Yes, interesting videos.
Hmm, maybe not for me, then. I’ve never understood the cult of tender meat. I don’t want to get too much stuck between my teeth, but I prefer meat with a little spring left in it. Some stews are really overdone that way, and the meat seems to dissolve, it’s not really meat any more, just a protein mush.
I totally hear what you’re saying. What drives me nuts is stuff like “fall off the bone” ribs. NO! Ribs shouldn’t be fall off the bone! They should be tender, but still have a bit of “tooth” to them. (At least to me.) It’s dead simple to make ribs fall off the bone. Getting them right at the sweet spot where they’re not tough, but they’re not mush, is a little trickier.
That said, the couple of times I’ve had sous vide steak, it was not at all comparable to the texture of overdone stewing cuts. It tasted and felt like a normal steak in terms of texture to me. If there was a difference, it was the uniformity of the doneness (where all the meat was exactly medium rare – although with the reverse sear you can get pretty much the same effect). However, I never had it cooked 4-5 hours in a sous vide. When my brother made it for me, I believe it was around 2 hours. It definitely had spring to it and was not “protein mush” and you certainly couldn’t cut it with a fork, but it was tender in the way rare and medium rare steaks are tender.
I am a sous vide enthusiast. I have had mine for several years and there is not a week that goes by that I do not use it. I use it primarily for meat, but some vegetables are great as long as you adjust to the much higher temperature they need to cook.
You can turn meat into mush, but you can spoil any food by cooking it wrong. No steak of mine has ever sat in a sous vide for 4 to 5 hours. There are excellent websites that show comparisons of food made at slightly different temperatures, and different times. So with ribs it is your choice whether they are fall of the bone (I agree don’t like) or have a firm meaty texture and are super moist. I grill or fry all meat after the sous vide.
My point to the OP is that if you have had steak at a restaurant, you have probably had sous vide. They don’t necessarily announce how they cooked it, but sous vide has many advantages to a restaurant such as edge to edge medium rare, less timing, less shrinkage, of the meat. quicker final preparation and others. After the sous vide they would again sear it and prep it, and you would not know how it was started.
I fully understand what you’re saying, but mush doesn’t come until you start getting into absurd amounts of time. What I’m winding up with is just about a perfect medium rare all the way through.
But you can always cook for less time for the exact consistency you’re looking for. One of the nice things about sous vide is the window for that perfect texture is much wider so you don’t have to watch it like a hawk to know when to take it out.
Okay. Maybe after I get my instant pot repaired, I’l consider a sous vide set up. 
Has anyone used sous vide for kebabs?
It would work only for kebabs with no vegetables. Veggies require much higher temperatures than meat does. I suppose you could sous vide a roast, after which you could cut it into pieces and put it on skewers to finish on a grill. You could put the veggies on separate skewers and cook them only over the coals. Seems like a lot of work for not much benefit, though.
That was my issue with a slow-cooker. It didn’t get hot enough for the veggies to cook properly.
Generally the idea would be to use a tougher cut, and tenderize it via the action of internal enzymes by cooking it sous vide for a long time.
There’s little point in taking an already tender cut of meat and doing that- you can sous-vide a reasonably sized steak in as little as 45 minutes IIRC.
Picked up a Sous Vide last weekend. Did pork chops first, but my pork chops usually suck, so anything was an improvement. Did a strip steak Thursday, and that was dangerously good, considering one of the reasons I never replaced my grill was to cut down on the amount of red meat when I started having to take statins…
So what is recommended? I have an Anova, and pretty hit and miss. Issue I have is there are enthusiasts out there that think anything is better sous vide. I want to cut through all through all the noise.
What are some favorite cuts of meat to sous vide? Say top 3? What are the top 3 stand out veggies? (I have tried several and they pretty much sucked, but I have an open mind there is probably 2-3 that are obviously great done this way, and that’s what I want to find). I’m testing sous vide dried beans tomorrow. I wonder if sous vide artichoke would be amazing (but I don’t want lack luster artichoke). What’s the straight dope?
