Go to the Recipe: Sous Vide Chicken Breast
No brine? Will it benefit from an equilibrium brine?
It’ll benefit, but I suspect that since this recipe was targeted at “weekday dinner,” it was let go in this case.
You could also just put it into the brine in the bag while it's cooking. If you don't want to wait for an equilibrium brine a higher concentration brine for an hour produces a juicy bird
arent you supposed to presear the chicken breast?
For the searing of the skin, would you start at low temperature and increase or go full heat? Wouldn't the skin, with no fat, stick to the pan then? Or is non-stick pans needed?
Just a small correction on the second paragraph: "(...) then serve up 'em with (...)" should actually be "(...) then serve 'em up with (...)".
Looking for some tips on getting ultra crispy skin. I've tried high heat and the skin burns before it's rendered out. I've tried low heat to no avail. I've considered taking the skin off, frying/baking it separately until crisp and then just adding it to the colorless chicken but that's not ideal.
Thoughts?
Oooh, thanks!! Fixing now!
You can, but you don't have to. If you pre-sear it, you'll get lots of delicious Maillard reaction flavors cooking together with the chicken in the bag. But because a chicken breast is a pretty small product, you also run the risk of over-cooking it if you sear it twice. A quick post-sear is usually enough to build up some nice browning and flavor before serving. So it's kinda up to you! Confusing?
How long could you hold the chicken?
Karen's correct it's up to you but....I super-chill my chicken breasts with skin-on and then sear quickly on all sides in a hot cast iron pan with a bit of clarified butter or rendered chicken fat that I've saved from something else. If the meat is truly cold when it goes into the pan, you're not likely to start any sort of internal cooking. Re-chill and then vacuum/ziploc, cook and then re-sear even quicker than the first time. Golden and crispy, works every time.
You could (as anything you do) but, to me, chicken is that kind of meat that has amazing flavour on its one. It's, sousvide cooked, the best meat.
once again,less is more.
Brining poultry has the benefit of seasoning throughout, with the downside (for something as tender as a chicken breast) of gelling certain proteins and firming the texture slightly. From comments Grant has made on past videos, I think it is more or less the official Chefsteps position not to brine chicken breasts, since they are so small, and surface seasoning is effective.
Do you mean in the bath? You could hold them there for up to two hours. Here's more guidance on that topic: http://www.chefsteps.com/activities/sous-vide-time-and-temperature-guide
You're welcome
Amazing and the best? I want to buy chickens where you buy chickens! In my area, chickens are either tasteless or expensive.
Portugal, sorry...
It's my opinion, so it's as relevant as any other. But when it comes to texture and plain and clean taste, it's amazing and the one I like the most. But I'll admit I may be the only one thinking that.
2€ a pound. And I'm refering to the organic/field chickens.
Maybe a torch?
brine the chicken overnight, remove from brine. sous vide at 148 for 2 hours, chill. remove from bag, rinse. heat up a pan with a little oil. season skin, and sear for a minute. Put in a 450 degree oven for 8 minutes. remove, serve.
Also the health department wants us to sous vide chicken to 165 and chill, then bring back up to 165 to order.
adding the chicken fat that floats to the top of a chicken stock adds amazing flavor.
I believe that pan searing and finishing it in the oven worked best for me. I'm not too thrilled with sous vide chicken breast. Maybe it's because I'm fairly new to it. Much to learn I have.
take the skin off scrape the fat of the skin, then place the skin in between baking sheet and place in between 2 baking tray in the oven at 350 for 5-8 minutes check regulary should be perfectly crisp
I tried the pre-sear approach adam described and it worked perfectly. Thanks for the tip
I have taken to removing the skin and baking separately pressed between parchment sheets and two baking sheets nested to keep the skin from curling. Yields a nice crispy chip that is perfect for accent garnish. Works great with salmon skin, too.
Is there any alternative to using a plastic bag to cook in?
Hmm, I can not think of one and I actually spent a good 3 minutes thinking about it. Sous Vide requires water and to "cook in water without boiling your food, you are going to need to contain it in some medium that allows heat transfer from the water to the chicken with out it coming into contact with the water itself.
