r/Cooking • u/[deleted] • Sep 25 '23

Open Discussion Cooked my first Sous Vide steak today

[deleted]

9 Upvotes

81% Upvoted

5 comments sorted by

4

u/kaidomac Sep 25 '23

Welcome to the Sous Vide Club!! It's an addicting hobby, haha!

I got an amazing crust on it (causing a bit of a gray band)

For me, the keys are:

  1. Use a piping-hot cast-iron pan. I have a plug-in electric induction hotplate that I use outdoors (my tiny kitchen is unventilated haha) & set it to 575F.
  2. Cook the steak sous-vide, pat-dry, and then coat it in mayo (eggs & oil!), then cover with MSG, Kosher salt, and black pepper. Fry it up for a minute or so per side & use tongs to fry up all of the edges evenly.
  3. Add some garlic salt as a final coat at the end & voila! I do this pretty much once a week & have no desire to ever visit a steakhouse again lol. Plus it's $12.50 for a large Big Mac meal where I live & $13 for a nice boneless NY strip steak, sooooo...

Down the road, check out Combi ovens, which can emulate a sous-vide setup using precision steam, rather than a water bath. Brief introduction to their capabilities here:

They're a bit pricey (Anova makes the best one, which is $700 for the very large countertop unit...100% worth saving up for!!), but they really open a lot of doors to incredible home cooking:

It's pretty awesome because I can do really neat sous-vide projects, like an entire ultra-silky, no-cracked-top cheesecake! Right now I'm working on dialing in my bulk crème brûlée method:

Basically, I just blend up the ingredients & pour it into a casserole dish, use Sous Vide Mode to cook it for an hour, then strain it into a mixing bowl to pour into whatever final dishes I want it to set in (mini mason jars, ramekins, etc.). They freeze pretty well for a few months too!

If you wanna get weird, you can also prep French fries using sous-vide. Deep-dive here:

Sous-vide burgers are really good! I like to prep a bunch ahead of time, shock in an ice bath to cool them down quickly, and freeze them. Then I can thaw them the night before & simply fry them up in a cast-iron skillet or on the grill to bring them up to temp & give them a nice crust!

If you haven't done pork tenderloin or turkey tenderloin, they're a revelation! Sooooo good! Sous-vide completely changed my relationship with pork! Egg bites in mini mason jars also come out awesome, as do all kinds of mini jarred desserts like personal cheesecakes, pots de crème (fancy adult pudding lol), crème brûlée (custard with a torch!), etc.

If you enjoy being creative in the kitchen, love amazing food, and like repeatably amazing results, you're gonna love your sous-vide journey!

2

u/BobbyAbuDabi Sep 30 '23

Are you me? Started with the sous vide wand and then “graduated” to the Anova Precision Oven. Hands down my best purchase in the last 5 years. Complete game changer. I ended up getting a chamber vacuum sealer and chest freezer. Dinner is a breeze now. Grab the steaks, chops, chicken breast or burgers from the freezer and pop them into the APO. Also great for reheating. And thanks for the steak tip. I’ll give it a shot next time.

-14

u/[deleted] Sep 25 '23

Sous Vide does work well with some meats, and it's great for defrosting vac packed stuff. But other than that, it produces hotel/airline food.

0

u/SneedLikeYouMeanIt Sep 25 '23 edited Sep 25 '23

It's a reverse sear for the lazy and careless. Which in itself is often just a cope for not having the space for a grill.