Cookaholics Bulletin Board

Following some ideas in Ideas in Food, I tried some brussel sprouts. Dunked them in vinegar wash for a minute, brined them in 5% solution for about 10 (not even 100% sure why I did this), cut them in half and vac-packed them.

Put them in simmering water bath -- no SV equipment needed for this -- for about 20 minutes or so. Chilled. For the supper, warmed/browned (a little) them in butter. The only issues is that as they cook, there is space/air in the bag, so you have to weigh them down.

The were very nice. More "brussel sprout" flavour (considerably) then boiled ones, but no over-done cabbage flavour at all. Very lovely, I think this will become a regular. I do wish they were slightly brighter green (they weren't gray or anything near it); they hadn't lost a lot, just gone deeper green, but it bright green would be nice. Wil have to read back up on that.

Paul,

Thanks for sharing!

"Conventional wisdom" is that you can't cook green vegetables sous vide, although Joel Robuchon disputes this. I've not dug to find out exactly how he does it, but I'd be interested to know.

Amy

Ideas in Food also disputes this, at least for certain lengths of time ( which I was pushing with the brussel sprouts and why I cut them in half). They also have an extensive explanation of the browning effect, chemically speaking, and why big pot blanching works.

Robuchons method for brussel sprouts for conventional cooking are also un-conventional because they don't use a big pot. He does a small pot blanch, very short, dump and then slow simmer cook in a smallish pot, chill, then re-heated in butter, etc. It works well and is the method I normally use, but it is time and effort consuming. I'd love to read his thoughts on sous-vide.

I tried brussel sprouts also and loved them - there was a definite "pow" factor to the flavor. As I recall, the bags barely inflated.

On the other hand, when I looked in on some broccoli the other day, I thought I had a helium balloon pouch that was ready to take off to the moon! The pouch was totally inflated and the broccoli was not particularly appealing to the eye (dark green). There must be some type of gas that is released when the broccoli is cooked that gets trapped in the pouch.

Do you think steaming them for 1-2 minutes before putting them in the pouches would make any difference either in terms of releasing the "mystery" gas or sealing in a more healthy looking color?

Gerard

According to my reading, the color should actually get stronger and better for the first 5 minutes, so ideally you could get your cooking time down to that (by controlling size). I can certainly steam broccoli in 5 minutes, not sure about sous-vide. I'm gonna go back and read some more on the gas, and if a quick "steam" blanch would seem to work.

Gerard,

I had the same experience. The broccoli was awful. Not an experiment I'd soon repeat.

Amy