Where to buy high quality meat

These are places that I think is able to give high quality meat (compared to supermarket) that should give better confidence for sous vide purposes:

https://honestbee.my/en/groceries/stores/the-blue-cow-butcher (also has their own website: http://bluecowbutcher.com/)

https://honestbee.my/en/groceries/stores/sanbanto (Sanbanto has standalone restaurant/shop, just like Blue Cow Butcher)

https://www.jayagrocer.com/category?category_alias=fresh-market-fresh-meat

http://www.coldstorage.com.my/ 

I've personally looked at the Cold Storage meat selection in-store, and they look much more appetising than Jusco.

Will populate this list as I dicover them.

Required reading for sous vide

The ultimate bible for sous vide cooking is an article by Douglas Baldwin called "A Practical Guide to Sous Vide Cooking" http://www.douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html The bulk of what follows is from this article, and bit and pieces I've gathered after reading through quite a few sous-vide related web sites.

Basically, sous vide is the act of heating up your ingredients to a certain temperature in a sealed bag, in a temperature-controlled water bath. This technique is a function of temperature and time. How long to cook something in sous vide is dependent on the temperature you apply. The rough formula (based on my understanding, no other website explains the breakdown, at least the ones I've visited thus far) is as follows:

Total time = pre-heat time + come up time (CUT) + pasteurisation time + hold time

Pre-heat time is the time required for the water bath to be heated to the cooking temperature. This is dependent on the volume of water, the container, the power of the heater, and so on. This time is not usually considered when cooking sous vide, but still got to keep in mind. One way to accelerate this step is to use water you heated from a kettle. For all extents and porpoises (good joke), pre-heat time is zero (in the context of cooking time). This because you don't put your ingredients into the water bath until AFTER the water bath has reached the cooking temperature.

The next segment of time is called Come Up Time (or just "heating time" in table 2.2 and 2.3 of Baldwin's article). This is the time that is requried for the centre of your ingredient to reach within 1degC of the water bath's temperature, or really, uniformly have that temperature across the entire thickness. This time is dependent on the thickness of your ingredients, and the temperature of the water bath. So for a sous vide item to be considered "cooked", the item needs to be in the water for this amount of time. "Cooked" in the case of meats, just means that the protein is heat treated to whatever temperature you wanted it to be, as this CUT affects meat doneness. Higher temp, more done. General rule of thumb is that 60degC is medium well for beef.

After CUT, the next segment of time is called pasteurisation time. This is the amount of time needed to reduce the spoilage bacteria across the entire piece of meat down to almost zero (because zero doesn't exist, duh). For beef, this is Table 5.1 in Baldwin's article. The general guide is that for superbly healthly individuals, skipping pasteurisation time for certain meats is fine as the risks are no different from conventional cooking. You need to apply pasteurisation time if you're feeding the meal to immuno-compromised people, like young children, old people, and sick people. Some meats are no compromise even for healthy people, like chicken. You also need to apply pasteurisation time if you intend to freeze the item after sous vide. Botulism is no joke, especially if cooked in a vacuum bag.

Pasteurisation time is not applicable when cooking below a certain temperature, as those temperatures typically promote bacterial growth instead of inhibiting it. When cooking below certain temperatures, the advice is to serve it as soon as the meat has reach the desired temperature (CUT), and only to healthy people. The usual risks of eating undercooked food applies.

Beyond pasteurisation time, is what is commonly called hold time. This is the amount of time you hold the food in the water bath before serving. This hold time is usually added after pasteurisation time to enable enzymes to further break down the meat to tenderise tough cuts of meat, like brisket, skirt or rump. Although it is commonly said that food cooked sous vide can be left in the water bath for prolonged period of time, there is actually a maximum duration you can leave certain food in the water bath before the enzymes overtenderize the meat to the point of being mushy or even liquidy. Examples of such ingredients are fish, seafood and chicken. Fish are generally not held for pasteurisation time for this reason, as prolonged pasteurisation can lead to mushy fish.

The upper limit of hold times can be referenced at this website: http://www.molecularrecipes.com/sous-vide-class/sous-vide-cooking-time-temperature/

On the topic of tenderizing, there is a technique in sous vide called warm ageing. It simulates the enzyme activity that typically comes from normal ageing techniques. It involves initially holding the meat at 39degC for an hour, then 49degC for another hour, then only commence normal heating for CUT. Required reading: https://stefangourmet.com/2012/02/27/sous-vide-to-the-next-level-tenderizing-beef-by-warm-ageing/
https://forums.egullet.org/topic/148167-modernist-cuisine-sous-vide-tenderizing-stage-and-enzymatic-activity/

eGullet also has an extensive thread populated with bookmark links to various discussions on sous vide.

This website gives a lot of visualisations for the effect of temperature on the result of sous vide (including the egg chart I replied on to make my first sous vide egg!): http://www.cookingissues.com/index.html%3Fp=3911.html

This paper explains that is a tough cut and what is a tender cut of meat: http://meat.tamu.edu/ansc-307-honors/meat-tenderness/

This website has some helpful visualisation of where the tough and tender cuts of meat are: https://www.fix.com/blog/identifying-steak-cuts/

Also check out the Sous Vide Everything YouTube Channel for lots of sous vide eating: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpFuaxD-0PKLolFR3gWhrMw/videos

Next post I'll discuss some possible sources of good clean meat.

