Simple Sous Vide Chicken Dinner

It seems like this new appliance will help save a lot of hands-on kitchen time and cleanup.  We don't have a dishwasher, so a big pile of dishes on a Friday night is not something that we want to mess with.  And while I really like to cook, after working all day I don't want to always be stuck having to keep an eye on things while they cook. So far, so good.  Last night was very easy.

After getting home from work, I vacuumed some chicken breasts into pouches with a sprinkle of Penzey's Northwoods Fire seasoning.  The sous vide got set at 145 and then B-Hubz (smile) and I left for the climbing gym.  By the time we got back - tired and ravenous, we had some good climbs! - the chicken had cooked for a little over 2 hours.

I preheated one of those George Foreman-style indoor grills, and started water boiling to cook frozen peapods.  The chicken was grilled for a few minutes to color.  The veggies were drained, buttered, and salted.  Dinner done!

The lighting in the photo is a little weird, but the chicken was amazing.  The texture was great - very juicy, firm, and evenly cooked.

Verdict - Next time - extra spice.  I was worried about over doing it but a little more would have been just fine.  Also I don't think I'm going to bother finishing a dish on the indoor grill again.  It didn't get hot enough to really sear to get the grill marks that I was going for.   A smoking hot skillet is the best way to go.  At least until I get a blowtorch.  :)

First Meal Sous Vide

A photo-blog of the first sous vide dinner I've cooked so far.  Looking forward to many more!

The Sous Vide Supreme "water bath" cooker.  It's looks prettier sitting on the counter than I expected.
Unfortunately with today being Thursday, the kitchen isn't quite as well-stocked with groceries as I would like.  But on-hand AND valid for the sous vide are apples and carrots.  Here are the results.

Carrots were peeled, sliced, and vacuum sealed into a pouch with butter, salt and pepper.

Apples chopped and vacuumed with butter, cinnamon, and brown sugar.

After a bit of experimenting, fiddling, and splashing water about, the packets were placed in the water at 183 degrees for about an hour.  While they cooked I started on some scrambled eggs with sausage and spinach, and whipped up some cream to go with dessert.

Cooked carrots, still bagged.  The thing about sous vide cooking is that after things are "done", they still need a bit of finishing off before serving.  That might be a sauce, or a quick sear in a pan to give them a nice brown finished look.  For the carrots I poured them into a very hot cast-iron skillet to caramelize.

Just barely saved from burning!  I actually liked the very dark spots of color they developed, and thought the smoky taste was nice with the concentrated sweetness of the cooked carrot.

The apples were treated in the same way...poured into a very hot skillet and browned while the liquid reduced. (Ha! The steam kept fogging up my lens :)

With the final results:

Verdict - I'm excited!  While the first try took longer than it should have, overall I'm happy with the way these two items turned out.  The carrots were intensely carroty, and the apples were (while a bit overcooked at 1 hour) pretty tasty too.