Three months ago I tried a soft boiled egg at 63°C during 1 hour. I have admitted that it was not the perfect egg for me and promissed to make another try. This time I cooked an egg 50 minutes at a constant 64.5°C temparature.

And here is the result!

(Soft boiled egg cooked at 64.5°C during 50 minutes)

 The egg at 64.5°C has nothing to do compared to the 63°C one (see the last picture down this post). The appearance of the 64.5°C is better, the white egg is more compact and doesn’t fall down like the 63°C one.

(Soft boiled egg cooked at 64.5°C during 50 minutes)

The yolk is also very different compared to the 63°C one.

(Soft boiled egg cooked at 64.5°C during 50 minutes)

See bellow the picture I made 3 months ago of the 63°C soft boiled egg with the Sousvidemagic and above the 64.5°C egg with the swid of Addélice. This is crazy to see how a difference of only 1.5°C can change so much the texture of an egg.
As I told it before I didn’t really like the 63°C egg but the 64.5°C was fantastic!! Absolutly incredible…I strongly recommend anybody trying it!
I read on internet that such egg was impossible to do without the precision and stability of an immersion circulator. I know understand why. If the temperature variation is equal or higher to 1°C then this can change the final texture of the white egg and yolk. The cool thing is also to be sure to reproduce the same result each time you set your immersion circulator at 64.5°C! I am definitely getting found of this cooking equipment.

(63°C soft boiled egg cooked during 60 minutes)

Jean François

Down to my home is a fantastic fish shop. I could not resist when seeing this huge and beautiful 2 Kg Atlantic salmon. This was a great opportunity for me to try my new toy…the Julabo EC immersion circulator.

Recipe: I just put some lemon slices inside the salmon, put the salmon in pouch and vacuumed it. Temperature 56°C (138.2°F)  for 12 minutes.

This Julabo is a war machine. The  56°C (138.2°F) target temperature was reached so fast (even with my 20 litres water bath) and was very steady thanks to the water pump. Haaaaaaa! The time when I was using a gas or an halogen stove to cook sous vide is now so far to my memory. What a pleasure to switch on a machine, fix the temperature and that’s all!

The result was fantastic…juicy, looking like row but in reality cooked. I invited my neighbour who heard about my experiments and where very curious to see what is cooking sous vide with an immersion circulator.

Jean-Francois

Immersion circulator manufacturer are historically laboratories equipment suppliers. Some of these suppliers have slightly adapted their thermal circulators to comply with sous vide cooking needs (refer to Molecularcuisine.org list and price comparison of immersion circulators). It is true that no cook need a machine that can heat above 100°C (212°F) as only water should be used for sous vide cookery. Some immersion circulators can even heat liquids at 200 or 300°C (392-572°F)!
Nevertheless the design of these machines dates back to the eighties and lab equipment manufacturers still have the “monopoly” of the sous vide cooking market.

It seems things are changing and, if the information is true, a new supplier enters the small club of sous vide cooking manufacturers. Contrary to some companies that only relabelled others products, Addélice seems to have designed its own immersion circulator. Addélice internet site is not very talkative
but indicates that their immersion circulator is a pure product from Addélice and will be price competitive. Addélice immersion circulator should be released mid August.

Wait and see…

Jean-François

SousVideMagic 1500B is definitely not an aesthetic cooking equipment but the finishings are ok and everybody who buys such machine knows that your kitchen will look a bit messy with all these cables…

My first problem was to read the 25 pages manual (available on Fresh Meal Solutions’ internet site)! If your are not comfortable with English and usually not enjoying reading manual then…back luck for you! Sousvidemagic’s manual is only available in English and gives you headache since you start looking at PID tuning!
It took me some minutes to understand how to shift the SousVideMagic from °F to °C. Trust me this was not a ”push one button” function key.
The major issues I had to face with were contained in the Fresh Meals Solutions’ manual warnings:

• “Use listed cookers with heaters rated accurately for their power wattage and with their own thermal cut off protection (thermostatic or thermal fuse) in case of any SVM failures. Do not use it with electric cook tops or hot plates. SVM is designed to control the cookers recommended by Fresh Meals Solutions only. Using it to control cookers not on the recommended list can be dangerous and cause fire hazards. Fresh Meals Solutions is not liable for damages caused by misuses of SVM”.
• “Always place the SVM sensor in the cooker’s water bath before turning it on. Leaving the SVM temperature sensor outside of the water bath while cooking will form an open loop operation. This way the sensor is measuring ambient temperature and not the actual bath temperature, as a result SVM will allow the cooker to heat at full power indefinitely. It will not only overheat the controller, but also damage your cooker, and may even cause a fire”.

