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serge wrote:
> (serge) wrote in message news:<339cbb2.0406261=
>...
>=20
>>Hi !
>>I bought a FoodSaver machine (VAC1050) used generally for vacuum
>>packaging.
>>I would like to know if it's possible to do "sous vide cooking" with
>>the FoodSaver bags.
>>Thanks for the information !
>=20
>=20
> Hi again every body !
> Here is an article about sous-vide that I found in the usergroup
> uk.food+drink.misc. It gives more information about sous vide and sous
> vide cooking. It's from Taste, November 1988, written by Sarah Manser.

There's a lot wrong in it from the physics and chemistry to what=20
actually are the opportunities for SV prepping. It's late at might and=20
I'm tired and very few people are going to want to do anything with it=20
anyway, so I'll leave it alone.

Pastorio

> Several months ago I rashly suggested that Taste readers might be
> interested to learn about a new cooking technique known as sous-vide.
> Having sifted through mountains of paper and research records since, I
> hope I may now be qualified to deliver Sous-vide Lesson Number One.
> The system is still in its infancy, it's not a household item nor
> likely to become one for many years, but it can significantly improve
> the taste of what we eat in restaurants, hotels, hospitals and even on
> trains.
>=20
> A distinguished French chef called George's Pralus invented sous-vide
> (the curious name translated literally means 'under vacuum'). It can
> be seen as a natural progression from those traditional cooking
> techniques in which offal such as bladders and intestines was used for
> making sausages and haggis - from earth cooking to the haute cuisine
> of the French en papillote method; they all use sealed, airtight
> environments and slow cooking, below boiling point.
>=20
> It started in the early Seventies, when Pralus was commissioned to
> find a way of reducing the shrinkage of foie gras - an expensive
> little item which lost nearly half its raw weight when cooked
> conventionally. He experimented with sealed plastic pouches - some say
> cling film! - to encase the foie gras, and found that not only was
> shrinkage dramatically reduced but the process spectacularly enhanced
> the flavour.
>=20
> Pralus was unable to find an airtight, water-and-heat-resistant pouch
> to develop his system further and approached the Cryovac Division of
> WR Grace - a professional plastics company - to solve the problem.
> They developed a series of multilayered impermeable plastic pouches
> which are perfect for sous-vide use.
>=20
> It is not 'cuisine boil-in-the-bag', although it was once very
> unfairly called that, with the result that nobody would publicly admit
> to using the sous-vide method for fear of losing all their customers.
> The fundamental difference between the two techniques should be
> understood. Boil-in-the-bag food is cooked conventionally, divided
> into portions, bagged and then blast-chilled or frozen. With
> sous-vide, the raw food is cooked in a sealed pouch, which may or may
> not be blast-chilled and stored for later use.
>=20
> The vacuum process is used in three ways - purely for storage of
> uncooked food, secondly, for sous-vide food prepared and used
> immediately, and thirdly, for sous-vide food that is to be used at a
> later date.
>=20
> The principles aren't tricky. Oxygen makes food deteriorate, so by
> removing it the biological breakdown is considerably reduced. Many
> restaurants who don't actually cook by the sous-vide method use the
> vacuum process as a means of storage. Following the daily delivery,
> food is divided and placed in special bags, from which the air is
> removed by a vacuum machine before being stored. If handled properly,
> the method is extremely hygienic, since the food isn't damaged further
> by air, handling or refrigerator odours. No cross-contamination can
> affect the sealed food, and the fresher the produce when vacuum-packed
> the longer it will retain its quality.
>=20
> Another plus for storage is that the vacuum process doesn't change the
> cellular structure of food as does freezing and canning. The jagged
> ice crystals that form in processes other than industrial
> blast-freezing tear apart food cells, and the heat in canning bursts
> them.
>=20
> For sous-vide, the food is cooked directly in the pouch with some
> marvellous results. Only the highest quality fresh ingredients can be
> used because the process intensifies flavour and, as the food cooks in
> its own, juices, none of that natural flavour nor any vital
> nutritional goodness is lost in the water or burnt away by the oven.
> Chefs have found (through trial and error) that far less seasoning and
> herbs are needed since the vacuum process forces their natural oils
> deep into the meat or fish. The results can be astonishing. Only the
> pure flavour of the food is left and, because sous-vide requires a
> lower temperature, there is little or no shrinkage, which means larger
> and very tender
> portions.
>=20
> Food can be prepared in various ways. A breast of duck, for example,
