Sous Vide Recipes. What are your best/favourite/proven uses? All suggestions welcome.

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I still think I can create a trend of searing with railroad track and open fire. Not with the sensible people, but the money is to be made convincing the idiots!
 
Rorschach said:
Salt, butter and pepper are often the only additions needed.
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revisiting this - i'm obviously swayed that I need to try this, but in a bag doesn't sound appealing. I can do it in glass, though.

But as you mention salt, butter and pepper - I often beat the drum with the mrs. "what are we doing to this?". She'll say "what are you talking about?" - already a little angry when she says it. And my response is (whether we're doing the cooking or going to a friend's house with some kind of trial dish that has become almost unrelated to what it started out as, "what exactly is wrong with the food that we're using here that keeps it from being able to stand on its own?", or "geezus, we've got 1/2 food, and 1/2 other things, 8 hours, I don't know what it is and it just makes me wish for a good pork chop. what's the gain in this?".
 
D_W said:
I can't imagine it for fish, either. Beef and pork come to mind for me as those are my two standby meats for back and forth between oven and cooktop (and in no way advanced, just trying to get the texture of the meat and the flavor right without it being tough or overcooked). I suppose butter is the poor man's searing bag.

As little as I know about meat, I learned pretty quickly when I left home (my mother cooks the life out of everything) that temperature control is awfully important if you're looking for the internal bits to have some kind of specific quality (other than cooked to death or, oops...still below room temperature).

As a kid, the go-to for my mother was pressure cooking. Sans bag, this results in almost magical things with cheap meat, but the result is missing the bag part - the meat is soft, but something has to be done with it after the cook to put flavor back in. Thus, the idea of the bag is very attractive - get control of blasting the flavor out of it into the liquid.

Laziness points me to understanding the smallest number of variables necessary to get good flavor, temp and texture.

Somewhat interesting that here in the states, "safe" electric pressure cookers are all over the place now - I guess the folks of means never started at the low end side and ate what we ate, so they've not heard of pressure cookers other than that they can blow up a kitchen. Something is missing from the current ones, though - I don't know if they work at lower pressure, but they don't do the same job as my mother's did.
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oooohhhh fiieeesh!

I have never cooked better cod loin as well as salmon than with my sous vide, prefect texture, just finish it off in a pan basting with butter and its amazing.

unlike ovens with high temp going from the outside to eventually hit the right temp in the middle, sous vide you set the wata temp to you final temp and whatever you put in there will eventually come up to that temp and therefore perfectly cooked to your liking, also as its a slower process and lacking scorching heat, you get much more tender results.

i dont use bags, i bought a foodsaver vacuum sealer, the only glass i use is kilner jars for making yoghurt.
 
Oddly enough, the classic restaurant way in the multi star Michelin places before sous vide took off in restaurant kitchens was to poach fish (and other things) in clarified butter. I know people like Marco PW and Thomas Keller used to do this back in the 80s or 90's and it would not surprise me if some high end restaurants still use the technique. (I am not a pro chef by the way - just a bit obsessed with cooking).

Given that a loin portion of salmon can be pan seared and finished in four minutes in a pan, I am not super convinced by sous vide for that, or a Dover Sole or similar fish where some pan seared colour is desirable.
 
I rear Hereford beef, the traditional way - they only get to eat grass/hay. IMHO the big issue with beef, is how it's bred, fed and slaughtered. My neighbour will send his beef of on a 14 hr trip to Cornwall as they can slaughter for 65p/kilo less than they can here, his cattle are packed full of soya to up the killing-weight. His beef then magically appears on the shelves at Tesco some 18 hrs later.

Mine goes about 16 miles, is off-loaded and killed within about 15 mins. It then hangs for 28-35 days before being butchered. I take every animal to the abbatoir myself, to ensure that it's as stress-free as possible, I load at 0500 and am on my way home by 6 after washing out.

It's not a nice process but at the end of the day we eat meat and I try to ensure that the beef that I eat and sell is as best as it can be. Yes it's a hobby- business but it does not need to be a pure chase for profit as livestock are involved. I'd be far more ruthless as an arable farmer!

I like the sous-vide concept but I have an all steaks take 10 minutes mentality for room temp steaks. One min/side for rare. 2 mins/side for med rare and 2.5 mins/side on a hot grill for med. The rest of the ten mins is taken up keeping them warm in an a=oven at 150 - which allows them to warm through.

If anyone asks for well-done - I send them 4 miles down the road to the local pub!
 
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Good grief! After a 14 hr drive I shouldn't think the beef could ever be tender, far too much stress and adrenaline. Yours would be a treat by comparison FL.
One of the best pieces of beef I ever tasted was from an old dairy cow, slaughtered 5 miles from the farm at a small abbatoir, properly butchered and hung, then slow cooked in a range.
Making myself feel hungry now.
 