After reading the manual it was not clear for me if my rice cooker was “listed” by Fresh Meal Solutions as a recommended cooker. Nevertheless I went further and wired the one I purchased in China Town for EUR 45.

The second warning (“don’t take the temperature probe off the rice cooker”) is easy to manage nevertheless I consider this to be a major failure in terms of excess temperature protection. No excess temperature protection switch is provided in this case. This machine will burn, that’s all! In otherwords no kids should go around the SousVideMagic pulling on wires and no scatterbrained people dealing with this machine. 

Fresh Meal Solutions also recommend using hot water to fill cooker’s water bath or pre-heat the water close to set temperature first, before hooking Sousvidemagic to the cooker.

I took for you some nice pictures to show the rear view of the SousVideMagic 1500B (I like taking pictures). As you’ll see this is a very simple appliance. You’ll also see the kind of socket adaptor you’ll need to purchase for European users. 

I also verified if Fresh Meal Solutions’ temperature probe was as precise as mentioned on their site. I took a glass of water and immersed the SousVideMagic probe and the Mastrad one together. I made the test in °F and the result was excellent: 1°F of difference! The response time of the 2 probes is also very good.

Now lets talk about my first experiment cooking sous vide with SousVideMagic: a beef fillet at 59°C for almost 2 hours.

I verified during the 2 hours cooking period if the temperature mentioned by the SousVideMagic 1500B was actual (you’ll see on the picture that I switched to °C). In fact I think I would have never trust the SousVideMagic would be so steady and accurate if I would not have made this test. I confirm this sous vide cooking equipment is precise and steady! 

Here the result: a fantastic colour for that beef fillet, very tender and juicy. I loved it!
For food safety please visit this link.

Let’s try a PID controller!
But first what is a PID (Proportion, Intregral, Derivative) temperature controller?

The PID temperature controller is the most sophisticated controller available providing exceptional performance at a surprisingly low price. But what is it, really?

Here are 4 articles that should help you understand it!

The first link is the most accessible information I could find about a PID controller. Let’s call it “PID controller explained for dummies”. This fantastic video was made by robot geeks and explains speed PID controller. You just have to replace into your mind speed by temperature! This video is a bit long to download but if you would have to watch one piece of information about the PID controller in your life time I would strongly suggest you to watch this video!

This second link is giving a little more information about temperature PID controller (still understandable for an average intelligent brain).

 Here are 2 links that I would recommend for people who are really interested in tuning PID controllers. In other words, don’t even dare clicking on these links  if your are not a scientist!

Sous vide cooking with a rice cooker paired with a temperature PID controller.

A rice cooker or other heating appliance will cycle on and off, causing fairly wide temperature fluctuations. To avoid this some people pair a rice cooker with a PID controller. The PID controller has a thermo-sensor that is inserted into the rice cooker water. You set the PID device to a certain temperature, and the PID will control the amount of electricity that activates the heater, thus keeping the water temperature at a constant.

Although other heating appliances can also work, the simple rice cooker seems best suited to work with the PID device for sous vide applications. You must buy a rice cooker that has a basic mechanical on and off switch. Don’t purchase an expensive sophisticated rice cooker, it will probably not work with the temperature PID controller.

What are the temperature PID controllers available on the market for sous vide cooking purposes?

Traceable Temperature Controller

Auber Instruments

SousVideMagic 1500B form Fresh Meal Solutions

I purchased the SousVideMagic 1500B as it seems to be the most popular one. Feedback of people who purchased it is excellent. The cost for this temperature PID controller is USD 169 plus approx. USD 25 shipping costs to Europe (USD 99 if you don’t have the patience to wait, therefore you’ll get it within 3 days with Fedex).
For non North American users an input power cord and an adaptor to the socket of local standard will have to be purchased separately.

To sum up, the global cost for my SousVideMagic temperature PID controller is:

• SousVideMagic 1500B: USD 169 + USD 25 = USD 194 incl. sending
• Custom duties: EUR 35
• Basic rice cooker: EUR 45
• Input power cord and socket adaptor: approx EUR 16.

Grant total (1 EUR = 1.4 USD): approx. EUR 234 (USD 327)

I sould receive my SousVideMagic tomorrow. I’ll give you my first comments as soon as possible!

Jean-François

After having tested sous vide cooking with a gaz stove and a halogen stove here are my comments about cooking sous vide with a EUR 100 basic water bath.

