Can Cinder, the World's Most Precise Griddle, Replace Sous-Vide? | Hacker News Reader

Can Cinder, the World's Most Precise Griddle, Replace Sous-Vide?

seriouseats.com

62 pointsDoubleguitars35 comments

Sous-vide is amazing but I can't believe how expensive they typically are.

Because I couldn't believe it, I built my own for $45 using weird things from amazon. It didn't even take any electrical work or programming and can be setup in about a minute:

Cheap fish tank pump: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EWENKXO

Cheap hot plate: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005T0SN0K

And the star of the show, a temperature modulator with a standard plug: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00V4TJR00

Put a pot of water on the hot plate, insert fish tank pump, plug hot plate into the Willhi. Put your meat into a regular ziplock bag, leaving it open, dip it into the water. The pressure of the water will cause the air to leave the bag, creating a vacuum (you can find many demonstrations of this technique on youtube). Clip the bag to the side of the pot using some clothes pins. Bam! DYI sous vide.

Generally it maintains the temperature within +/- 1 degree Fahrenheit, which is good enough for a rare steak. I had this incredibly dangerous coffee heating element at first, which could keep the temperature within 0.1 degree, but decided it was too dangerous to be worth it: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00V4TJR00

I then use a $25 Iwatani torch to char the surface: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BBJC1CY

As opposed to most butane cooking torches, this one seems to produce a large hot flame about 20 centimeters long and the diameter of a quarter.

Not to take away from this griddle or anything, but I'm pretty psyched about my sous vide machine and it was too easy to make just to not tell everyone that will listen.

Some units now are only $100ish, especially on sale :D

If you have the tinkering aptitude DYI is definitely way to go. These sous vide machines are really basic components. But most people want something that works outta the box and looks pretty. Ha ha, business!

That's an improvement, but I still don't see why they should cost more than a decent crock pot. Hell, my crock pot cost $50 and it actually came with a thermometer probe that plugs into the base and reads out on the front panel. You could practically turn it into a sous-vide cooker with a factory firmware swap.

That's awesome :) Chef Steps on YouTube show some examples of them just using ziplock baggies and a simple thermometer, so I tried that and it worked fine. Took some fiddling with my stovetop -- I had to use the weakest burner on the lowest setting to get one of the temperatures I needed, but it worked!

That can totally work. I also cooked salmon with nothing but hot tap water at the office, it turns out most taps are around 118F which is low temp salmon! (of course you should decide for yourself if you're ok eating food cooked below USDA guidelines)

The main thing the DIY version doesn't have is a circulator, so in a larger pot for a bigger cook, you'll have a temperature gradient across the water bath.

But it definitely works. I've even reheated precooked frozen food while camping buy heating water to some temperature, pouring it into a cooler to prevent too much temperature drop, and putting in the precooked, still vacuum sealed bags into the cooler, and letting it sit there for an hour or two.

The temperature change was maybe five degrees over those two hours, but it was for reheating, and would have been fine for some foods as well. Kenji also has an article about sous vide in your kitchen sink, where you don't have to buy anything at all, though it only really works for shorter cooks and you won't have precise temperature control.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2013/06/video-how-to-cook-your-st...

This design uses an $8 fish tank pump as a circulator.

Good catch. I missed that.

so simple diy setup..

some questions:

first two links:

   And the star of the show, a temperature modulator with a standard plug: http://..

and

     but decided it was too dangerous to be worth it: http://..

were the same: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00V4TJR00 ; was this intentional?

second, does that little water pump handle the heat?

lastly, did you just bend up the heating element and place it directly in the water?

I assume he's using the hotplate as-is with a large pan of water on top and the thermostat controlling power to the hotplate and the temperature probe in the water.

If Steve could continue to be a Cool Guy (sorry!) and confirm that would be wonderful because I've just been to Amazon to try and create a similar set-up.

Another implementation question: does the pump need a pipe connected to it, or is it sufficient as-is?

For those in the UK, here's what I ordered: Pump - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00BVK966C Thermostat - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00BVYCZ84 Hot plate - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00A4DE35G

Yes, it is all frighteningly cheap and I'm not going to leave it running unattended!

Yes that's it, the hot plate is being used as a normal hot plate, but its power is being controlled by the thermocouple.

The pump is used as is, fully submersed in the water with no tubes. All it does is agitate the water to make the heating more evenly dispersed.

Your setup looks good, I was going to buy a similar control unit to yours until I found the Willhi version that just used regular outlets. The thing with this box is you have to do a little bit of wiring work to set it up. Turned out to be cheaper for me to buy the already assembled outlet version than the components for it.

I think you can already find tutorials online about people connecting this non-outlet style of thermocouple to a slow cooker to make a sous vide. That was my original plan until I sleuthed out this cheaper design. So check those tutorials out.

The best thing about sous vide is that you can "set it and forget it", you should thoroughly leave it unattended because it's so amazingly convenient.

That was a mistake, the second link should be this crappy heating element: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VK0DRY

The water pump has been fine so far after maybe 10 hours of being immersed over a few weeks, I figure if it gives up I'll get another one.