Crazy idea - can't you just use oil instead of water and heat the oil directly with the 'sous vide' heater?
Does anyone know where I can but those stack-able sieves that they're using to strain the stock in this video?
I live in the UK, but I guess I'm looking to see if they go by a specific name.
Straining large quantities of stock always ends up being a nightmare for me using my usual chinois.
Kind regards,
John
I think the answer is yes. You can use butter, oil, beer even.
It would be a lot of oil and a mess to clean up. But people have used beer in a sous vide to cook sausages for a huge party, and i think the french laundry used to have a butter sous vide tank for poaching lobster.
Actually, if you start off with a dry skin (a simple kitchen towel will accomplish that), it will crisp up beautifully and dry further, thus unsticking from the pan automatically.
Of course having a non-stick pan is an added advantage, but again, the key is having a relatively dry skin.
That's brilliant ! How long and at what temp?
Yes, you could use oil and perhaps add some aromatic ingredients that go well with chicken. This is called 'poêler'. Actually your question inspired me to try it with my chicken fat which I skimmed off the stock I recently made. Will add lemon zest and ginger, perhaps rosemary - could be something.
Hey, I would love to know this also
Check out what I did with my sous vide oven, chicken and... beer! https://ilariantaste.wordpress.com/2015/03/24/sous-vide-stout-chicken-reduced-fat-hummus-beetroot-hummus-steamed-buttery-spinach/ Ciao :-)
Nice blog, Ilaria!
Does anyone have a good technique for applying this to a restaurant? I can't wait and hour per order obviously. Bath, chill, rebath, sear? Timing?
You can do them before service. Before service set them to a slightly lower temp, put in more than a few, when you have used a few, put in a few, try to set up a system to keep them in order, so you always use the ones who have been there the longest.
Wiah I could view it. Apparently has been removed.
Hi Mike
I have been doing a sousvides sous glass in a 1.9l mason jar. I use a brake line pump and a mason jar sealer to get a vacuum in the jar then use my immersion circulator set to 140 for 2 hours...works great
Run it as a special and have a bunch in the bath ready to have skin crisped and served. 86 the special when you're out. They should keep for 4 hours without too much change in texture.
This sounds dangerous. Why lower the temp? Safety relies on time and temp. Kinda defeats the purpose to bring it up to "serving temp" quickly as you'll over cook the outer layers doing it this way.
You can use plain water but it will leach flavor from the meat. Or you could flavor the water, brine putting a different flavor into the meat I have poached fish in butter using a therma pen on the stove top which came out very nice. The beauty of the plastic bag is you can use minimal amount of butter, brine or spices and keep the natural juices and flavor on the target as its cooking. Concentrated flavor!
Please post video on this, it makes no sense. Glass has no give so getting a vacuum in a jar would provide nothing toward cooking sous vide.
Thai pea velouté, 62 degree chicken, crispy egg and crackling, coconut foam
I'm new to this. My first sous vide chicken breasts are in the pot now.
This is a nice-looking site with a lot of good information, but how good? I have questions just from this one page.
The recipe says to use a cooking temperature of 140 °F / 60 °C. However, as the comment below, and my own research, show, health authorities recommend a minimum temperature for poultry of 165 °F., or around 74 °C! I've pushed my temperature up to 65 °C. I may go higher. These recipes ought to take food safety more seriously. It's not good to poison a newbie with a dangerous cooking temperature, especially with all of the news lately of chicken (at least in the U.S.) being loaded with antibiotic-resistant bacteria..
Next, I question the scaling instructions. Is the timing really linear? If one breast takes 1 hour, do 2 really take 2 hours, and 4, 4 hours? Microwave cooking time is mostly linear, but sous vide? That doesn't make sense.
I appreciate the comments. Most, if not all, of the commentators here are far more accomplished chefs than I can ever hope to be, but some of the comments are a bit offputting. I, at least, don't have the patience to cook my chicken, cool it, and heat it back up, not to mention cooking it sous vide, in a pan, and in the oven. Too much work.
