Or at least everyone should. The sous vide is wonderful and I
love it, especially since I snagged mine for $50 at Aldi. It’s the logical
answer to “What if I hate the way the slow cooker dries out my food but I still
need to cook in advance?” (Other people ask this question, don’t they?)(Also,
the slow cooker doesn’t really dry things out if you use the correct size but
David insists that some things taste like they came out of the deflavorizer so
I’m on the hunt for more ways to make dinner before I leave for work so I can
be lazy at night.)
I’ve used the sous vide to make yogurt and oatmeal for running-out-the-door-today
breakfasts that weren’t from McDonald’s. I’ve poached about 300 pounds of
chicken (really not exaggerating on this one, I used to work in a restaurant
that served a very popular chicken salad). It’s brilliant for fish, one of the
few things I’m legitimately still afraid to cook. I’ve made desserts in it,
including a fantastic black pepper-pineapple thing that was so, so good. It
makes perfect steaks and tender pork chops. And, if you really want to plan
ahead, it makes char siu that is better and more tender than anything I’ve had
lately in a Chinese restaurant.
Not gonna lie – this is not a quick-and-easy dish, as you
have to get it started pretty far in advance. And I can respect that fact that
most people’s kitchens aren’t going to have all these ingredients just laying
around (although mine did, and that’s a topic for a different post about condiment
hoarding). But given sufficient planning, this is utterly delicious and well
worth the relatively minimal actual effort. I made it right before we left on
vacation, and served it chopped up in bento boxes with soba noodles and vegetables
as an alternative to throwing ourselves on the mercy of roadside restaurants.
We ate the leftovers around the campfire later that night, but they would have
also been delicious thrown into some fried rice.
From Sous Vide For Everybody by America’s Test Kitchen, the same
people who bring you Cook’s Illustrated magazine in all its exhaustively detailed
glory.
Char Siu
4 lbs. boneless pork butt roast, trimmed and sliced
crosswise into ¾-inch steaks
1 cup soy sauce
1 cup sugar
¾ cup hoisin sauce
½ cup Shaoxing Chinese rice wine or dry sherry
¼ cup grated fresh ginger
2 tbsp toasted sesame oil
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp five-spice powder
½ tsp ground white pepper
¾ cup honey
Whisk the soy sauce, sugar, hoisin, rice wine, ginger,
sesame oil garlic, give-spice powder, and pepper together in a large bowl. Reserve
1 cup of the mixture and put in the fridge. Add the steaks, toss to coat, and
refrigerate, covered, for 10-16 hours.
Remove the steaks from the marinade and divide between two zipper-lock
freezer bags. Seal the bags, pressing out as much air as possible, and cook at
149 for 12-16 hours.
Whisk the honey and reserved marinade together in a medium
saucepan. Cook over medium heat until reduced to 1 cup, stirring frequently and
looking out for boil-overs. Boil-overs are sad and also a bitch to clean up
thanks to all the sugar.
Cover a baking sheet or broiler pan with foil and put a rack
on top of it, then spray with cooking spray. Transfer the steaks to the rack
and pat dry with paper towels. Brush the top of the steaks with a generous amount
of marinade and broil on high 2-6 minutes or until mahogany in color. Repeat on
the other side of the steaks.
Brush both sides of the steak with more marinade and broil
another 3-6 minutes until lightly charred. Transfer to a cutting board and let
rest for 10 minutes. Slice crosswise into ½-inch strips and serve.
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