What Is Sous Vide Cooking? How to Sous Vide and Easy Sous Vide Short Rib Recipe

Sous vide (pronounced soo-VEED) is a cooking technique of placing raw ingredients in a vacuum-sealed bag, then immersing the bag in a circulating water bath heated to a precise temperature. Sous vide, which is French for “under vacuum,” is the name of the process, but many people also refer to the immersion circulator devices that heats the water as a “sous vide.”

While sous vide cooking generally takes longer than cooking food on a stovetop or in an oven, it has some distinct advantages over these methods.

1. 1. It’s impossible to overcook. Food overcooks when the internal temperature extends beyond the point that the food is cooked, resulting in mushy vegetables or dry, rubbery meat. Because a sous vide uses a low temperature, and maintains that precise temperature over a long period of time (unlike a crockpot or slow cooker), it’s easy to get your preferred level of doneness without guesswork or overcooking.
2. 2. Sous vide cooking is low maintenance. With a sous vide cooker, there’s no stirring, flipping, or tossing: your food is in contact with both your heat source and your seasonings on all sides. This means that you can literally “set and forget” your immersion circulator, making sous vide a great way to cook when entertaining.
3. 3. Sous vide is a healthy cooking method. Because your food is vacuum sealed, sous vide recipes often require less oil, fat, and salt than traditional cooking methods like sautéing or frying. Slow cooking methods also preserve more nutrients in many foods, resulting in more nutritious meals.
4. 4. Sous vide requires less cleanup. Because sous vide doesn’t require any pots or pans, cleaning up after sous vide cooking is easy: simply plate your food, toss your sous vide bags, and you’re done. In addition, you can often cook sous vide on your countertop, leaving your stovetop and oven free for other dishes.
5. 5. You can cook multiple recipes in the same pot. Because each vacuum bag is self contained, you can potentially cook multiple dishes or variations on the same meal all at once in the same water bath. This is especially convenient when cooking for people with dietary restrictions or food allergies.

The process of sous vide cooking with an immersion circulator is relatively straightforward. Many people associate the best sous vide cooking with steak, since the resulting meat is perfectly juicy, so we’ll use a ribeye steak to demonstrate the sous vide process.

1. 1. Prepare your water bath. Fill a large pot with enough water to cover the amount of food you are cooking. (If the immersion circulator manufacturer has a recommended sous vide water level, use that.) Place the immersion circulator inside the pot according to the instructions, and begin preheating the water. The water should always be preheated before placing any food into the bath, especially when cooking meat; if the bath is not properly preheated, it can hold food at an unsafe temperature, resulting in the growth of harmful bacteria.
2. 2. Season your steak. Season your ribeye steak as you normally would, with salt, pepper, butter, oil, and even some whole herbs. Place the steak and other seasonings into your plastic bag. Think of this as similar to a marinade, but instead of marinating before cooking, a sous vide cooker marinates and cooks at the same time.
3. 3. Seal your sous vide bag. If you don’t have a vacuum sealer, you can use a resealable plastic bag for your sous vide. To seal the bag almost as well as a vacuum seal, use the water in your pot to your advantage: close the bag almost all the way, leaving about one inch unsealed. Slowly lower the bag in the water, stopping right at the top edge of the bag. The pressure of the water will force most of the air out of the bag. Use a binder clip or clothespin to attach the bag to the side of the pot, just in case it isn’t sealed completely.
4. 4. Sous vide your steak. For a medium rare doneness, we recommend cooking your ribeye at 134ºF for one to four hours. For more specific cooking instructions, refer to the manufacturer's recommendations, or consult our guidelines below.
5. 5. Finish your steak in a pan. Once time is up, take the bag out of the bath and cut or unseal it to remove the meat. While a sous vide steak will come out perfectly cooked, it will not have the same sear and crust as a steak cooked over a stove or grill. To get this added flavor and texture, finish the steak before serving by heating a cast iron pan with some canola oil, safflower oil, or butter on high heat until the pan is very hot, then searing for about a minute on each side.

A sous vide is also great for cooking vegetables, specifically hardier, less delicate vegetables. For instance, a sous vide can cook potatoes to tender perfection for making smashed potatoes or potato salads. Carrots are also delicious cooked in a sous vide, with butter added to the bag to create delicious, soft carrots. Other vegetables that can be cooked using a sous vide include beets, leeks, artichokes, squash and pumpkins, fennel, brussels sprouts, artichokes, and asparagus.

Here are some general sous vide cooking times and temperatures for various foods. Note that cooking times and temperatures may vary depending on the size of your steak and the immersion circulator device you’re using.

Again, it’s difficult to overcook food using the sous vide method. When in doubt, use the minimum cooking time as a guide and play it safe by cooking about 20 minutes longer.

Beef Steaks (Including Ribeye, Tenderloin, Chops, and T-Bone)

• Temperature: 120ºF (rare), 134ºF (medium rare), 140ºF (medium), 150ºF (medium well), 160ºF or higher (well done).
• Time: 1 to 4 hours for a 1-inch thick steak; 3 to 6 hours for a two-inch steak.

Beef Spareribs

• Temperature: 134ºF
• Time: 24-72 hours

Pork Tenderloin or Pork Chops

• Temperature: 134ºF
• Time: 90 minutes to 7 hours

Boneless Chicken Breast

• Temperature: 146ºF
• Time: 1-4 hours

Duck Breast

• Temperature: 134ºF
• Time: 90 minutes to 5 hours

Fish Fillet (Including Tuna, Salmon, Bass, and Snapper)

• Temperature: 126ºF
• Time: 20-30 minutes

Lobster

• Temperature: 140ºF
• Time: 45-60 minutes

Root Vegetables (Potatoes, Carrots, Beets, Etc.)

• Temperature: 183ºF
• Time: 1-3 hours

Tender Vegetables (Asparagus, Broccoli, Green Beats, Squash, Etc.)

• Temperature: 183ºF
• Time: 30-90 minutes