Sous-vide

[Tab]

Has anyone tried this?

I heard about it on NPR this morning; prior to that I was not aware of the technique.

For those unfamiliar, if I understand it properly, it involves vacuum-packing the food, then boiling it (uniformly heating in water) but because of how it's packed, the flavors stay concentrated.

It's more commercial than home-use, at the moment, I expect, but chefs such as Thomas Keller (of the French Laundry) are pioneering its potential.

- t

[Warpy]

1. Aw, hell

just put it on a plate, invert a bowl over it, and nuke it.

That'll have the same effect. Nuking food retains more flavor than any other cooking method I know of.

The vacuum packing bit sounds like an invitation to botulism if the food isn't cooked immediately after packing.

[Mr. McD]

2. I don't call it Sous-vide

But I have been cooking food in vacuum packed bags for years.

We buy large quantities of some items, vacuum seal and freeze. When we thaw them boil the bag and open it. Great for leftovers too.

[Stinky The Clown]

3. This has been around for years

In fact, lots of chain restaurants have much of their menu made in sous vide packaging and their on site "chef" is a boilin' whiz!

The food can be done raw and then cooked after packaging or it can be cooked and then packaged. It is not so much about the preparation method as it is the packaging.

Anything packed this way and then shipped to another location is as safe as anything can be as it is, by law, done under USDA supervision (yep ... an actual, live, breathing, (usually) thinking USDA inspector actually on site and actually testing the actual product right there at the actual plant). For stuff done in a restaurant for use right there at the restaurant (or hospital or hotel or catering house or school, etc.) there is no need for USDA involvement; just the local health department sanitation nazi.

You have all probably eaten more sous vide food than you know. Room service after that late arrival in Dubuque for the sales meeting? Sous vide, probably. Eaten at a 'trendy' chain restaurant where the manager is younger than your kids and the waitrons all chew gum and have I-pod earphones plugged in? Sous vide, for sure.

Come to think of it .... be thankful for this. It has saved the world from many terrible meals cooked by formerly unemployed slackers.

And yeah ..... if you ever have cooked (boiled) leftovers right in the bag you packed at home in your FoodSaver® vacuum packager (we love ours and use it often for both fresh foods and leftovers) you've pretty much done sous vide at home.

[Tab]

4. Well, I'm very familiar with "boil-in-a-bag"

but this was presented as something new; in the food industry based on cryo-vac, but as they put it, Thomas Keller (French Laundry) was basically taking a roast, doing some initial braising and whatnot for color, then vacuum packing it, then putting it on a slow low boil (150 degrees) for like two days, the net effect was it was incredibly juicy - nothing was lost - and all flavors were concentrated.

This is slightly different than my pre-cooked, vacuum-pack-to-reheat experience; bascially they're doing the majority cooking in the vac-bag.

[Stinky The Clown]

28. Boil-in-bag is all it is, really ........

As I said in my post, it is more about the packaging than the method. Some food is packed raw and cooked completely in the bag - either before or after shipping. Some is aprtially cooked, then packed for final cooking (as you cited for Keller). Some is fully cooked and then packed, to simply be reheated at the end.

CryoVac is a brand name for some of the packaging. It has, through common usage, also come to mean the process.

http://www.cryovac.com/

In recent years, CryoVac as also offered equipment for cooking, packing, sealing, etc. What their big claim to fame was is their plastic tube that is used to form the bag. If you use a home vacuum sealer (or have seen one), the tubing they use (packed as a flat roll) is very much the same type of product as CryoVac, just smaller. And with cute little quilting in it.

CroVac started out as a maker of plastic bags for the meat industry. They also offer vaccum pakers to work with the bag. The concept grew from there. Sous vide enters when the French got on the bandwagon.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

5. Speaking of Food Savers,

I don't know anyone who has one - yes, yes, I live in a narrow little world NOT comprised of food freaks, dammit - but I'd love to know more about your experiences with it, if you've got the time.

Thanks.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

6. DH has one.

He vacuums everything. Some day he'll vacuum me, too.

[The empressof all]

7. Actually......

I think they just came out with one of these for the mortuary trade. Quick and easy containment of bodies in disaster situations reduces spread of disease. Kind of creepy....... well nevermind....we can move along now.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

8. Oh, the GIANT size?

They sell them at Costco?

I finally have a place for Old Yeller, and I can sell the woodchipper I bought - just in case..................

[The empressof all]

9. I'm going to be turned into glass myself

I think I'd make wonderful Christmas balls. The family can bring me out and hang me on the tree. I hear tell you can be pressed into a gemstone. Might be nice to be made into a choker. :evilgrin:

[OldLeftieLawyer]

10. I'm being stuffed

I mean, why should death be any different from life?

I'll be seated in my firm's waiting room. I'd like to hold the little machine that verifies credit cards, if that's possible. I'd hate just to take up space.

There will be one thing, though, at which I'll be very useful: I've given permission for any of my colleagues to put me in a car in order to be able to use the HOV lanes at rush hour.

Planning. Where would we be without it?

You'd be a choker? Again?

<ducking, running, screaming in terra>

[Tab]

11. Your powers are amazing

You have taken a thread asking about a new cooking technique and have turned it into a discussion about vacuum-packing corpses!!!

LEAVE MY THREAD ALONE!!!! :)

[OldLeftieLawyer]

12. Oh

That wasn't me. That was The Empress Of All.

She hits me with a wooden spoon unless I do as she says.

No, really.

So, ever use one of the Food Saver things, Tab?

Didn't Niblets in Butter Sauce used to come this way?

(Don't tell The Empress I told you about the spoon, 'kay?)

[The empressof all]

13. Hanging my head in shame.....

I'm the thread abductor here. It's all my fault.

