Sous vide yummy scotch fillet steak
This is my first attempt at sous vide cooking. I recently purchased an Anova Culinary (water recirculator) precision cooker on-line from the Anova Culinary Australian store. From Amazon Australia I purchased a dedicated sous vide plastic bucket and lid.
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Because of the longer cooking times, I can only realistically cook sous vide on weekends and public holidays. I usually don’t get back to the flat each day until about 6 pm so a two hour cook won’t see my dinner served until after 8.30 pm. That’s way to late for me given I normally head to bed between 8.30 and 9 pm. That said, this cooker has Wi-Fi capability so if I decided to keep my Wi-Fi on in the flat while I am out, I could start the cooking while I’m at work and the meat would be ready for me when I arrived home. I will have to test this feature on weekends first just to make sure I’m happy with it.
For my first sous vide cooking experience I thought I’d cook beef steak. At first I thought I might venture to Costco and by a new york strip or some rump cap. As I was drooling, I rethought it, and I settled on the notion, rather than going for the high quality, expensive cuts first, how about going with a supermarket grade good cut? I can then work up to the fancier cuts as I gain experience. The Costco meat can be a treat.
Recipe
- 330 grams Scotch fillet steak (300 grams = 12 ounces)
- Iodised salt flakes
- Freshly ground black pepper
- Garlic powder
- Brussels sprouts
- Cauliflower
- Broccoli
- Peas
- Corn
- Pouring cream
- Grated cheddar cheese
- Chilli flakes
- Parsley
- Dill
- Spring onions
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Season the scotch fillet steak with iodised salt, black pepper and garlic powder
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Vacuum seal the meat
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Set the Anova Culinary recirculator to 53 °C/127 °F and cook the meat for 2 hours.
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Put all the vegetables into a plastic container and cook with microwave radiation for 5 minutes
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Drain the vegetables and place them into an oven proof glass dish
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Add and mix through chopped parsley, dill and spring onions along with the chilli flakes plus some iodised salt flakes and ground black pepper
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Mix through some grated cheese and then some cream
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When the meat has 20 minutes left of sous vide cooking, put the vegetables into the oven at 200 °C/400 °F for 20 minutes
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When the meat has finished sous vide cooking, open the vacuum seal and withdraw the meat
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Pat the meat dry with paper towel
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Sear the meat in a hot frying pan with a little oil and butter
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Plate up the meat and vegetables
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Shoot a photograph
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Eat the meal
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Wash the dishes
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Write the recipe
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Write a blog post
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Hope your friends share the recipe on social media
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Hope your regular readers read the blog post and leave a comment
You have to try this. I deliberately do not calculate energy for dishes. I deliberately default to 500 Calories or 500,000 calories because I do not make these calculations.
Oven roasted scotch fillet steak with cheesy creamy vegetables Meater review
Photographs
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Questions and answers
What is sous vide cooking?
Sous vide cooking is basically a type of cooking using a water bath set at a constant temperature for relatively long periods, e.g., anywhere between 2 hours to 3 days. The food is contained in plastic bags with the air removed either by a vacuum or using a displacement method.
What is the history of sous vide cooking?
French for under vacuum, sous vide is hundreds of years old but was made popular by a French chef in the late 1970s.
How do you learn about sous vide cooking?
I learnt everything from two men from Brazil and one man from Cuba who live in Florida. They host a YouTube channel named Sous Vide Everything.
While the videos each follow a template, the video production quality is high. I bet you didn’t know the best tool for searing meat is a flame thrower! True story. Check out the searing tournament playlist.
Will you buy a flame thrower?
No. Can you imagine me using a flamethrower in a one bedroom flat in Canberra? The city councillors would be all over me in a second.
How will you brown your meat?
A hot frying pan with some butter and a little grape seed oil.
How did the steak taste?
