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Floating fat

nick.pmallon

I notice when I add duck fat into my bags for sous vide, after being in the water bath, the fat rises to the top of the bags and the protein sits in the bottom. I've tried melting the fat and then pouring it into the bag then chilling it so in encompasses the protein, tried adding way more fat, but still, when it melts again it rises to the top of the bag. I'm worried this won't give me the consistency i'm looking for especially when going for the confit texture.

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Patrick_Ancillotti_6135

What temp are you cooking at? How much duck fat?

Chris_Young_80640

@Nick Don't stress about the fat. It doesn't matter for the confit. Indeed, cooking in fat is pretty irrelevant to the final texture of a confit, which depends on the time and temperature you cook the duck leg at. All that's needed to transform a simple cooked duck leg into a confit duck leg is an oily coating of fat on the surface. So long as you have just enough fat in the bag to heavily anoint the surface of the meat, you're fine.

Most people don't believe this at all, but oil doesn't diffuse through the surface of food while its cooking. Only as the surface cools after cooking does the surrounding oil seep in—and not very far. The wetness of the meat stops diffusing fat molecules in their tracks. Ultimately, the oil doesn't go much further than a small fraction of an inch into the meat's interior (because I hang in the company of huge food and technology nerds, we've actually used an MRI to check this).

But oil coating the surface and penetrating a fraction of an inch into the surface is enough to make confit taste like, well, confit. That's because it's the fat at the surface that counts when we taste and chew.

nick.pmallon

@neogenix I'm cooking turkey legs and thighs at 63c for 24hrs. I've tried anywhere from 2T of fat to 1/2c. But the temp doesn't seem to matter, it seems to happen regardless of temperature.

@Chris wow, that's very informative. All this time, I've been told to make sure the protein was covered in quite a bit of fat to make sure it would confit properly. But then I noticed most of the fat floating in the top of the bag. Knowing what you've told me might save me a little $ in rendered duck fat as well! Unless I need it in there for when the protein cools.

seijoed

@Chris are you able to publish the fat / brining tables I've seen? I.e how little effect in what really goes in over time?

Chris_Young_80640

@seijoed I'm working on some lectures and info on brining for sous vide today. We should be putting them into the course next week. Hope that will suffice.

@Nick you really just need a small amount of oil coating the surface as it cool. So shaking the bag a few times as it cools to coat the surface with oil as it thickens back into fat is enough.

Chris_Young_80640

@Nick BTW, your problem is going to happen regardless of the cooking temperature. As soon as the fat melts and becomes liquid oil, buoyancy will take over and oil will rise to the top of the package and the relatively dense aqueous cooking juices will settle to the bottom.