Note: I've only had one meal of experience with sous vide at this point. Please do your own reading instead of depending on my understanding of the technique. Food safety is extremely important. Make sure you understand it before proceeding. I highly recommending reading up on current regulations on sous vide cooking of different countries to internalise some best practices. The one I've read is from the British Columbia Centre of Disease Control: http://www.bccdc.ca/resource-gallery/Documents/Guidelines%20and%20Forms/Guidelines%20and%20Manuals/EH/FPS/Food/SVGuidelines_FinalforWeb.pdf This guide is where I gathered the term CUT from :) I like how it parallelises the role of a chef and a food safety inspector, as they basically follow the same guidelines, but for different purposes.

That's it for now. I'll populate this post with reading materials as I discover them from time to time.

First sous vide meal!

Kinda neglected to take lots of pics. Not quite trained in the arts of super multitasking cooking with taking pics. Someday.

Prior to what follows in this post, I did some verfication of the ANOVA immersion heater's temperature controls. I managed to convince myself that the temperature indicator indeed reflects the temperature of the water bath, by checking the water temperature with an IR thermometer. I'm not sure if IR is the right procedure for measuring water temp, but it did say the temperature that I was shooting for, within a few tenths of a degree. I'll reverify when the probe thermometer arrives (which should be within the next week or so).

So basically I went around to look for good quality meats to make dinner. It wasn't easy. I had no confidence in Jusco, although coincidentally their meats were packed that day (well it says so on the packaging, and it looked less disgusting than the last time I bought chicken there). There was a premium pork restaurant that doubles as a raw meat vendor, but for some reason they weren't open that day. Last ditch effort went to Setiawalk's RedTick. They don't have fresh beef or chicken that day, and I'm not feeling fish. So went to their pork section and got two pieces of pork loin at 100g each. The guy that cut me the portion was fantastically accurate. Two pieces added up to 202g. I ordered 200g, and when he started to cut a second piece I was like dammit will he overshoot. Nope. Right on the money. The 200g of pork costed me a bit over RM3. Didn't know pork is this cheap... Or is the loin a cheap cut? I'd totally order by the thickness next time.

There will be a write up on the various meat vendors that I'm looking into.

At this point I'm already surrendering to the fact that Trichinosis is a real posibility. Oh well, yolo?

Seasoned the pork with salt, black pepper, garlic powder and rosmary.

No vacuum sealer yet, so I used the water displacement method to kinda shrink wrap the pork in a zipper bag. Fearing surface bacteria, I poured boiling water over both sides of the packaging. It kinda cooked the surface a bit, but that's fine by me. We have all the time to get the insides right.

Set up the cooker to 60degC. My timing was about 2 hours. The pork loin was measured at about 20mm at the thickest point. Agak agak la, sous vide timing too long no effect one (unless we're talking about pasteurisation time).

This came out in the end:

 

 

 It smelled good. 

If I got to do it all over again (and I will) I'd cut out a piece and try it as this stage. Because...

 

I kinda overseared the surface. It was moist and juicy, but texture wise it was a bit stringy for what I expected the sous vide technique to yield, especially at the edges. Maybe next time I'll add in some sauce too, though really, that piece of juicy meat was adequate.

Served it with mash potato and blanched brocoli. The brocoli was a total failure. I like them soft, but I overdid it and it sorta became a mush. Was quite digusting to eat. The mash potato though, fluffed it up with a fork and some butter. Seriously mash potato is worst when it's over mashed to the point of babyfood, and some even augment the flavour with milk. Simple really is the best. I think I boiled the potatoes (halved) for a good 30-45 mins, and the brocoli 20mins.

Being unsatisfied with the way the meat came out, I had to redeem myself with a sous vide egg. The egges were bought fresh as well, since the eggs in my house we all floating.

65degC for 1hr and this was the result:

 

It kinda was what I was going for, in that I aimed for the yolk to be buttery. After I ate it did I realise that I wanted the yolk to still be flowy that I can basically drink it. The buttery yolk was still fantastic though. This consistency is impossible to achieve with a conventional boiling water method. Would totally make it at 65degC if I wanted to spread egg like butter on toast or something. Next time maybe 62degC for that Zanmai Sushi onsen tamago doneness.

In the next post I'll discuss on the required reading materials before one embarks on sous vide.

Accessories Pt1

So, to do sous vide properly you gotta have your ingredients vacuum sealed.

So you gotta have a vacuum sealer.


You also need the vacuum bag.







You might also fancy a digital pribe thermometer.

They havent arrived yet, nor have they even shipped yet. So no pics.

In the next post I'm gonna show you my first meal made with sous vide!

Acquiring the Immersion Heater/Circulator

Was surveying sous vide circulators on Lazada. 

 

 I was going to order the Nutrichef, it being the cheapest circulator listed. Then I had the idea to check what do the forums say. Someone on LYN said that the ANOVA can be bought at their online shop and shipped to Malaysia. So:

 

Let's test the shipping fee to Malaysia:

Wow fantastic price. Comes up to about RM700, which is a few bucks more than the Nutrichef on Lazada. Compare the price of ANOVA v2 on Lazada which is basically twice it price (as well as being potentially US plug), and you'll see having it shipping from ANOVA official is a no-brainer.

I opted for DHL express at extra SGD2. Shipping was basically instant. August 10 was the day after I placed my order. So within 48 hours of ordering, the thing is already in Malaysia. Freaking fantastic.

However there was one thing about importing stuff that I forgot about: customs excise duty. Basically, add RM250 on top of the RM700 I already paid. DHL was kind enough to call me up to inform me about it. Well they pre-paid for me, I'm sure they'd love to recuperate that money.

 This makes the final price of the ANOVA RM950, basically RM1k. Still 33% cheaper than on Lazada. Couldn've split the shipping fee if I did bulk purchase though...

In the next post I'll talk about the accessories I bought, on Lazada.