A previous episode saw me lured into attempting sous vide by only the best chef in America, Grant Achatz, making this method of food preparation look as easy as…well, dunking plastic bags in water. The first attempt didn’t pan out so well, probably because I wasn’t really that on top of making sure the temperature was constant. I had been a little nervous about whether or not 140 degrees was hot enough to cook the beef, and with the temperature gauge obscured by steam, I’d definitely left the steak too hot for too long!
This time I decided to work with some salmon left over from sushi night, deeming it easier to work with since I wouldn’t be nervous about undercooking it (hey, I already ate this raw). I loaded up a Ziploc bag with a filet of salmon rubbed in salt, chunks of butter (can’t skimp on this), orange slices, tarragon and basil. Squeezed all the air out of it, sealed it and tossed it in the pot:
Most sous-vide-at-home guides I have read on the Internet insist that you need at least a fancy thousand-plus-dollar water circulator to get this right. To them I say “bah,” me, my 25 cent potato masher, and a bowl of ice cubes at the ready can do more or less the same thing:
Okay, so maybe the fancy water circulator owners don’t have to hover over the pot, constantly potato-mashing the water, and frantically toss in ice cubes when the temperature gauge rises above 113 (stupid electric ranges). But it’s not such a big deal when cooking salmon, which only takes twenty minutes. I don’t think I would have the patience to do a turkey this way, much as I really wanted to try this last Thanksgiving!
Pulled out of the bath, like this blogger had reported, the salmon didn’t really look that much different from when I started. Good thing I am not squeamish about seafood! I dumped it unceremoniously onto a plate, and I confess it didn’t look too pretty – I definitely squished the fish a bit in my efforts to squeeze every bit of oxygen out of the bag:
Quark loves assisting me with sous vide experiments!
The salmon turned out lovely, much better than my first attempt at sous vide! Texturally it was like smoked salmon, but much more tender. The tarragon and basil butter flavor infused throughout the flesh. I was disappointed that the citrus flavor from the orange slices didn’t really come through, but I was using an out of season and not very fresh orange (as you can kind of tell from the photos).
All in all, a success and I hope to try this again with red meat, to equal effect!
2 Comments
“constantly potato-mashing the water, and frantically toss in ice cubes”
for some reason I burst out laughing when reading that.
I am glad it ended up tasting well.
Though I am ways away from becoming this much of a foodie!
Looks like Quark is a tremendous fan of your masterpiece. He’s staring at it so longingly!
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