I did a chuck roast today for 24 hours that was about 2 inches thick. I salted/peppered it heavily and it could have used more. Came out a nice rare 130 F. I seared 30 seconds a side on high heat. Undersalted. I think could have seared 60 seconds as it was think. Very tender. Good but not like AWESOME. Would be about perfect for Thai beef salad beef.
To say this another way, I’d love suggestions for the top few cuts of meat and/or veggies that should be amazing to just about anyone testing out sous vide.
I have had very good results with pork chops, lamb loin chops, steak, and salmon.
Salmon cooked at 110 to 115 F has a beautiful silky texture. I don’t know of any way to achieve this other than sous vide.
Made pork chops last night. Sous vide 4 hours at 140 F. Delicious, juicy medium rare pork chops from a neighbor’s pig.
If you could pork chops medium rare in a frying pan, they are also juicy and delicious. There’s almost no trichinosis in commercial pork in the US these days, so the risk is comparable to rare beef.
And i can pick up some chops on the way home from work and prepare them in time for tonight’s supper.
Carrots were outstanding. They came out that perfect soft yet firm texture that’s difficult to get by roasting or steaming.
Poached eggs are worth a shot, if you’re into them. I’m not particularly a fan but SV gets them perfect. I find myself wishing I’d just cracked them into a skillet but give it a try anyway since they’re a good demonstration item. Same for bag-scrambled eggs: interesting but not my favorite. I think I just prefer a firmer egg on my plate.
I second the salmon recommendation.
I like a sous vide burger, beef or lamb. Half the time, I don’t even bother with the sear. The other half, I finish on the chimney charcoal starter or in the broiler. Immerse at 145 degrees for 90 mins or so. Don’t mix any veggies into the meat, they need a higher temperature.
The best thing I ever made was beef plate short ribs. I went in on five pounds with a friend and did a 24 hour soak in the bath. With the rich sauce, it was astonishingly delicious. We also weighed the ribs before and immediately before serving to see the loses. After trimming, cooking, deboning and shredding, there was a 50% (!) overall reduction in weight for the ribs. It was worth the cost for the meat and demi glace, though.
Recipe:
One of the things I like most about Sous Vide is to know I have a safely cooked piece of meat that is not overcooked. Chicken breasts can be tricky to cook through without overcooking part of them because they vary in thickness (unless you pound them flat which is a different approach). With the Sous Vide I can be confident there is no pink left, but they will be moist and tender. I can then blast them on the fry pan or bbq for a few moments on each side.
Other top recommendations for Sous Vide are beef short ribs and pork ribs. You can get them to any stage of tenderness or meatiness. I have let beef ribs go for 3 days. My wife had braised short ribs yesterday at a good restaurant. They were tender, but dry tasting, even though they were smothered in sauce. Not so with sous vide.
I started a pork shoulder roast yesterday. I made a generic rub (brown sugar, chili powder, mustard, salt, pepper), coated the roast, and vacuum sealed it. I’m going to sous vide for 48 hours, then finish it in the oven with some onions for an hour or so.
ETA: the roast is from the same pig that my chops were from earlier this week.
Cool, love pork shoulder, pulled pork is a great leftover, and pork shoulders are often on sale very cheap.
Another meat I have been using for sous vide are chicken drumsticks. I give them a couple hours at about 75 degrees Celsius, which is a much higher heat than I use with most other cuts. Then again fry them or grill them. They are so much more juicy and tender than drumsticks fried from scratch.
They are also such a quick and easy meal. Just throw them frozen into the sous vide at the right temperature and forget about them. Then fry them for about 5 minutes and done.
You’ve probably eaten it if you have had “steaks on a plane”. It’s tender, but you still need to char the outside. If using good meat, any well cooked steak is delicious. I’ve never had a cheaper cut of sous vide steak — could be transformative.