What are the advantages of sous vide?

Because food is hermetically sealed in a vacuum bag for the sous vide procedure, the harmful influence of atmospheric oxygen and oxidation is eliminated. In particular when it comes to vegetables this is immediately noticeable even to the naked eye; the consistency and color are maintained much better than with other preparation methods.

Sealing food in a vacuum bag also offers a variety of other advantages: The food loses significantly less fluid, which means that drying out is avoided and cooking losses are substantially reduced. This not only delights the palate of guests but also offers an economic advantage that should not be underrated. For example, a relatively expensive piece of meat loses much less fluid during preparation, and therefore also loses less weight. The cooking loses during sous vide compared to standard cooking are reduced from 40% to a maximum of 5 – 10%.

In addition to this, cooking in a sealed bag means that less aromas are lost and the respective flavor of the food is maintained better. Conversely, it is possible to influence the flavor with only sparing use of spices and other ingredients in the film bag.

When it comes to cooking point, sous vide is a very safe and easy to handle procedure. Classic overcooking is almost impossible due to the generally applied principle with the water bath temperature being approximately equal to the core temperature that the food should reach. Depending on the food being cooked, standard preparation methods sometimes only have a few seconds between “not yet done,” “perfect” and “overcooked/too dry.” The sous vide procedure, on the other hand, is significantly more relaxed: Here the critical component is the set temperature; the component of time is secondary and is not critical for many types of food. Only the required minimum cooking time needs to be ensured, but exceeding this generally doesn’t lead to impairment of the quality until quite some time later. However, overcooking of game dishes such as venison or saddle of venison can lead to a “liver-like” texture. In this case, one should either keep an eye on the time or monitor the desired core temperature with a core temperature sensor.

If larger quantities of food are required at a certain time, then sous vide makes it possible to pre-prepare the required quantity of portions at an earlier point in time. These can then be appropriately stored cooled before being briefly heated up to serving temperature again in a water bath. This method is called “regeneration” and makes it possible to prepare food at less busy times then quickly make it available again when it is needed at a later point in time, without a loss of quality.

Another advantage is the high energy efficiency of professional cooking devices. Low energy consumption means that economical continuous operation is possible and even small quantities of food can be prepared at any time in a cost-effective manner and while maintaining excellent quality. All fusionchef cookers have a very high heating capacity of 2 Kw, which is noticeable in the heating phase and also with larger water volumes. As soon as the desired water temperature has been reached, the device pulses with 100 watt to keep the temperature uniform.