(BTW OLL: Did I tell you that I've put away that spoon....Now I have a lovely fork) :hi:

[Tab]

19. Up until now

I thought the thread about fellating a cow was the weirdest one I had participated in.

(fwiw, there was a comment in a thread that Bush could fellate a cow on national TV and still get a pass by Fox News, then someone asked how you fellate a cow, and having grown up in Vermont, I felt obliged to point out that you can't fellate a cow, cows being female. The conversation proceeded to degrade from there)

But here we are discussing a new cooking technique and we've shifted it into a conversation on how to vaccuum pack a corpse and the benefits thereof. It wins my reality-shift-of-the-week award.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

23. I take exception to that.

I didn't say DH was going to vacuum pack my corpse. Allright? He's gonna vacuum pack me alive. I plan to be cremated & just before I die I'm gonna buy some 5 thousand dollar urn & make him drag me around with him wherever he goes.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

26. A word of advice

Buy it now.

Death has a way of screwing up everybody's shopping plans.

Use it as a big candy dish.

That should keep people suitably on edge............. ;)

[OldLeftieLawyer]

24. I once made a crack

about George W. Bush trying to blow himself, and there are DUers who will never let me forget that.

They liked it.

He'd never blow a steer. Too much like blowing Cheney.

Lynne, that is.

<ducking, running, screaming>

[Tab]

17. Actually I was just given one as a wedding gift

haven't taken it out of the box yet...

But again, those are for post-cooking storage. I was curious about the technique of cooking in the bag itself under low temps for long periods of time.

Also, the report implied that you needed a more commercial version, that regular Food Saver home ones didn't quite cut it. I don't know why.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

18. A NEWLYWED!!!!!!

Well, aren't you the lucky one!

Congratulations, sweetie!!!

[Tab]

21. Thanks, darlin'

It's my second, but the first for my wife.

Hopefully this will turn out better than my first marriage!

[OldLeftieLawyer]

22. The triumph of hope

over experience.

Hell, we all need training wheels.

You know what not to do now, so you're wiser.

Plus, your wife is always right. Don't ever forget that.

Live long and prosper, and be happy ever after...............

[Stinky The Clown]

36. I've reheated in the storage bags that go with the food sucker ......

Its works fine.

Just yesterday I reheated some Thanksgiving dressing I'd sucked and frozen. Took about 30 minutes in the water at a simmer. The result was just fine and the bag suffered no ill effects.

[bettyellen]

37. i thought it was the cooker itself that you needed because of the long low

heat. but you're right, they were making a big deal of how intense and different the food tastes when cooked long at very low temps. i remember saying so many things taste better and have incredible texture afterward. the odd thing that stuck out in my mind was watermelon.
maybe a crockpot filled with water would work at home. try it and report back to us.

[wildeyed]

31. But you gotta admit.....

it is soooo much funnier this way :rofl:

[wildeyed]

14. Well thank you for sharing that

in, um, cooking and baking group.

;)

[OldLeftieLawyer]

27. Don't tell The Empress that I told you this,

but she got banned from the Mortuary Science and Thanatological Hairdressing group.

(I once had a subscription to the magazine called "Thanatological Hairdressing". It was for beauticians who specialized in corpse presentation. The first issue I got had a big picture of, well, see if you recognize her:



Seriously.)

[The empressof all]

32. All right now OLL

I'm taking my Christmas Balls and going home. :cry:

[OldLeftieLawyer]

33. You think those are tears? HA!

[wildeyed]

34. Well if the lawyer thing doesn't work out

you have another career opportunity :)

[Stinky The Clown]

30. We love ours. We use it a lot.

We got a model 1075 at Tuesday Morning for cheap.

No more freezer burn on meats or fish. Stores leftovers nicely.

The catch ...... ? Ya hafta buy their bags. Not that cheap. Not pricey, since the two box roll goes a long way, but I see it kinda like disposable shaver heads. They give away the handles for free. Then they get ya buying the shaver head that only they make.

All in all, I'd recomment the sucker to anyone who likes food, and likes to keep it nice. It honestly beats the foo outta foil or baggies or saran wrap.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

35. Tuesday Morning?

The ones I've seen are a hundred bucks at BJ's and Costco.

Yeah, I figured the supplies would be where the money is. That's what puts me off the idea.

Now, I gotta go check out our local Tuesday Morning.

Thanks a lot, H2S.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

16. that's why I hate chains.

And rarely if ever, eat in them. I didn't realize the food was vacuum packed, but I knew it was shipped in, probably in 10 gallon barrels.
Yuck.

[wildeyed]

15. There was a great article about this in the NYT mag a few

months ago. I *meant* to post, oh well. But if you look in the archives, you should be able to find it.

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

20. have you ever checked out

Keller's cookbooks? Way OTT. I still haven't made the french onion soup recipe (had to come here & have regular people try to explain to me how he was telling us to cut the onions) but I gotta say, his mushroom quiche was the best I ever had or made.

The idea sounds interesting.

:hi:

[Tab]

25. I have the French Laundry Cookbook

and I gave the other one about grill work to a good friend of mine...

but it was much more interesting to read about him in Michael Ruhlman's books... covers his philosophy and all. Makes me want to travel to CA specifically to eat in that restaurant.

I have made the Beurre Monte (I think it's spelled that way) - and tried cooking lobster tails in it - also used it for a number of other things. It's great stuff (for those unfamiliar, it's basically a butter emulsion that lets you melt a bunch of butter, keep it warm, and without separating, and you can cook seafood or whatever in it).

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

29. Is Ruhlman's book the

about the making of a chef? Or the heart of a chef? Or am I have oldtimers & mixing it up? I could always to to amazon, but that's too much work.

The one I got the quiche & soup recipes out of is Bouchon