I got my Anova today!

[Kaido]

So now I go looking for this thead after seeing this on the Amazon Prime day...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00UKPBXM4?ref_=gb1h_tit_m-6_6222_b2b67c0a&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Whats the consensus? Awesome? Overpriced? Expensive but who cares?

I really like mine. You have to experiment to get the results the way you want them, but it can produces excellent, replicatable results once you nail down the recipes to your preference. I've mastered chicken & steak, but I'm still working on pork. My last week of school is this coming week, so after that I'll have more time to try fish, burgers, duck, lamb, veggies, etc.

 

[slayer202]

I've found temp & time vs. meat thickness has a big effect. I did a couple 2" steaks yesterday & they came out fairly dry (I did them for longer than my 1" steaks due to the size). They were good, and tender, but oddly a bit dry. So far my experience has been that the best results come from locking down a procedure for a specific type & thickness of meat. I can nail BSCB & 1" steaks every time no problem now, but even altering it by an inch-thicker steak causes enough changes to warrant a procedure update.

such a complex technique. after years and years of (learning) traditional cooking I guess we can't complain about the learning curve

 

[Howard]

Went ahead and tried it out according to some recipes online with a lemon head ice cream.. 185º for an hour and mixing the bag every now and then. Turned out awesome. Ended up buying the Foodsaver on sale for $60 at Costco after doing it though.. trying to get the air out of the Ziploc was a nightmare.

Does that Foodsaver do liquids? Most don't.

As far as releasing all the air, just squeeze until you start pushing out the liquid. It'll get the outside of the bag a little dirty but just wash it with a bit of soap.

 

[Kaido]

such a complex technique. after years and years of (learning) traditional cooking I guess we can't complain about the learning curve

Sort of...it's kind of like programming, which is like an iceberg - a lot of work goes into a very small output at the top that we see. But once you get all of the 'programming' done for your particular tastes, then you can buy a similar cut & thickness of meat and get exactly the same results time after time after time. If precision & convenience appeal to you, it's a pretty neat way to cook.

The next step will be that upcoming $500 that has the built-in fridge-style chiller so you can toss the meat & veggies in before work & program it for when you want it to be ready...genius! Right now, my next planned purchase is the Namath Rapid Cooker, which is a budget salamander cooker. My biggest issue right now is not smoking out the house when I sear the meat after cooking it sous vide, so that would be nice for outdoor use. I should've bought it when it was on sale for $250 at PC Richards (back up to $400, bah!).

Lately I've been doing stir-fry stuff. It's nice because the meat is so tender & pink, so you just chop it up & add it to the stir-fry to get a bit of a crispy crust on it while still retaining the softness that makes it easy to chew. Super easy in a wok, especially with instant rice noodles (I've been trying to clone Noodles & Co's pad thai dish haha). I've mentioned the Wok Star training system a few times before, but here's a link again:

http://eleanorhoh.com/

Basically how to do freestyle wok cooking (uses a mental flowchart system if prep > marinade/sauce > stir-fry [veggie, meat sauce, combine]). Really slick. Although you can buy the gas burner for $35 on Amazon here:

http://www.amazon.com/Iwatani-Corporation-America-ZA-3HP-Portable/dp/B006H42TVG/

Personally I recommend a lightweight cast iron wok (per her recommendations), but a lot of people like carbon steel too. Tonight I did a really simple throw-together stir-fry using instant rice noodles, soy sauce, steak, and avocado along with some garlic salt, cajun spice, and homefry spice. Pretty decent for just about zero effort since I had the sous vide steak leftovers in the fridge :thumbsup:

 

[Ns1]

few nights ago I did a boneless center cut chop at 130 for a bit over 2 hours. The first couple bites I thought I finally found success. Color and texture was really nice. But further towards the middle of the meat was very tough and chewy. Longer cook time needed? I still wish I could go even lower temp...

That crust is awful. Sorry bro.

 

[Kaido]

That crust is awful. Sorry bro.

