio of 1.5% but if i am indeed closer to 3% then i will need to add more water before injecting.

 

Can someone please figure this out with the weighed amounts i listed above.

 

I am trying to wrap my head around this but according to some calculations done on equilibrium brining my meat + water weight times a target 1.5% salt , i would need 148g salt. I added 110g + 10g msg. I am guessing i am somewhere around 1.1% salt. Now does injecting change this? I would think not but i dont know for sure.

Edited September 13, 2015 by FeChef (log)

[Smithy]

From everything I've read so far (in the last 12 hours), the calculation should include all salts, not just the sodium by weight.  

 

Here's the calculation, using your original numbers* of 6218 g meat, 3702 g water, 101 g salt and 10 g MSG:

 

Brine concentration = total salts / (total of meat + water) = 

 

(101 + 10)  g           ₌   111 g       _{= 0.011 = 1.1%}

(6218 + 3702) g          9920g

 

*Note that in your first post you listed 101g salt, and in your most recent post you listed 110 g salt.  I used 101 g salt in this calculation.  If you really used 110g salt, then the calculation changes from 111g total salts to 120g total salts, and your brine is 1.2%.

 

I apologize for adding to your confusion earlier.  HTH.

[FeChef]

From everything I've read so far (in the last 12 hours), the calculation should include all salts, not just the sodium by weight.  

 

Here's the calculation, using your original numbers* of 6218 g meat, 3702 g water, 101 g salt and 10 g MSG:

 

Brine concentration = total salts / (total of meat + water) = 

 

(101 + 10)  g           ₌   111 g       _{= 0.011 = 1.1%}

(6218 + 3702) g          9920g

 

*Note that in your first post you listed 101g salt, and in your most recent post you listed 110 g salt.  I used 101 g salt in this calculation.  If you really used 110g salt, then the calculation changes from 111g total salts to 120g total salts, and your brine is 1.2%.

 

I apologize for adding to your confusion earlier.  HTH.

No need to apologize. I am terrible at math and get easily confused. I left out the MSG in my last post because the amount of sodium in the MSG is 60% less then salt. It probably barely effects the ratio.

 

I think i will keep the ratio i used and inject what is in the container to speed up the process. I probed the solution and it is around 37F and i plan to sterilze the injection needle to prevent the least amount of bacteria getting inside the whole muscle.

 

I still need to find more info on how and why the extra inch and 1/4 thickness would effect using the sous vide method. My guess is that i just need to either #1 increase the amount of time the meat needs to be held at the pastuerization temp, or #2 increase the intitial water temperature to compensate for the extra thickness, or #3 both. This will lead to an outer inch being more done then the rest but it would be hardly noticable and alot less then oven roasting at higher temps.

[FeChef]

Going to make a wedge to fit my ovens broiler too add a 3 inch aluminum dryer hose attached to my steamer port. My gas oven goes as low as 150F so i think i could convert it to a steam oven like a combi oven.

 

Been thinking of this idea for awhile for cheesecakes.

Edited September 14, 2015 by FeChef (log)

[rotuts]

steam in the oven might require Stainless Steel in the long run.

 

I hope this works out for you.

[FeChef]

steam in the oven might require Stainless Steel in the long run.

 

I hope this works out for you.

Probably right. I thought about it, and i think once every so often wouldnt hurt. I use a ceramic bowl filled with water when i bake cakes and never noticed any rust. I dont think i will have time to build a wedge before this needs to go into the oven anyway so it will have to be put on hold for another time.

[rotuts]

I think the 'ceramic bowl' technique is a 'heat sink'   if the water in the bowl gets hot

 

then you bake, you mitigate some of the maybe large fluctuations of temp in your over, as the thermal mass of the water/bowl helps

 

out every time you open the door of that oven

 

there is no steam involved.

 

this technique is used in " BBQ " of every kind not to make your Q moist, but to even out the Q temps.

 

works for that  not for moisture i.e. to evoid evaporation,

[FeChef]

The water evaporates so i dont see how thats not adding moisture to the cake. Ive tested this numerous times with and without the bowl filled with water and everytime the cake turned out more moist with the water bowl.