165 is the temperature at which Chicken is sterilized instantly, thus you know it is safe to eat as soon as the center reaches that temp. Pasteurization actually begins at about 126.5 though, you just have to cook it for longer; pasteurization time/temp follows a logarithmic decay curve. At 140 you're good after like 45 minutes (less actually, but you have to account for the time it takes for the meat to come to temp). I have no idea what various local health department requirements are for restaurants, but if you are home cooking there is no reason to sous vide chicken higher than like 62.5 C.
As to scaling, once the meat is at temp, cooking time doesn't actually change. Depending on your cooking device, it will likely take longer to get the meat up to temp as more energy needs to be transferred from the heating element to the water bath and ultimately to the meat, but I have no idea what the graph on that looks like.
Finally, you don't need to chill and reheat. Searing adds flavor and texture though, so I usually just dry off whatever I'm cooking and sear it quickly in a cast iron pan or with a torch.
Please, let me know, how the skin can be crispy if it is cooked into water? To me, and forgive me, obviously I´m not a professional chef... so I deem that the skin would turn out to be soft as if it would be like boiled. Thank you !
Read step 4.
Wow you do make some fast and loose judgement calls. My god no one here wants to
poison you but your rudeness wouldnt make me sad if it happened.
Chefsteps provides you with very safe and concise methods to using a sous vide method for
home cooking. Should you not trust them go elsewhere but dont make assumptions and
rude remarks. You at least have stated that you are not a professional, but I cant help but wonder why
you seem to imply that you know more then a pro then?
If you find the comments"offputting' perhaps you might want to consider that you doing
what you have done is completely off putting and find somewhere else to go for
your information.
Might want to have a look at this if you're afraid for your safety:
It's worth diving into Dave Arnold's primer on the subject: (http://www.cookingissues.com/index.html%3Fp=6.html)
Where did the blog go??
Worked pretty perfect for me, I just seasoned with salt & a bit of lemon juice...and it really didn't need much more, it tasted great.
This recipe works great, I made the warm potato salad to go with it; I even made my own home made grainy mustard for the potato salad. Thank you Chef Steps for a great recipe.
First time Sous Vide cooking here! Had fun setting everything up... However! I was worried 140F would be too "soft" texture for me, so, according to the table provided, I upped the temp to 149F and cooked for 60 minutes. In hind-sight, I think this overcooked the chicken? The chicken was chewy and a bit tough. On the next go-around, I'm planning on doing 140-145F for 90 minutes. Will the additional cooking time help break down the protein, so it is not so chewy?
Would this work for a boneless turkey breast as well?
I generally use a slightly higher temperature (143F) and cook the chicken breast 50 minutes and then I pop them into a 500 degree convection oven on a cold skillet skin side up for 4-5 minutes to crisp the skin. And yes, this recipe works perfectly for turkey breasts, but the time in the sous vide water bath must increase if you have a seven pound turkey breast. For Cornish game hens I decrease the temperature slightly to 137F and for wild pheasant I just increase the cooking time by 50%. Increasing sous vide cooking time costs nothing as far as food quality goes, but can offer an added layer of protection from pathogens.
143F for 50 minutes or longer. No knives will be needed to cut those breasts. Chicken breasts can never be to soft if they are appropriately cooked. I strive for a beef tenderloin consistency.
Do people put salt and pepper on the chicken before the sous vide? I know it says add afterwards but just wondering if it would help/hurt to add it before... thanks!
Yeah, it will make a difference. Salt extracts fluids, and thus adding the salt before cooking sous vide it will eventually act like a sort of brine, removing some of the liquid.
Köszönöm! Tökéletes a recept. A fiaim szeretik. Gyakrabban kérik mint ezelőtt bármikor. Kiváló, könnyű vacsora.
Hello!!
Thanks for your post, it's really interesting. I have a few questions about chicken sousvide process so if anyone can help me with that i would really appreciate.
I usually sear in the pan the chicken breast before sealing and placing it inside the bath. That way when the cook is finish after an hour i can eat directly without no need to use a pan. Isn't recommend this option?