It's a tough thing to do with sous vide. I tried a Porterhouse on my wok @ 900F the other day and it just doesn't really work. It's primarily for appearances. I really like a good crust. So far, my wife prefers the Alton Brown method (burner + oven in a cast iron pan) over sous vide. I like sous vide if I (a) want to eat a lot of steak, or (b) want to use it in other stuff (for breakfast with eggs, on a shiskabob, in stir-fry, etc.).

 

[Ns1]

Why don't you just copy the reverse sear method and adapt to sous vide? Cook to around 100 on the inside and then finish on the grill or cast iron.

 

[Kaido]

Why don't you just copy the reverse sear method and adapt to sous vide? Cook to around 100 on the inside and then finish on the grill or cast iron.

That reminds me, Serious Eats just published their complete guide to Sous Vide chicken breasts:

http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/07/the-food-lab-complete-guide-to-sous-vide-chicken-breast.html

 

[Kaido]

Searzall is now selling their rotating platform, the Steak Decorator, for $85 shipped on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00RW871E6/

12" diameter spinning platform with drip grate. Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy7YGVSSVVw

$85 is pretty dang expensive, but I guess anything niche like this would be...

 

[yuchai]

It's a tough thing to do with sous vide. I tried a Porterhouse on my wok @ 900F the other day and it just doesn't really work. It's primarily for appearances. I really like a good crust. So far, my wife prefers the Alton Brown method (burner + oven in a cast iron pan) over sous vide. I like sous vide if I (a) want to eat a lot of steak, or (b) want to use it in other stuff (for breakfast with eggs, on a shiskabob, in stir-fry, etc.).

For steak, I slightly prefer the Alain Ducasse method.

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/27/dining/the-chef-steak-with-style-easy-does-it.html

I think it beats out both the Alton Brown and sous vide methods in terms of crust and flavor. Arguably not as juicy as sous vide method but if your judgement/technique is good it's pretty close.

I have had good results with scallops and salmon using sous vide. The crust isn't as important to me for those proteins. I think sous vide will also work very well with lobster, but I haven't had a chance to try that yet.

 

[Kaido]

The Namath Rapid Cooker (basically a portable salamander broiler) is on sale for $199, details in Hot Deals:

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2443503

I jumped on it, will report back! If it works well, this will be excellent for crusting steaks & stuff without smoking out my kitchen since it's portable & I can take it out to my patio.

 

[slayer202]

hope it works well!

 

[JSt0rm]

That crust is awful. Sorry bro.

He probably didnt let the meat rest before cutting. Thats why his first few bites were good but then all the juices ran out of the meat.

 

[Kaido]

hope it works well!

Yeah, me too. The two biggest issues I have with sous vide are:

1. Crusting smokes out my kitchen (tiny & no exterior ventilation)
2. None of my stuff gets super hot (aside from my Searzall, which is slow)

If I'm just cooking for me or my wife & I, I'll just bust out the Searzall indoors. If it's more, I'll go outside with a cast-iron pan & a burner because of the smoke. The Namath cooker supposedly does 1200F, so even if the temp hitting the meat is half of what's advertised, that will still be plenty sufficient to give a nice crust to sous vide'd meats, and since it's a tailgating device, I can simply bring it outside for cooking, piece of cake!

 

[Kaido]

Got the Namath in today. Thoughts:

1. It is large & heavy (nearly 40 pounds, which is hefty to carry due to the size), but it IS portable (and has handles in the sides). Took it over to a buddy's for steaks for the maiden voyage.

2. Not happy that one of the holes for the pull-out tray handle was punched 1/8" off. I'll have to do some metalwork tomorrow to fix that. The handle binds the tray & front cover to the handle. Either mine was built on a Friday or there's not much quality control, I dunno. The rest of the unit is surprisingly well-built...it's a solid, basic design with a lot of nice stainless steel.

