I’ve got an advance galley of the soon to be released Sous Vide at Home, from Lisa Q. Fetterman (the founder of Nomiku) and Scott Peaboddy (executive chef at Nomiku) and I think it’s going to become a must-have for anyone interested in this method of cooking. There aren’t a lot of straight up sous vide cookbooks for home cooks out there.
I’ve got a long, somewhat embarrassing history of being obsessed with every immersion circulator that comes out on the market, starting with the original Nomiku Kickstarter campaign in 2012. I think I’ve finally stopped buying them, though, because I’ve settled on three that are my favorites: the wi-fi versions of Nomiku and Anova, and the new Joule. The Nomiku has a nice form factor – rectangular, which works well for me since I normally use a square Cambro container to cook in. The Anova is solidly built and quiet. It was my go-to for a long time. Joule started shipping last week, and I finally used it last night. It doesn’t have on device controls, but the trade-off is a very compact device that’s sleek and well-made.
I cheated on the Nomiku cookbook a bit and used the Joule to make this dish, though. I was itching to give the Joule a try. The app interface is really simple and nice. There’s not a lot of content in the app, which is fine with me. One thing I like is that it decouples the controls for heating the bath and turning on the timer, so you don’t have to reset the timer once the bath is preheated. Other apps tie the power control in the app to a timer.
The chicken is fairly simple, just fish sauce and brown sugar with boneless, skinless chicken thighs in the bag. Larry typically doesn’t like poultry cooked sous vide, because the smell of the meat is intensified (not in a good way), and the texture is sometimes a bit soft. And add fish sauce to the mixture, this was not pleasant to smell when it came out of the bath.
A quick saute in a hot pan gives the chicken a brown crust, and the leftover marinade serves as the base for a pan sauce that includes lemongrass, ginger, garlic and chiles. I liked it – super flavorful with lots going on, and the chicken was perfectly cooked. Larry didn’t like it as much as I did, but he didn’t hate it.
- Vietnamese Caramel Chicken (Sous Vide at Home)
- Delicata Squash Rings with Harissa (The New Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone)