Farm Labourer said:
.......... If anyone asks for well-done - I send them 4 miles down the road to the local pub!
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And pray tell what's wrong with properly cooked food?! :)

Can't stand meat that's still mooing and then being criticised for wanting it cooked the way I want it.

This sous-vide thing is boil in the bag yes? :)
 
stuartpaul said:
And pray tell what's wrong with properly cooked food?!
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This is a neverending argument...

The reason cows are cut up in a certain way, into named cuts, is to make the best of each area’s characteristics:
Steaks are sliced thinly from the tenderest parts of the animal, and are intended for rare cooking.
Tougher areas, like silverside, are intended for slower cooking, such as roasting.
Very tough areas, like shin, are intended for the slowest cooking, like casseroles.

By cooking a steak right through, as if it were the outside of a roast joint, you’re buying a much more expensive cut and eating it like a cheaper cut. “Properly cooked” doesn’t always mean cooked right through - think of a soft-boiled egg. Much nicer.

Of course you should have it how you want it, but you get criticized because you’re eating it other than as intended - it’s seen as a waste. Many people are squeamish about the ‘blood’ on the plate, but it’s not blood.
 
stuartpaul said:
Can't stand meat that's still mooing and then being criticised for wanting it cooked the way I want it.
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No criticism here Stuart. Eat your meat how you want of course. Eat at my house and I will cook your steak as you want it. Even if it makes me inwardly shudder. 😬
And if you want to add coca-cola to an Islay single malt that's up to you too. (Just don't ask for one at my house. I do draw the line at that sort of malarky).
We are all different thankfully.
I'm not sure what criticism you have encountered of course, but maybe it's just people being enthusiastic about sharing their love of the benefits of eating a more tender and flavoursome (really trying not seem critical here!) version of what you like with the misguided view that you can't make up your own mind about what you quite rightly enjoy. Bit like ex-smokers trying to help out smokers by trying to convince them they can quit too. It's well meant but unwelcome advice.
I promise, never to try to convince you, in this thread on sous vide cookery, to cook your meat other than how you want to... *fingerguns*
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D_W said:
For those of us who don't like vinegar, the world of food has really gone down hill in the last 25 years!!

I don't know much about the sous vide trend, but appreciate good meat with salt, garlic butter and black pepper. I think that's a taste that's a few decades out of date now.
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Not in my house!


Appreciate all the replies guys. It's always good to get your opinions. Someone always surprises me.
 
Bm101 said:
Following from a previous thread about cooking wagyu steak.... I recently bought an Aldi sous vide machine. I've cooked a (rather extravagant) rib of beef in it for the first go which was possibly a bit daft but it was amazing. 6 hours at 52.5 and then rubbed it with salt, ground pepper and dried rosemary. Chucked it back in a hot oven for 15 minutes.
It was cooked perfectly rare wall to wall so to speak. Even the Mrs, not a great carnivore, went backtwice for more. I was astounded how good it was.
I also bought my first T Bone at the same local butcher and perhaps madly I also put that in. (Finished in the cast pan etc)I didn't get that quite right tbh. 😡
Moving forwards I'm back to far more affordable and usual joints. So I was interested in what you guys could afford me in the way of good advice and experience.
Today I picked up an aged Lidl joint of roasting beef. It looks quite nice. I haven't bought a beef joint in years due to constant dissappointments so I'm hoping the sous vide gives me an option to enjoy rare and tender beef again. Shooting at the stars with a pop gun possibly but I live in hope.
I also picked up a much more affordable irate person joint. Thinking of doing that with a balsamaic/brown sugar glaze that looks deadly.
https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes...m-with-balsamic-brown-sugar-glaze-recipe.htmlNext up I'm going to try and get a bit of venison from her old mans butcher in Essex (lockdown allowing). Father in law cooks that every year at christmas and it's amazing. He makes a big show of carving the loin Every. Single.Year.
Be sweetly pleasing if I could quietly make him quieten down lol. (In a nice way... ;))
Open to any and all ideas. From rabbit to fish and vegetables. Not just the big meat dishes. We could all eat more healthily.
Also.... while on the subject does anyone smoke duck?
And any tried and tested bombproof websites for sous vide recipes?

Cheers guys, as always.
Chris
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Where do you get bags big enough for a rib of beef?

Cheers
 
I have never heard of this machine, I'm 55. Mind you I have zero taste, think "cheese is cheese" all taste the same.
 
Bm101 said:
And if you want to add coca-cola to an Islay single malt that's up to you too. (Just don't ask for one at my house. I do draw the line at that sort of malarky).
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That’s an excellent analogy - I might steal it :)

Paying a premium for an Islay single, then drowning it in coke might be what you like, but if all you want is whisky-flavoured coke it seems like a waste. It’s certainly not what the distillery would recommend.
 
You'll get no criticism from me, you enjoy your food the way you like it and I'll enjoy mine the way I like it. If you come to my house I'll do my best to accommodate you, unless you are vegan in which case don't come over ;)
 

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