3. Takes standard 1-pound propane tanks, five bucks at any hardware store. Super convenient, no having to lug my 20-pound propane tank & hose around.

4. I had a hard time lighting it the first time. After trying for 5 or 6 minutes, it finally lit, but the gas build-up created a fireball that belched out the front opening. Let's just say that my left arm is now hairless & I've discovered the smell of burning human hair is one of the worst things in the world :awe: I checked the manual after & it said if it doesn't light up within 3 seconds, pull out the tray & let the gas air out for five minutes. I will be sure to do that next time

5. Preheat is only 5 minutes, awesome.

6. Hard to measure the actual temps. The $12 thermometer gun bounces off metal. The infrared heat plate on the inside ceiling of the unit did read at over 800F though, but it had a hard time getting a lock on the material to get an accurate temperature.

7. I did a pair of half-pound NY strip steaks, one sous vide & one fully cooked on the Namath. It gives it a nice visual crust, but I think the cast-iron pan or Searzall do a better job - the steak cooked completely in the Namath actually came out noticeably better. Only 3 minutes per side on high heat & middle height setting. Not as good as say grilling over lump charcoal, but pretty delicious & super easy - I would just add more seasonings next time to flavor it up a bit more, probably some garlic salt.

8. The two biggest benefits of this unit for me are (1) moving the heat outside of my tiny kitchen to my patio, and (2) doing the same with the smoke, without being a big hassle to setup. Carry it out, preheat for 5 minutes, cook, done. Throw some tinfoil on the pull-out tray to keep it clean.

9. First time using finishing salt (Fleur de Sel) - wasn't very salty, would be better as a salt on top of a chocolate-chip cookie. Last time I tried Maldon, which are sea salt flakes, but that wasn't right either. Kosher salt or just garlic salt works the best so far. The French sea salt is pretty good though, will definitely try it on cookies in the future. Here's a link to the one I got:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000K6Z22U

Left is 100% on the Namath, right is sous vide'd via the Anova & then seared:

 

[zinfamous]

He probably didnt let the meat rest before cutting. Thats why his first few bites were good but then all the juices ran out of the meat.

don't need to do that with sous vide, though. But it does look like quite a bit of juice out on that plate, so not sure what happened there.

 

[slayer202]

hopefully you'll get even better results with more practice kaido. looks like some potential there.

as for the salts, I never use finishing salts after the fact, but I've had some smoked salt at a steakhouse that was pretty amazing.

 

[Kaido]

The new Anova Wifi model is available for pre-order:

http://anovaculinary.com/anova-precision-cooker/wifi/

$249, but get $50 off with code WIFI to bring it down to $199 if you order early. Ships October 2015. I'm curious about the potential of this; I like the concept, but honestly I've never even used the Bluetooth feature on my current Anova. The reason I'm curious about how this will work out is because Mellow is shipping in February of 2016 for $399 on pre-order ($599 otherwise), which is a sous vide machine that also has a built-in chiller to refrigerate your food, so you can tell it over wifi exactly when you start cooking, which makes a lot of sense to me:

https://www.cookmellow.com/

So I'm not sure where the Wifi portion of the Anova fits in, especially since there's no built-in fridge...it's not like I'm going to leave a piece of meat floating in room-temperature water all day & then remotely turn it on 8 or 10 hours later. Maybe you could throw some ice in there, if you're using a cooler as your cooking vessel, but you wouldn't get as exact results for your food since you'd have to figure out how long it'd take to melt all the ice and then do the cook time. Hmm.

 

[Kaido]

hopefully you'll get even better results with more practice kaido. looks like some potential there.

as for the salts, I never use finishing salts after the fact, but I've had some smoked salt at a steakhouse that was pretty amazing.

Yeah, there's a salt & oil shop a few towns over for me that really opened my eyes to infused olive oils & balsamic vinegars and flavored salts. I bought a chipotle smoked salt sampler that was just incredible, so much flavor from just one thing to sprinkle on!