I put a pot on top of a hot plate. The hot plate is turned on but the Willhi unit turns the power on and off. At first it overheats the water by about 10 degrees, so give it time to heat up before immersing the food, but after cooling down it oscillates around 1 degree Fahrenheit.

Before the hot plate, I had that coffee element which I taped to the side of the pot. The problem with that previous heater was that despite saying "immersion", you can't submerse the cable without electrifying the water. The thing got banned in Canada. Don't buy one.

J Kenji's articles on Serous Eats are phenomenal. It's what got me started sous vide cooking, as well thinking about cooking in a whole new way.

I highly recommend anyone who hasn't read any of his stuff to do so, regardless of whether you like to cook or not.

His new book is also great.

Can you please link to some "highlights"? Some must-reads from seriouseats? I like Kenji too, but I only started following him just recently.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/08/the-food-lab-complete-gui...

http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/02/the-best-buffalo-...

This one made the news when it came out, because it's totally fun and great:

http://aht.seriouseats.com/archives/2010/05/the-burger-lab-h...

Everything rdw said, plus the following:

Steaks: http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/06/food-lab-complete-guide-t...

Chicken: http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/07/the-food-lab-complete-gui...

The older versions of these articles were what sold me a few years ago. (He keeps updating them as new technology/research comes out.)

Here's a popular one from a few years back that relates to this story: "Cook Your Meat in a Beer Cooler: The World's Best (and Cheapest) Sous-Vide Hack" - http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/04/cook-your-meat-in-a-beer-...

Answer from article: No

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...

"Entering the fray next year is the Cinder, a countertop cooking device that promises to deliver sous-vide-level precision without the bags and the water bath."

I've been critical before on technology solving home as opposed to commercial cooking, this statement alone using a technical approach to avoid waste of water and removal of plastic from cooking is fantastic.

"Sous-vide cooking excels at tenderizing typically tough cuts while maintaining juiciness through prolonged, often multi-day cooks that break down connective tissue while also conveniently storing released juices in its bag."

Why is a sous-vide better than a pressure cooker here?

Sous-vide is better for some dishes because the temperature is controlled, and generally low. If you want a rare steak, the temperature should be 120 F (http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/06/food-lab-complete-guide-t...). A pressure cooker, because it relies on steam, will always cook above 212 F. That's awesome for a lot of dishes (chili! http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/pressure-cook...), but for many meat preparations it's overcooking.

One dish that I have directly compared sous-vide against more traditional techniques is pork shoulder. My "traditional" technique is oven-cooking, a process that takes 6 hours at 325 F. In sous-vide, the shoulder takes longer, more like 24-72 hours, but the temperature is lower, 135 F (http://sousvidely.com/sous-vide-pulled-pork/). Also, it's in a bag. The sous-vide version is better in many ways -- it's got more juice and color and tastes fresher -- and it's way easier because I don't have to turn and baste it every 2 hours.

But yeah, I don't love the consumables of sous-vide. I reuse bags and water whenever I can.

thanks @rdw, that is a great explanation.

The test sounded promising vs sous vide.

I demand a Pepsi challenge.

I just can't believe this thing would end up as juicy being exposed to the air like that.

That is a good idea, I'll look into doing that!

In an article all about how precision cooking is changing the world:

> That said, precision isn't really needed when searing, just high heat.

Searing is just one step in the process.

I have a pricey high tech anova sous-vide circulator which is great for getting steaks to the perfect done-ness, then I use a decidedly low-tech $15 lodge cast iron pan to get that perfect finish.

Right tool for the job, etc etc.

You could use a blow torch for searing-- hell lot less hassle, and so much quicker.

Not enough new tech involved! Consider getting a Searzall to solve that problem: http://www.bookeranddax.com/searzall/

I have a blowtorch and a bought a Searzall for it. While it's a really cool device, I've found I prefer blowtorching my steaks normally as it provides a higher temperature.

I feel the Searzall works better for things like melting cheese, lightly toasting bread, or otherwise browning things without too much heat.

How does the blowtorch work for things like melting cheese, toasting bread, etc.? Or is that just not feasible?

edit: wait a minute, it seems that Searzall is basically just an addon to a normal blowtorch. So if you just take off the "Searzall" addon, you are left with a normal blowtorch. (Or am I misunderstanding something here? Please confirm!)

Yeah, exactly, the Searzall attaches to a blowtorch. It reduces the heat and spreads it out over a larger space.

For steaks, I prefer to get oil very hot in a cast iron, then put the steak in the cast iron, while torching each side for 30-45 seconds. (Also got that off a Kenji article.)

Searzall FTW

Searing is the easy part, it's getting the steak to medium rare thoroughly and consistently that's the precision part.

No question that a torch is an amazing tool for the ultimate high temp sear. We are going as high as we can in an electric device, shooting for 500F in the first version. However, the most interesting thing is that we've found there are some magical temperatures below that (500F), but above sous vide (212F) the higher end of the spectrum. For example, 365F lets you maillard unattended, giving amazing eggplant or grilled cheese. You can toast pine nuts or sweat garlic.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com