FalcoColumbarius wrote:Is the rice cooker like a crock pot? How does this work? This device from Auberins, the wire coming off the side and into the top of the pot, is that the temp sensor? I haven't ever cooked this way but I have had some wicked stews that have been cooked in a crock pot.
Falco.
You can use a crock-pot instead of a rice cooker, however, a rice cooker is better because:
1) It has a stronger element, so it can heat up and balance (stabilize) the temperature faster.
2) The element is at the bottom, not the sides, so it creates convection currents in the water that keeps the temperature much more stable.
Sous Vide is not like a slow cooker however. At first it seems the same, but it is very different.
First, it involves cooking at ultra-low temperatures for extremely long periods of time. These are normally the temperatures you would associate with the food making you sick - except the food actually gets pasteurized, and is in many ways much safer than regular cooking - as long as you do it correctly.
Here is an example, I cooked steak last night:
The steak was seasoned and placed in vacuum sealed bags (you can use ziplocks). The key here is to get as much air out of the bag as you possibly can. You want as much contact with the water/plastic/food as you can get.
The reason for this is that water transfers heat something like 30X better and faster than air. So, having air in the bag insulates the meat, and you would prefer to avoid that when you can.
You heat the water in the rice cooker - but the rice cooker is plugged into the auberins controller. That controller has an extremely sensitive thermocouple attached that you drop in the rice cooker water. The rice cooker gets turned on and off by the auberins controller until it reaches the temperature you want 135F for a medum rare steak (recommended) 144F or so for chicken or pork. (temps vary from 130f to 160F or so).
Next, you drop the sealed bag in the rice cooker (or steam table or what have you).
The meat will heat to 135 F, and stay at that temp for as long as you have it in there. In the case of the steak, it was 5 hours. I have done 24 hrs, and even 48 hrs. (My 36 hr baby back ribs were awesome).
When you are done, you take the bag out, empty the juice (make gravy with it if you wish) dry the meat and then quickly sear it to build a crust on it - you can use a screaming hot cast iron pan. I use a home depot blowtorch.
Now, you would probably ask,
why?
Great question.
Here is the answer.
First, it only requires about 5 min of "active" cooking. Seasoning, bagging, and then searing. (I pre-bag all my foods, then freeze them. When I know I am going to cook them, I drop them in the rice cooker sous vide already prepared and I am done until they finish cooking - even better, Costco sells pre-sealed and pre-seasoned foods like this, so you just drop them in as is!!)
Second, this is the best bit. How the meat is cooked. When you cook a "perfect" medium rare steak, the core should be exactly 135 F. However, because you cooked it in air/flame at a temperature greater than 135 F, the outer layers are overcooked, and at a temp higher than the perfect 135 F. So, now if you sous-vide it, the entire steak is cooked to perfection. You only need sear it to get the nice crust at the end.
Third - it is nearly impossible to overcook. As you can cook some foods up to 48 hours, if you have dropped something in the sous vide water, and things are running late, no problem. Just leave the food in there. It will be fine. It can't overcook because it never goes above the temperature required to ruin the food!
Fourth - with the precise control, you can do some things that are impossible in other ways of cooking. Got a tough steak? Cook it at 135 F for 24 hours. What happens? All that tough chewy collagen that makes the steak so chewy breaks down and converts into gelatin. But, this happens without overcooking. In order to convert collagen to gelatin, you must have a temp over 130 F, and hold that temperature for at least a few hours. This is something that is extremely hard to do in a normal oven - and it is even dangerous. Since the water conducts the heat so perfectly, as long as you have a good controller, then the temp stays in the safe range, and you denature the right proteins etc, without overcooking.
Fifth - it basically yields amazing tasting food that is impossible to cook any other way. But it is so easy to do it is laughable.