For steak, I pretty much just stick with Kosher salt & black pepper, although I've been experimenting with homemade butter (heavy cream + food processor = awesomely easy fresh butter where you can control the salt, flavors, and whippedess/hardness for spreadability), especially flavored butters, like the yummy kinds they put on at steakhouses. For example, bacon-chive butter with garlic:

http://www.americancupcakeabroad.com/savory/bacon-chive-butter

It's cool to be able to get really good results at home, easily, every time...cook the steak in the Anova, add salt & pepper and sear in the Namath, and throw a pat of flavored butter on top. Voila, a $50 steak for ten bucks :thumbsup:

 

[RossMAN]

Pre-Order Anova Precision Cooker WiFi - $150 AC (Ships October 2015)

Edit: D'oh Kaido beat me to it, naturally.

 

[Kaido]

Not sous vide, but interesting & related...heated mixing bowl from KitchenAid:

http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/kitchenaid-precise-heat-mixing-bowl-lift/

Soups, cheeses, chocolate tempering, etc. Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uggm8yVXAK4

At about 48 seconds in, he also mentions a KitchenAid multi-cooker, which has an automatic stirring attachment...whoooooaaaaa. I did a little digging & there's a whole world of multi-cookers out there!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50dvuHsriIA

The stirring attachment has 3 functions (mix, flip and stir), 3 constant speeds, and 2 intermittent modes. The 4-quart multi-cooker itself has a temperature range of 165 to 450F (also 110F for yogurt mode), so it can replace both the stovetop & a lot of the oven functions. $400 for the combo on Amazon...not cheap but WOW, what a machine! Food technology is getting crazy! Oh yeah, and if you're a fan of Sonic ice (we buy it by the bagful), there's a campaign on Indigogo for a $500 version: (the official one runs about five grand, so this is a good deal)

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/opal-nugget-ice-maker#/story

 

[slayer202]

pretty cool stuff

 

[Kaido]

pretty cool stuff

It's interesting to see the shift in social behavior thanks to technology, as well as the economical impact, especially depending on your current situation. For example, having kids typically limits your time & budget, so even something simple like going out for dinner & a movie with your SO requires getting a babysitter & then paying $13 for a ticket ($16 if you want to see it in 3D, at least where I live), paying for dinner & a tip, and then paying for the babysitter, plus having to find a kid who is actually home on a Friday night to be available for babysitting. Typical babysitter cost in my area is $20, plus dinner is always at least $30 (let's say $50 for a nice dinner & good tip), so a 3D movie, dinner, and babysitter can easily run you $100 for an evening out.

Not that it's an impossible thing by any means, but it does require some preparation & cost to coordinate everything. As of today, I can simply fire up my sous vide machine & make a $50-equivalent steak with like zero effort and then head down to the basement to watch a movie on my budget-friendly, crystal-clear LED HD projector. Pair of steaks, $15. Buy a new movie, let's say F&F 7 on VUDU in HDX, $15. So basically fire up the sous vide, put the kids down, grab the food, fire up the movie, $30 total & I don't have to deal with any obnoxious people sitting in front of me at the movie theater or even have to go anywhere. Sure, it's nice going out, but having these modern tools lets me have an equally good experience for a third the cost without really doing any work, which is pretty awesome!

 

[Kaido]

The Food Lab's Complete Guide to Sous-Vide Barbecue Pork Ribs:

http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/09/the-food-lab-complete-guide-sous-vide-pork-ribs.html

 

[notposting]

Pre-Order Anova Precision Cooker WiFi - $150 AC (Ships October 2015)

Edit: D'oh Kaido beat me to it, naturally.

But you got the price correct.

$199 regular price ($20 increase than the BT version), $149 with current coupon (WIFI).

The bucket of ice water, some food, and network capability actually is pretty intriguing. A few tests to see what kind of time differential you need, coupled with the ability to keep an eye on the temp remotely? Could see it being a really nice improvement when someone won't be at home to start it cooking earlier in the day.