It was bloody brilliant. The meat was cooked medium rare. It was pink in the middle and the muscle bundles were moist and juicy. A gentle squeeze revealed some meaty juiciness. The steak was easy to cut with a sharp chef’s knife and a steak knife just slid through the meat so easily.
The taste was magnificent. While I could have done a better job of searing the outside, the meat had a lovely beefy taste and it was so easy to chew. The fat was wonderful. A terrific mouthfeel as the fat melted in my mouth.
You keep mentioning iodised salt rather than just salt, why?
Iodine is a critical element for human brain development. The first 1000 days of life are critical. Women who are pregnant or planning to be pregnant should ensure they have sufficient iodine in their diet. Babies and infants need iodine in their diet. Anyone who says iodised salt is poison, yes you celebrity chef, Pete Evans, is sending an anti-public health message and doing harm to the collective intelligence of the offspring of people who are foolish enough to listen.
Have you learnt any important lessons?
Yes, this is an update entry. On the following Saturday night, I learnt something about cooking lamb which readers should know about.
Final thoughts
I’m pretty sure you’re going to see more sous vide recipes on Yummy Lummy. Let me know what you think. Please leave a comment at the end of this post or on Twitter or Facebook or Instagram.
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I am yet to do sous vide cooking and neither have I used grape seed oil. The steak look amazing!
Thanks, Liz. The steak was really nice. The grapeseed oil isn’t necessary, I just like adding a little oil with a high vapour point to the butter to stop it burning too much.
That’s an amazing idea to be able to start the cooking process remotely! Wow!
It will be great in winter when I can feel safer leaving vacuum sealed meat in a room temperature water bath for a few hours before the preheating and cooking starts.
I’m glad the first attempt worked out so well! I use the Anova as well and I just love it (though I don’t have the fancy tub, I just use my giant stock pot, which seems to work well).
Congratulations on your first attempt! The beef strips look really tender.
Thanks very much Rose. I was pretty happy with the result. It tasted great too.
I still haven’t tried sous viding but friends that have a machine love it. That’s very clever about the wifi capability!
It’s a brilliant system Lorraine and worth trying.
My steaks so far have been perfect.
When I first read the title I really though that you were adding a bottle of Scotch to your food! I suppose that is the name of the steak like Kobe steak! LOL!! I guess I’ve read one too many recipes where liberal does of wine or beer are added to the meal! Or I need to get better glasses and/or enlarge the text on my laptop! LOL!! 🙂 😀 Anyway looks extremely delicious!
Thank you, Deborah. That made me laugh. I don’t know why it’s called scotch fillet. It may be because a person from Scotland first described it.
Perhaps, LOL. 😀😁😃😄
Congrats on your first sous vide steak! A roaring success from the sounds of it 😀 ‘lovely beefy taste’ – You know you did it right. I wonder what cut of beef next time round 😃
Thanks Mabel. The plan for tonight is a porterhouse steak.
Your food looks very delicious, Gary 😀
I have a question for you, because you use also to post about, what is healthy. Why do you choose to use Grape Oil? And a microwave, isn’t there other options?
Hi Irene,
Grapeseed oil has a higher vapour point so I can get the frying pan really hot to get a good sear on the meat.
I like to use microwave radiation for short bursts because it is quick, neat and safe.
Thank you for your quick response, Gary.
In Europe, we are recommended not to fry anything in Grapeseed Oil, because it develops not so healthy, when warmed up, which is why, I asked you.
I haven’t been cooking with a microwave for about 30 years, because I got into analyzing and see the food before and after in microscope, what happened. This taught me to use the more slow and usual way of cooking.
I do also know, that we need to take much for thought about what kind of tools, as we use in our kitchen and my tools are not all optimal either.
Thanks, Irene. There are no restrictions here in Australia on Grapeseed oil and our food safety regulators have not declared any safety concerns with using microwave radiation.
It is okay, Gary. I just wondered, because I know, you often write about healthy food. I think, that we can use mostly, just not too much of anything.
I agree. Thanks, Irene.