Let’s Drink to Sous Vide!

Posted on by

I had the incredible opportunity to live many years in Mexico City, D.F. where I learned a great deal of things, one of which was drinking. Since my drinking years were formed while in Mexico my favorite spirit was Tequila, but since I have been back in the states, and my palate has changed, I have become a fan of Whiskey, or Bourbon, specifically.

One night while sipping on Maker’s Mark a taste of vanilla appeared for some reason and I thought the combination would be nice. I tried mixing in fresh vanilla bean and then a vanilla extract, but I was never able to achieve the flavor I had imagined. I figured I just didn’t know what I was talking about – me flavoring Whiskey, ha!.

When I heard about infusing alchohol with the sous vide technique, the idea reappeared. Since I have the equipment I figured I had to try again. So here it is, I will be attempting three different infussions.

1. Vanilla Whiskey
2. “Old Fashioned” Bourbon (my favorite whiskey cocktail)
3. Jalapeño Tequila and Oak Smoke…

Flavoring alchohol is nothing really new, nor very difficult to do. But it can be time consuming. For example, it is easy enough to flavor Vodka with strawberries or cucumbers (which is delicious, by the way), by simply cutting the fruit and letting it sit in the Vodka for several days.

The sous vide process accelerates the infusion with heat, which is low enough to avoid evaporation or burning off of the good stuff, the alchohol…

The equipment I will be using for the experiments are:

– Boxer 35 with H2O Sensor (Chamber Vacuum Packer)
– Pearl Immersion Circulator
– Standard 3 Mil Vacuum Bags (8″ x 10″)

I will be posting recipes and results in separate entries. Please check back and leave your comments. We’ll be drinking soon enough.

Cheers!

3 thoughts on “Let’s Drink to Sous Vide!”

    • Hi, thank you for looking at the blog and reading the post.
      When we did this fish we did not write out a recipe. My wife is a chef, and pretty much eye-balled the proportions of the ingredients (coconut milk, kafir lime leaves, lemon grass, etc..). But as it so happens, we hope to do this dish this week. I will try to get down on paper a more formal recipe and I will post it here for you.

Leave a comment