Good timing, I just pulled two slightly different bags out of the sous vide tonight. 3 day oxtail - toss your oxtail into the sous vide for 3 days at 170 degrees F.
In this case I did it for the first time with a mix of standard stewing vegetables
Bag 1 - Leeks, carrots, celery, parsley - nice meaty flavor, good falling apart texture, a bit bland
Bat 2 - Leeks, carrots, celery, parsley, onion - what a difference one small onion makes. Took it to a whole different level of subtlety and nuance.
I did it this way because I’d previously determined that onion powder turned acrid when I used it in a sous vide prep and had never tried fresh onion before. Obviously not a problem.
I’ve done the 3 day oxtail before - once with fresh rosemary and twice with fresh thyme. The thyme prep was good, the rosemary was overpowering. In both cases I just tossed in the whole packet of herbs from the market, obviously I’d need to reduce the quantity of rosemary if I use it again - maybe only one or two sprigs.
I usually take the juices, defat them, add some demiglace and salt and reduce. I can then tear up the oxtail and toss it with the sauce over some pasta.
A few days ago I cooked Berkshire pork chops at 132-F for about three hours, finished at a minute per side on a hot grill, and they were absolutely perfect. I’ve cooked a lot of pork SV, but mostly slow cooking (shoulders). This was the best chop I’ve ever had.
Following a recent serious eats article, for NYE I sv a whole pork belly porchetta for 36 hours at 155 deg. Then deep fried in peanut oil in a wok 5 min per side ant then into a 275 deg oven for 15-20 minutes to warm through. Made a sauce from the juices from the vacuum packs and butter. It was incredibly rich and drew rave reviews. Texturally it had it all. Killer with champagne to cut through the fat.
Tim -start with shrimp. 20 minutes. the texture is impressive vs. grill or pan sear. Throw it on some good rice and pour the ‘juice’ from the bag into a pan an reduce - instant sauce.
I ended up doing a flank steak first (before your recommendations of shrimp). Had it at 133F for 24 hours. Seared it in cast iron just before we ate. It was very tender but had… almost an aged flavor. Wasn’t my favorite, but my wife and kids liked it a lot.
I don’t see why flank steak needs 24 hours, was that a call on your part or a recipe?
When you first start out doing SV you may want to take a chunk of the beast, and in the flank steak example, trim off 2" of it, and set it aside and cook it ‘normally’ to do a taste/toughness comparison between the two cooking styles.
Meats tasting ‘aged’ kind of send up a signal flare to me about your food safety. Keep an eye out for bags that puff up or blow up a bit - if that happens, b/c you’re cooking in such a wonderful zone for ‘wee little beasties’, you may have some bad product.
I do 2.5" strip steaks from Costco quite a bit in SV and I have them in and out inside 35 minutes and am always pleased with the outcome.
Back to food safety and cross-contamination, I tend to flip down the top 3" of my bags much like you would on a piping bag where you give it a “french cuff” as you fill it. I find this gives me a better seal and a little more room to work with.
Again, my $.02. I love my SVS, use it about 1x a week - far more in winter than summer (too easy to grill etc) - and prefer to keep my cooking times for food to under 2 hours.
I used a recipe. I’m very clean when cooking. I’m a home brewer so I’m kind of crazy about being clean. It wasn’t really an off flavor, more like a leathery texture on the outside of the meat. That’s a good idea about reserving some beef to do a side by side. I almost never eat flank steak, mostly rib eyes and the occasional strip so to be honest, I don’t even know what a proper flank should taste like. I’m going to experiment with some other stuff before going back to beef. Or maybe will try some short cook times on my regular cuts to get that perfect “pink through out”.
Mark - I’d suggest grabbing a copy of Moderist Cuisine at Home for the sous vide charts. I use the Sous Vide Supreme - and have had no problems with it despite the lack of a circulator - it is about the most cost effective and easy way to SV cook.
Proteins are the obvious start. It is great for slow cooking tough cuts of meat. Of course you can perfectly cook tender cuts. But I have become especially happy with how well it cooks fish.
The obvious advantages are that you never overcook anything and that using it gives you an extra pair of hands in the kitchen. You will want to finish most proteins with a very quick sear of some sort.