I usually cook one or two kilograms of chicken at the same time to have enough for the week. My question is, can I freeze the chicken in the bag after cooking it? I usually wait an hour after the bath finishes to have enough time to let it cool and then i put it on the freezer. Do you know how long can be the chicken (inside the bag) be stored in the fridge after been cooked if we decide not to freeze it?
Do you have any particular ingredient rather than just oil, salt an pepper that could be added inside the bag and make it be more tasty? I've tried with lemon zest and the flavor is really good, but i am looking for any other alternative.
Thanks for your help!
This is some kind of magic. There must be some kind of voodoo involved or something. I just did this with my Sansaire Sous Vide and the chicken was the most tender, juicy piece of poultry I have ever tasted. No need for sauce, or seasoning, or anything! Just some black pepper and salt. If you haven't tried this, you need to try it!
Gosh I had my chicken at 150 for 1:45 and they were rubbery. What was wrong?
Perhaps the heat was a bit too high and the length a bit too long, 140F for 1 hour works really well for me. Adding 10 degrees and an extra 45 minutes might be the cause.
Lesley Davies, I read FRXL's remarks, and no way did I deem them rude...just straight forward questions. Please don't discourage people who question the how's and why's of a process; that's how people learn, and are won by new and unfamiliar concepts. I would be more concerned if folks didn't ask questions, but just blindly followed the advice of strangers. Please, don't consider them rude when people ask specific questions, based on what is commonly taught and considered to be safe!
I did this, and my chicken turned out with a weird unpleasant "chickeny" flavor, like how some chicken smells before hand. I bet it is because I am not buying expensive high quality chicken, but is there any thoughts on how i can circumvent this with the cheap chicken i buy?
You seem to be alone in this..... There is a way to ask questions but that was not it...
I didn't think he was rude either.
The only times I've had rubbery chicken in sous vide was when I tried to cook the chicken in a liquid like a marinade. Make sure there isn't any liquid in the bag. One exception I know of is that I do cook chicken poached in olive oil. You can try this. I have good results. Just a little bit of olive oil in the bag will work.
" skin side with oil added"
you mean without?
I ran mine today with some Trader Joes Curry Chicken Cutlets. They were vac sealed but I got nervous and transferred it to a bag. Cooked for 2 hours at 150F. The inside of a few pieces seemed kind of pink. It was crazy but looked like some light pink. Was the marinade an issue? It was a thick curry sauce, Any idea? All of our chicken has been great up until this.
I guess it can be said that regardless of what media one is using to comment or questions a post.... it really doesn't state or dictate the tone or anger of one's comments. Having said that I guess the correct reply if one feels a comment is off color or rude is to ask if the instructions were incorrect or depending on the size of the breast it might take a little longer to cook. Just saying not being critical.... sincerely the newb!
What?
No, it wasn't a problem with anything. Sounds about right. It's not undercooked. You're fine.
Ummm, your post is the only place "skin side with oil added" appears.
"These recipes ought to take food safety more seriously. It's not good to poison a newbie with a dangerous cooking temperature, especially with all of the news lately of chicken (at least in the U.S.) being loaded with antibiotic-resistant bacteria.." accusing ChefSteps of giving people dangerous cooking instructions, so dangerous that they might poison people, isn't rude? What wouldn't have been rude was to request an explanation of why the cooking temperature was so low, but that's not what @FRXL did. This individual just accused them of propagating a recipe/cooking method that is unsafe, and that food safety is not a concern of ChefSteps. The questions were not rude. The accusations were.
Sorry been gone for a while, like a degree or two lower. You'll only add new ones so they won't stay there for more than 1-2 hours.
I am new to this way of cooking. I cool my food down below 40°for within 6 hrs is the time line. I would put your sealed bag in a ice bath and get it under 80°for within 2 hours. Then put it in the freezer. You should be ok for 4 to 6 months. It helps with freezer burn if there's oil or a sauce in the bag.
Maybe they updated the time and temp recently but the recipe I am seeing says
"Cook for 55 minutes at 149 °F" - I am wondering why all these post are talking about higher/lower temps and longer times. I also have to remind myself that when the bath is at the proper temp, it will drop for a while until the circulator compensates for the meat being put in. Start the time when the bath is back at the proper temp.