> may be cleaned as normal and placed inside a specially designed
> impermeable plastic pouch with herbs and seasoning. The pouch is then
> into a vacuum machine to remove the air and seal the pouch before
> cooking in digitally controlled, pre-set steamer. Once cooked, the
> duck skin may be browned under a hot grill and a sauce made from juice
> left in the pouch. If it's not to be eaten immediately, once steamed
> it must be rapidly chilled to below 3C - either by an ice bain-marie
> or blast-chiller - and then date-stamped and stored at below 30C.
>=20
> The delicate taste of seafood, particularly shellfish such as
> scallops, lend themselves well to sous-vide. Alex Neil, food and
> beverage manager of the Kensington Hilton and Patrick John, executive
> chef of the Gatwick Hilton International, have found that fish,
> especially fresh salmon, shows the most dramatic improvement both in
> flavour and texture.
>=20
> When Hilton International first introduced sous-vide, their executive
> chef, Graham Cadman, experimented with pears and rosemary. He
> accidentally removed the air too quickly for this delicate item, and a
> flattened pear pancake resulted; most odd, but it had such a delicious
> and unusual flavour that he tried again. He found that the pear lost
> neither its texture nor colour, and that the flavour of the herb was a
> wonderful complement to that of the fruit.
>=20
> Some vegetables, particularly carrots, work very well. David
> Dorricott, chef of the Portman Hotel, finds that sous-vide is by far
> the best way to cook artichoke hearts - it greatly enhances the
> flavour and lemon juice is no longer needed to prevent discoloration.
> Without lemon juice the conventionally cooked artichokes turn brown,
> and the additional sharp taste means they can't be used for delicate
> mousses or soups.
>=20
> It's possible for the food produced for room service and small
> coffee-bar-type restaurants in hotels to be greatly improved - some
> would say about time, too - and that the awful stodge served in many
> hospitals and on planes could be a thing of the past.
>=20
> Despite its many and various culinary advantages, sous-vide is not to
> be undertaken carelessly, particularly when the food is to be stored.
> Although by removing oxygen the deterioration process is slowed down,
> it isn't halted completely, and the growth of anaerobes can occur.
> This means hygiene must be paramount. If germs enter the pouch with
> the food, they breed in the warm, moist atmosphere and, as with the
> flavour, there is nowhere for them to escape. Jochem Schafheitle,
> lecturer in catering at the Dorset Institute of Higher Education, has
> studied sous-vide for the last five years and strongly believes that
> nobody should consider it until they fully understand the hygiene
> implications, the necessary refrigeration chain, the internal
> core-temperature machines and the DHSS guidelines.
>=20
> Hilton International set aside special production areas where the
> temperature is controlled at below IOC /50F to limit bacterial growth
> during the preparation process. An antibacterial cleaner is used in
> the area. Foods are vacuum-packed by chefs wearing sterile surgical
> gloves and masks.
>=20
> Albert Roux undertook two years of extensive study of this type of
> cookery before he set up a factory concerned with its production. He
> worked with Pralus in France and obtained an honorary Doctorate of
> Science Fellowship from the Dorset Institute for his work there. He
> now supplies Roux restaurants and some caterers: British Airways (for
> Concorde), Bass and the SNCF (French railways).
>=20
> Since he is concerned with preparing food for storage and later
> presentation, he does not agree with low temperature cooking, but
> prefers a quick-cooking, quick-chilling method. The highly controlled,
> clinical surroundings in which he works make sous-vide viable and
> safe, but he believes that few restaurants can achieve these standards
> of hygiene and should therefore only employ sous-vide for food to be
> served immediately.
>=20
> Sous-vide does not necessarily work well for everything, nor is it
> likely to replace conventional methods, but it should be seen as a
> valuable addition to any professional kitchen. It doesn't mean that
> the creative skills of chefs are lost, since recipes have to be
> adapted and tested before they are used and accepted by discerning
> palates.
>=20
> It's early days, but with further research to establish ideal cooking
> times and temperatures, and balanced microbiological and nutritional
> levels, it may well become an internationally available alternative to
> canning, freezing and conventional cook-chill.
>=20
> Plans are afoot to prepare sous-vide packages for shops, which would
> allow us all to have perfect dinner parties where the only
> requirements would be a pot of steaming water and scissors to cut the
> pouches!
>=20
> For more information about this technique, The Sous Vide Handbook,
> edited by Julie Sheppard, is available from Convotherm, I Devonshire
> Gardens, London W4 3TW. It was then =A312.50 including postage and
> packing.