I fully acknowledge it's possible I overreacted to the New York Times article. Maybe you'll eventually convince me that sous vide is the best possible way to cook. But like you, I don't have the money for it, anyway.

Actually... guess you didn't read far enough into the thread to pick up on this. I am cooking sous vide. I was able to put together the equipment for $270. A big rice cooker, a temperature controller and a Foodsaver. The Eades, of Protein Power fame, came out with their own Sous Vide cooker for around $400 bucks and that got me interested again. It just seemed like I could come up with my own for much less money, and I did.

I've been sharing my experiences with the cooking method on this thread. I found it really easy and convenient, which is why I thought you might be interested. You mentioned that space and time were an issue for you in not cooking for yourself, and that lead to you falling off the wagon over and over.

Anyway, it's not for you. That's abundantly clear. I do wish you luck on your journey to better health.

I appreciate your suggestions. I don't have the money, however - even a few hundred dollars is more than I can afford right now. And I definitely don't have space for three more appliances, even if I did have the money.

Before Edgy came along I was reflecting on what appliances I would want, if I didn't have a kitchen. I'd probably want a hot plate of some sort, definitely. Perhaps even an induction burner, if I had the money for it. Maybe even two. I'd need at least a small fridge with a freezer. But I could definitely live without an oven with my sous vide equipment. The rice maker is biggish, probably the same width as a toaster oven, but the controller is small. The Foodsaver can easily sit on top of something else.

Fortunately I don't have this issue. I have a real kitchen, even if it isn't as big as I'd like. I think I'd find it about impossible to stick to any diet without a kitchen.

I had my ricemaker/controller in the garage for awhile when I needed to clear off the counters for something else. Actually, if I get the garage cleaned up I might put it there all the time, it's only a couple steps from the kitchen and it certainly doesn't need constant attention.

My first Sous Vide machine worked so good that I went to a larger cooker. The temperature probe and controller were transferable to the new cooker so that part worked perfectly. The new cookers wattage output is less than the first, but it gets up to temperature, I have been using 140F, in 30-40 minutes and then holds that temp to within 0.5F +/- (it is insulated).
So far I have tried chicken breasts, eggs and tough tip steaks. All were excellent and worth the effort. Next time I am going to try boneless Country Style pork ribs. Have to be careful that I don't get too far ahead putzing with this thing or I will have more food than I can eat.

LOL! Jay, that's the problem I'm having. I definitely have more food than I can eat right now. Thanks god for freezers.

You should try doing an egg at 148' for about 45 minutes (I think, it's in the Baldwin document). Comes out really nicely.

You can always fill your cooker with hot water to shorten the heating time.

Wow! I just made the best lemon custard ever. I use fresh squeezed lemon juice (usually I use the bottled sort... lazy) and some lemon zest. I didn't let it cook very long this time, it really sets up pretty fast. Like 20 minutes or so. I'm so excited! Lemon custard anytime I want it's so easy!

Vacuum sealing is LOW pressure, not very high pressure. A vacuum sealer just sucks the air out.

By the way, obtaining a vacuum seal doesn't have to be expensive. The new Ziplock hand operated vacuum pump for food was only $2.99 at my local grocery store. The Ziplock vacuum bags are $2.19 for 12 quarter bags or $2.19 for 8 gallon bags. And, they make a very nice vacuum seal for food and for cooking sous vide.

A couple of weeks ago, I bought a PID controller for $155 (including shipping), a 16 cup rice cooker for $15 at a Black and Decker outlet store, and the Ziplock pump for $2.99. It was relatively inexpensive and the sous vide food is wonderful. I figure that I'll get my $173 investment back fairly soon from what I'll save by buying inexpensive cuts of meat. My favorite inexpensive beef cut so far is the top blade steak (aka flat iron steak), which is very tasty and tender when cooked by sous vide.

Well, it's got to be somewhat high pressure to turn watermelon into the consistency of meat (as described in the NY Times article).

Sounds like semantics to me. Of course the vacuum is low pressure, but what really matters is the pressure differential between the inside and the outside of the bag.

Dang it all, I had no idea such a gizmo existed! Where did you find it? I know they used to make a similar pump, different manufacturer?, but whatever it was was discontinued.


Yeah, it's magic with steak! I'm so excited you got one too! Be sure to keep us updated with your successes and failures.

If you use non-caloric sweeteners, you might want to try my lemon custard. It works super well in SV (155' for about 20-30 minutes).

A couple of experiments yesterday:

Confitted some already cooked duck. I cooked some garlic and marjoram in duck fat then added it to my already cooked duck and SV'd it for a few hours around 140. Came out very nice! Lost all the dryness from roasting.

Not low carb: I bought some teeny tiny potatoes (called that, really) and SV'd them with duck fat, garlic, rosemary (cooked the garlic and rosemary ahead of time). This was an experiment I was trying out for Thanksgiving. I had heard that SV'd potatoes were really good.

They were ok, but really I would prefer them done in the oven. But the lesson I learned is that precooking the garlic and rosemary really mellowed them out. The garlic was about right but I probably could've doubled the rosemary. I was just scared of it from my turkey experiment where it was super overpowering. However, the turkey was cooked at a much lower temperature than the potatoes.

Oops. I forgot what temperature the wobbly eggs were supposed to be and did it at 158' instead of 148' but it made for a really nice hard boiled egg. It doesn't have that sulfurous chalkiness that traditional hard boiled eggs get.

so this (http://www.auberins.com/index.php?m...1&products_id=1) is the control unit dh wants me to get, but even he isn't "sure" it will work as well as this ( http://www.auberins.com/index.php?m...&products_id=44) but it is cheaper! That's what counts right? }-(

Also it does not come with the probe so either I'd have to get the one that comes with the other kit from this place, or, as my dh suggests, "just use the one that came with the digital meat thermometer, it might work." yeah. it might. Any thoughts? Am I being difficult just wanting to get the one I know works? WHY do we have to make a project out of this? *whine*

But seriously, does anyone know the chances of the cheap PID functioning as the other one? I can't tell too much about it from the description other than it does not have a timer, which is fine with me. Is it the same powerfull-ness? (making up term here) blargh. Technically the probe in the aforementioned meat thermometer is compatible with the unit, but will it work for sous vide applications? I don't know if it is sensitive to less than a degree fluctuation.

You might try goggling on sous vide and that particular model and see if anyone else has "talked" about it.

On the model I have, the rice cooker plugs into the controller, in the back, does this one have a place to plug your appliance in? Or do they wire it directly into the appliance? I hope your husband is a very good electronics hack if so...

Because you had to go and ask your husband first! If you'd just purchased it and said, "Surprise honey! Look what we got!". Then you can apologize and get on with it.

IMHO it's probably sensitive enough I'm just concerned you might need to directly wire it into your cooker, in which case it isn't nearly as flexible as the plug-in controller and it'll take a electronics hack to make it work. I hope your hubby knows what he is doing!

I'd also compare the voltages this handles versus the one I got. If your cooker exceeds the voltage it might be a bad thing. Jayseem seems to have some expertise in electronics I think he made his own controller. One thing I read is the unit can overheat if you're trying to push it's limits too much.

As far as accuracy, I think +/- a few degrees isn't bad unless you're doing really delicate egg things. I think the accuracy will probably be good enough.