Sous Vide is a popular technique of cooking, also referred to as low-temperature long-time cooking (LTLT in short). It is a procedure in which the food is put inside a plastic pouch or glass jar and cooked in water. The food is usually cooked more than its normal times but at a regulated temperature.
Depending on the food, the cooking time may vary from hours to even days! Similarly, the temperature may also depend on the food. The point of Sous Vide is to keep your food cooked evenly, all while still having the moisture.
Best Alternative for Sous Vide Plastic
Plenty of users don’t seem to be comfortable using plastic in Sous Vide. Moreover, most of these users don’t like their food to come into contact with any type of plastic. While they may have different reasoning for it, most of them seem to think that plastic can directly harm their food.
In either case, if you are also conscious about using plastic for sous vide, then this article should be of great help to you. Through the article, we will be listing some of the best alternatives that you can use instead of plastic in sous vide. Here are all of them listed down below:
- Wax with High Melting Point
Although this isn’t a really used medium, and might even seem weird to some users, wax with a high melting point, i.e., carnauba wax can be used for sous vide. The reason behind it is simply because it fulfills all the requirements that may be needed for your food to be cooking using sous vide.
How you will be using it is by coating or painting the wax on your food. An even better method would be to make use of gauze. You can soak a piece of gauze in melted wax, and wrap food, like your steak in it. Ensure to let it cool down before you start cooking.
- Silicone
Silicone is a more commonly used medium for sous vide. Silicone bags can be found quite easily and then used for the purpose. The major benefit of using Silicone bags compared to plastic is that any food-grade silicone that you find will not have any chemical that will leak from it.
Hence, if you are not using plastic due to the chemicals, then this option should prove to be quite effective. There is no harm in using food-grade silicon for cooking your food. The only complication that you may encounter is that you will need a sealable bag of silicone.
- Glass
Glass is also a widely used method for sous vide. Although there aren’t many harms attached to using glass for cooking your food. However, there are a number of things that you will need to keep in check if you decide to use glass as a medium for cooking your food through sous vide.
For instance, your cooking times may vary if you decide to use glass. The reason behind it is because glass is an insulator due to which won’t absorb heat quickly. Before you decide to use glass, it is important that you get accustomed to the procedure of using glass for sous vide.
- Using Something Protective
If you are hesitant of using plastic to cook your foods purely due to the harm from the chemicals, then there is one thing that you can do about it. What you can do is cover your food with some kind of protective material and then wrapping it inside the plastic.
This way, when you are done, you can get rid of both the material as well as the plastic bag that may have been contaminated.
The Bottom Line
These are 4 of the best alternative that you can use instead of plastic in sous vide. All of them can cook your food while making sure there isn’t any kind of harm that reaches them.