Turbo Sous Vide

[IndyRob]

I saw this referenced in a ChefSteps video.  I guess Joule has been taken over by Breville.

 

Anyway, apparently the idea is that if the Joule sous vide machine/app knows what you're cooking, it can bring the water up to a higher temperature in the beginning to kickstart the heating process, and then back it off to finish cooking.

 

It seems like a valid strategy but I'm not so sure how far I'd trust it.

[haresfur]

Colour me sceptical. The whole idea of a properly set up PID controller like used in sous vide is to ramp up the temperature quickly when it is far from the set temperature and then reduce the rate of increase so the temperature is approached without overshooting. For some things it doesn't matter if the outside overshoots the temperature, but the whole idea is to cook very close to the ideal final cook temperature.

 

I'm not sure how the instrument would control for the initial internal temperature of what you are cooking. It probably would have to guess but then would you want to ramp the temperature faster to warm up a cold piece of meat or slower so the outside doesn't overcook as the inside is coming up to temperature? Personally, I'd just set and forget.

[Bernie]

The rate of heat transfer is determined by the characteristics of the object (in this case the food) and the difference in temperature.  It will also depend on the interface, that is the hot oven air (which is a relatively poor conductor of heat).

In SV the interface is water (and usually a single layer of plastic) and the water is a much better conductor of heat.

In a "normal" oven, cooking say a chicken with the oven temperature set to 180C and the desired temperature say 60C it will take a certain time.

If the outside oven temperature is 60C it will take a much much longer time  time.....

You can cook it at 180C but by the time the temperature of 60C is reached in the center the outside (the skin and outer layers) will be much hotter (probably 180C)

 

In the same way you can "turbo" the SV by setting the temperature higher but the end result will be the internal temperature will be the desired 60C but the outer temperature will have been hotter and then (hopefully) will have cooled down.

So if you don't mind the outer layers heating over the set temperature and then cooling back down then go for it

 

Sort of defeats the purpose of SV doesn't it?

 

[rotuts]

its a mistake to be in a hurry w SV.

[btbyrd]

It's called cooking with a temperature delta. You set the circulator bath to a higher temp than the desired final core temp of the food and this means that it gets done faster, but you have a risk of overcooking things if you don't time it right or forget to pull the item from the bath in time. 

 

The easiest way to get your head around this idea is to think of SV eggs. The standard way of doing them is selecting a temperature between 60-70C and dropping your eggs in for an hour. As we all know, an hour is a long ass time to wait for a single egg to cook. The team did the experiments and found out that if you set your bath for slightly higher -- 75C -- you could get similar results to the 62-63C egg in just 13 minutes. But if you forget and pull them at 15 minutes, you will have lost the doneness you were aiming for. The size of your eggs matters more, as does their initial temperature. Cooking without a delta takes longer but produces more consistent results.

 

Joule "Turbo" is that, but applied to steak and pork chops or whatever. It does speed things up slightly, but SV is such a convenient, timesaving workflow that I've never felt the need to cook a steak faster with it. An egg? Sure. For me, the 13 minute 75C egg is the best application of the technique. It makes your gourmet instant noodle game "more instanter." Ain't nobody got an hour to wait on a 62C onsen egg at lunchtime.

 

The other application that this is good for is imposing a bit of a gradient of doneness on certain items where that's desirable. Some fish, for instance, have better texture if the outside is set a bit more firmly than the inside, so cooking with a hotter bath and allowing the outside to "overcook" in the sous vide bath can be beneficial. But you can often accomplish something similar or better in the finishing step when you sear or broil or whatever. On a steak or pork chop, I really don't care that much if there's a bit of a gray/overcooked band present, and I usually prefer that textural contrast to uniform edge to edge soft pappy SV protein.

 

A final note: none of this applies to long cooking cuts that are held at temperature for extended periods to tenderize them. You can kind of do "turbo" by assuming that tenderizing reactions will happen twice as quickly for every 10C you go up in temp, but that that's not something you can give a snappy marketing name to.

[gfweb]

This feels like a way for Breville to be able to say "new and improved".  To my eye, its different but not improved

 

  As @rotuts said speed isn't the goal with SV.

[AlaMoi]

being an old geezer, and having experienced the "normal" oven/pan cooking techniques . . .

 

cooking chicken at 350'F to an internal temp of 145'F - yeah, you get some seriously overcooked chicken on the outside.

same with beef, same with pork, same with fish, same with scallops, same with (everything else)

 

this is _exactly_  the problem/issue sous vide was 'invented' to solve!

 

if it needs to be done faster - I suggest the microwave - it too heats from the inside out . . . so they say . . .

[Bernie]

I too am an old geezer (but my mind refuses to admit it)

So while we on the subject of comparisons of cooking methods..

What is the difference between BAKING & ROASTING (I roast a leg of lamb but bake a ham) I don't roast cakes but I bake them.

Is there a similar sort of distinction between "traditional" SV & Turbo SV

(told you I was old and have nothing better to do than cogitate..😁)

[Smithy]

2 hours ago, Bernie said:

I too am an old geezer (but my mind refuses to admit it)

So while we on the subject of comparisons of cooking methods..

What is the difference between BAKING & ROASTING (I roast a leg of lamb but bake a ham) I don't roast cakes but I bake them.

Is there a similar sort of distinction between "traditional" SV & Turbo SV

(told you I was old and have nothing better to do than cogitate..😁)

 

The difference between roasting and baking is a perennial question! About a year ago it was discussed here and our own @blue_dolphin was good enough to provide a link to a discussion about it in a Master Class, "Learn the Difference Between Roasting and Baking in the Oven". As to parallels, if any, to sous vide vs. turbo sous vide...well, I'm staying out of that one. 🙂

 

[mgaretz]

They’ve had turbo mode for some time, it’s even available with the original Joule. It works. When they came out with the turbo model, I couldn’t figure out what it did that the original didn’t do.  

Edited October 8 by mgaretz (log)