right…i also use instant hot water to start so the lead up time is minimal
Not sure why it takes you 45 min to get the water bath temp up. My hot tap water is about 110 - 115 and I get to 145 in about 4 min… to 165 in another 4 or 5.
One technique I’ve used for low temp eggs is to drop them in boiling water for a minute or two to set the soft white and then out into the sous vide bath. You get the textured white and perfect yolks without the runny soft white. found it on Serious Eats if I recall… a hard core Kenji scientific compare of times temps and methods.
Nice! I’ll have to try that next time.
Haven’t been reaching for the sous vide much recently due to mobility issues. Once I can walk again later this month I’ll give it a whirl.
It wasn’t ‘a bit of snot’ - it was, as I said, two giant globs of snot, as in the entirety of both eggs was snot
Here is the link
Here’s Joule’s useful “Egg Calculator”:
My hot water tank is set fairly high, so I just use hot water from the tap and it takes only a few short min to get up to 135 (porkchop temp)
What temp were you cooking the eggs at? There is a large difference in egg texture with only a few degrees. If the yolks were not set it sounds like the temp was low. 149 degrees F is my favorite yolk temp but the whites are pointless. Chilling the eggs and then boiling for one or two minutes (depending on how cold the eggs are) will firm the whites but retain the yolk texture. I like to separate the yolk and spread it on bread for a sandwich instead of mayo and then do a hard fry on the whites and add them to the sandwich. Just made some tonight with smoked salmon, sautéed asparagus and that egg prep, it is worth repeating.
That is a really bad recipe for cooking eggs with a circulator, almost takes away any reason to cook eggs this way. The temp is way to high and the time to short.
THAT is an excellent idea. Thanks Michael!
That is actually one of the most common ways to do it Rob, although not in restaurants since it has a shorter margin for error. High/short or low/long can get you pretty much the same texture.
My point is that with a circulator you are going for a set core temp, especially with eggs. Overshooting that temp in hopes of having the core coast into the desired temperature is a pretty imprecise technique. I know they were trying to set the whites more but there are better ways to do it.
If I understand what you are trying to say Rob, that is not precisely correct. Unlike a steak, where you are trying to achieve a specific core temperature (at least practically speaking*), an egg will continue to cook even after its core has reach a specific equilibrium temperature in the range we are talking about. Time is a critical variable for cooking a sous vide egg. You can’t just put an egg in a water bath and leave it there. You can see this very clearly illustrated in Kenji’s article that someone linked below (and the Joule Egg Calculator that I linked to takes this into account). As he notes, many chefs, for example Alex Talbot and Aki Kamozawa of Ideas in Food, cook sous vide eggs high and fast.
*Actually, the same holds true for steaks and eggs, but the differences over time are much less noticeable for steaks.
The reason there is so much debate online about how to do something seemingly as simple as sous vide cooking an egg is that the devil is in the details. Each cook needs to find the right time and temperature that reproducibly works for them (taking into account their egg source, egg age, starting temperature, water circulation, and post-cook handling). Any “recipe” is just a starting place to figure out what works in your kitchen.
Which is why Todd ended up with snot!
I once took a sous vide cooking class given by Shola Olunloyo, who I think is the best chef in Philly. He spends a lot of time consulting for biomedical equipment manufacturers on how to convert their laboratory tools for use by chefs. His kitchen always makes me laugh, since it looks a lot like my lab at work, although the products are a lot more tasty. The last part of the class was spend cooking and cracking open numerous eggs. I didn’t want to eat an egg for a month afterwards!
Thanks for the reply, I am in agreement on your points. I wasn’t trying to say that eggs could be left in the bath at that temp with no difference in outcome, but they can stay in for at least an hour if you are cooking at core temp and still be perfect. What I was trying to say was that I think most people low temp eggs for the difference in texture they can achieve in the yolks. With a circulator it would be easier and much more precise to cook the yolk to your desired temp, chill the egg and then set the white either with simmering water for a few minutes or leave the white soft. (I have never tried steaming eggs for a few minutes after they have been chilled, bet that might work well). Having a piece of equipment that will let you cook to a tenth of a degree and then setting the temp around twenty degrees higher than the temp you are going for doesn’t seem like the most reliable way to get consistent results. At that temp timing will definitely become a issue and that, to me, seems to be removing one of the main benefits of using a circulator.
Thanks for letting me know of Shola Olunloyo, I will try to eat there next time I’m in Philly, the food looks great!
FWIW - this morning’s breakfast… 2 eggs boiled for 7 minutes… in ice water for 1:30… shells came off clean and easy… yolks jammy and warm… whites completely set but not rubbery. Maybe 15 minutes from walking into the kitchen to eating. I am a fan of sous vide eggs when I have time… but a rolling boil is useful too.
https://www.studiokitchen.com/taste/
Tickets go fast for his infrequent dinners.
Although he’ll probably ban me for posting a link. He hates social media coverage. ![[smileyvault-ban.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/4/426cc97ad8dd530c8304b0918ca75ff841d4d950.gif "[smileyvault-ban.gif]")
Chefsteps has the Joule on sale for $129 today.
LOL, I was just about to post that. I’m buying a second one. Definitely the Ferrari of home immersion circulators (assuming you don’t mind using an smartphone app to turn it on/off).
They also just released a UK version of Joule.
Same price on amazon today as well