For the purpose of measuring the range of temperature variation of my water bath I poured 14 litres of tap water at 43°C (109.4°F). My target temperature was 58°C (136.4°F).
I approx. need 34 minutes to reach my target temperature which is very long compared to the gaz and halogen stove experiment. This can easely be explained by the 14 litres water to heat compared to 4 litres container I heat with the gaz and halogen stove experiment. The range of temperature variation is of approx. 4 to 5 degrees if you are not taking care. But if you remain close to your water bath and play with the thermostat (see on the graph T5 for thermostat 5…) you can easily remain in a range of 2 degrees. This range of 2 degrees (that could be considered as acceptable) was facilitated by the fact that my container was fed with 14 litres water. Nevertheless you can’t remain close to your cooker if you want to cook a meat for a long period!  Therefore cooking sous vide with a basic water bath is not a good option.

I summed up my comments in the table below. Next step will be a SousVideMagic from Fresh Meal Solutions that I purchased on internet some days ago. I should receive it soon!!

Jean-François

I was happy to discover some days ago that someone already made the laborious work consisting in comparing immersion circulator prices on the net. Thanks to Molecularcuisine.org who dated this work March 20, 2009.

This comparison is available on a Wiki platform provided by Molecularcuisine.org so that you are free to amend it anytime.

The results of this work shows that the two cheapest immersion circulators available on the net are: 

• Fisher Scientific Polystat 36: USD 886 excl. sending costs and VAT (Fisher.com)
• Julabo ED: EUR 852 excl. sending cost and VAT (Laboland.com)

No need to indicate these 2 immersion circulators are the most basics available on the market sold without timer and grid protection.

Jean-François

 After trying keeping a constant 58°C (136.4°F) temperature with a gas stove I decided to do the same experimentation with a halogen stove. Halogen stoves usually benefit from a thermostat working together with a thermometer probe which should help regulating the temperature of the pan.

For this experiment I took the same pan used with the gas stove and poured 4 litres of the water pipe already at 43°C. It took me quiet long (approx 20 minutes) to reach a steady 58°C (136.4°F) temperature (I had to fight with ice cube and play with the thermostat). I probably can improve this time repeating the process several times. Anyway, as you can see on the graphic, since I reached 58°C (136.4°F) I switched the thermostat at 1 (minimum) and let the stove work on itself. I was moving the water often to make sure the water was evenly at 58°C (136.4°F).

The result was not so bad I maintained the temperature in the range from 58°C to 59°C almost doing nothing (just moving the water) for a period of 20 minutes (see on the graphic).

I summed up my comments in the table below. Next step will be a bain marie that a friend of mine borrowed me.

Jean-François

There are basically 4 techniques to cook sous vide with low and constant temperature:

• with a gas/electric/halogen stove,
• with a water bath (bain marie),
• with a cooking controller,
• with an immersion circulator.

It seems each technique has advantages and disadvantages. Cooking sous vide with a stove is definitely the cheapest way to proceed as the only thing you need to purchase is an external digital thermometer (approx. EUR 30).

Today’s post goal is to determine if a 58°C (136.4F) temperature can be kept constant with a gas stove. The Youtube video below seems to confirm this possibility. But how difficult is it really? I recommend anybody taking the time to watch this funny video with its typical British humour. Cooking and humour, what a fantastic combination!

Click here to view the embedded video.

As said this is caustic humour!

Now lets try the gas stove sous vide cooking technique.

First I had to find a gas stove which a kind of issue when 85% of the people have now electric or halogen stove. I found it just visiting my old mother and get the biggest container I could find in her kitchen. I finally choose the container of a Cocotte-Minute (pressure-cooker) in which I poured 4 liters of hot water coming from the pipe. The more water you add the less variation in temperature we should theoretically have for our experiment. My thermometer indicated 45°C (113°F), I lighted the gas et set it at the maximum power. It took 6 minutes to reach my 58°C (136.4°F) goal. I lowered the gas but the temperature reached anyway 60°C. Therefore I added 8 ice-cubes in the water to lower the temperature until 58°C (136.4°F).

Then I lighted again the gas and set it at minimum. You’ll remark in the chart below that I succeeded in maintaining the temperature in the range from 58°C (136.4°F) to 59°C (138.2°F) but after a great deal of effort.

To sum up I would say that sous vide cooking with a gas stove works, is price competitive but is obviously not a serious option. The range of variation in temperature will totally depend on how diligent you will be with the temperature check.  I read several times in books and on the net that a variation of 1°C could have a significant impact of the final foodstuff. Above all you can’t prepare a diner for 4 people and spend most of your time watching the screen of your thermometer!