5 Ways to making Sous Vide Steak

Beef Steak is considered to be the most popular meat to cook sous vide. And once you master cooking steak by sous vide, you may never eat regularly cooked steak again. So the best way to start cooking the perfect sous vide steak is by understanding how it is done. But you will first need to learn everything about sous vide steak.

Traditional cooking a steak on a skillet or grill to a precise “doneness” is quite a daunting task. The difference between getting rare and medium rare steak can only differ in a few degrees in temperature.  And it is up to you as the cook to determine exact moment to remove the steak from the pan or grill.

This means that your entire attention should focus on cooking the steak, if you miss the moment you will get the wrong “doneness” in the middle. Even experienced home cooks know that traditional can be a very demanding effort, and turning your back for just a few moments can cause a juicy rib eye to turn into a tough gray waste.

But by cooking sous vide steak with precision a cooker; you can achieve the desired “doneness” as simple as setting the temperature with a knob. No need for guesswork, no split-second timing, and no hair rising stress. You just cook perfect steak, every time.

A precision cooker also saves you the effort of constantly checking when the steak will be ready, just input a number in the timer then you will know exactly how long to sous vide steak will be done. So here are a few step you can follow to make an easy sous vide steak:

• Attach the precision cooker to the water pot, and preheat it to 52°C / 126°F for a rare-medium-rare or for whatever your “doneness” preference is. Depending on the temperature, the water might start to boil.
• Season your steaks on all sides. You can use whatever marinade you prefer or any herbs and spices. If you like to marinade your meats, you can also use the marinade in seasoning your meat.
• Seal your steaks, either by using a Ziplock bag or by using a vacuum sealer on a plastic bag. If you prefer you can also add your marinade into the bag, and some herbs and spices if you prefer.
• Submerge the steaks in the water bath. Then cook sous vide for 60 minutes for every 1” thick cuts. Make sure to tie the bag in such a way that it won’t keep on moving inside the pot.
• You then remove the steaks from the bags and sear the outside of the steaks using your preferred method. If you prefer you can also grill them.
• Season with salt and pepper, or you can garnish it according to your preference.

Now that you have a general idea on how to cook the sous vide steak, you just need to know how to cook the steak in your preference. So here are 5 ways you would want your steaks:

Rare at 120°F:

If you prefer your meat nearly raw, then rare is for you. At this stage proteins in the muscles have not started to contract that much and meat shall have that wet texture. Cuts like hanger meat will be specifically toughen at this point. Fattier cuts will also have a waxy texture since it still hasn’t start to render. It is recommended that you cook only very lean and tender cuts just like the tenderloin to the rare.

Medium-rare at 129°F:

One of the most popular ways to have your steak is medium rare. The steak is quite red and nice however, the proteins in the muscles already started to firm and tighten up. Its juiciness would be lessened because of its tightening but when you sous vide the steak, you will only gain tenderness since the meat was sealed.

You can also make a clean bite to them; this is because instead of the muscle fibrils mushing and the slipping away from each other like they are in one of a kind steaks. This way cooking is very recommended by steak aficionados but high in fat steaks that tastes better when they are cooked closer to the medium side.

Medium at 135°F:

A good characteristic of a medium steak is now pink in colour it has all throughout. And if you cook this traditionally, its juices are significantly less than a steak that is rare. But with a good marbled beef with lots of fat, the taste of rendered softened fat should be a lot more to make up for the loss.

At this range coarsely textured cuts like skirt, hanger, and flap meat turns juicy and firm. It is recommended when cooking sous vide with very fatty or the coarse beef pieces to adjust into a cooler side of medium range.

Medium-well or 145°F:

At this range the steak is all well and on its way of turning dry. A medium-well steak would have lost almost six times the juice in a rare steak. This will make the meat turn into a significant grainy and cottony texture that any amount of lubricating excess fat could disguise it.

If you prefer to have the meat cooked as medium-well, it is suggested that you use very rich cuts like skirt steak, short rib, or hanger. ThFis type of meats will suffer less compared to the finely muscled texture cuts like tenderloin cute, strip or ribeye.

Well done at 156°+:

Some people really like their steaks well-done. But if you do this then there is no reason in cooking the meat using the sous-vide accuracy technique. It would be more cost effective if you would just grill or even pan-roast the meat until it’s done just like the way you want it.

So there you are the 5 different ways making sous vide steaks. There are recipes that you can use to make different kinds of steaks or you can also use this technique in making pork chops or grilled chicken. Fish and vegetables can also be cooked using sous vide.