Sous Vide Style Cooking | Vacuum & Immersion
Bring home the secret to healthy and professional home cooking.
Every person, who has ever held a spatula in their hands, knows that the aim of home cooking is for meals to be delicious and nutritious, that take little effort to prepare AND are mess free - because, let's face it no one likes doing the dishes.
So, what’s so great about Sous Vide?
Also known as immersion vacuum cooking, it is the secret to many restaurants consistently brilliant tasting dishes. Now, you can have this secret at home - and it's not even a new concept. Developed in 1970's by a French chef, hence the French-ness of its title, today the method doesn't require any expensive machinery or specific skills. This means that anyone, even with little culinary knowledge, can enjoy delicious high quality meals at home.
There are two parts to Sous Vide, the vacuum part and the immersion bath cooking. Let's break it down.
Vacuum sealing is the method used to remove air from pouches before sealing them to keep products fresh for long-term storage.
Here are the main benefits of vacuum sealing
Locks-In Nutrition
We aim to get the most out of our food however we tend to silently ignore the most forms of conventional cooking (boiling, pan frying) results in a loss of nutrients, and get dosed in additional free radicals in the process. In scientific studies, vacuum sealing demonstrates how nutrients are locked in through vacuum immersion cooking. Studies highlight how nutrients can be retained not only in meat, legumes and vegetables but also seafood.
No Loss Of Moisture During Cooking
When we cook at home, we imagine the end result to be tender, juicy and with the right amount of crunch where needed, like in restaurants. However conventional cooking methods such as grilling and panfrying often leaves meals slightly dry, bland and chewy, and us disappointed. Vacuum sealing in moisture and improves the texture of food making juicy and tender.
No Loss Of Flavours
We all dream of packing in as much flavour and taste a we can whether it is restaurant food or home cooking. Vacuum sealing ensures the infusion happens faster and retains more flavour during cooking.
Efficient Heat Transfer
Vacuum sealing is also efficient at heat transfer as well as not compromising nutrients such as proteins during the cooking process, which means less free radicals are present in the food once cooked.
Better Shelf Life
Vacuum sealing, goes without saying, is a great way to prolong the storage of fresh produce in the fridge. This is because it is not exposed to oxygen and does not get cross-contaminated with other foods in the fridge.
Efficient Storage In Fridge
When food is vacuum sealed it can be conveniently stacked to make room in the fridge more efficient.
Immersion bath
The immersion bath is the process of slow-cooking vacuum sealed food with water set to a specific temperature. Note, that last part was important, the set temperature depends on the food you are cooking.
Control Equals Consistency
Achieve consistent delicious results every time through easy temperature control settings, even with minimal culinary experience.
Great For The Multitasking Cook - So, You Can Set It and Forget It
Traditional cooking methods require your attention and time, while putting vacuum sealed food in an immersion bath allows you to multitask, gives you a larger time window to focus on other tasks and still get consistent results.
Tough Cuts Made Tender - AND overcooking is virtually impossible
A huge advantage of sous vide style cooking is that tough and cheap cuts of meat become tender and juicy. Cooking at specific temperatures helps tough cuts not lose moisture and therefore become a pleasure to indulge in. Specific temperature control also makes overcooking nearly impossible. It is also ideal for cooking juicy seafood.
Worth noting - Sous vide-style cooking will not brown or crisp, so you can easily achieve this by pre-searing or quickly applying a finishing sear to the food.
Necessary Equipment - what you will need
An immersion circulator, which often features adjustable clamps that easily attach to your water bath. You can use a plastic food box or any storage tub to hold the water you’ll use to sous vide.
A commercial vacuum sealer and vacuum sealer bags. This is to package your food - simply place it into the bag, use the machine to suck out air and seal it .
Worth Noting - Most vacuum packaging bags are made of polyethylene (PE), which is considered a safe plastic for food storage. Ensure to avoid cheaper plastic wraps made of PVC which can react chemically with your food.
