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Dorkfood DSV

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Around May of last year, I believe, was when I heard about the Dorkfood DSV, a relatively inexpensive temperature controller that allowed you to use a basic slow cooker as a sous vide water bath cooker.

A month or so later, I saw a 7 quart, stainless steal, manual Crock Pot on sale at Target for $35, intending to pair it with the DSV when the hundred buck asking price became free and clear.

And then I ended up having other priorities for that chunk of disposable income. Don't blame me. I'm not the one who released two new game consoles. The point is, a couple of weeks ago, I got me a Dorkfood DSV and immediately started experimenting with sous vide. And the first thing I learned is that once you have the gear, it's really, really easy. If you plan.

It works simply, which is good. You plug the crock pot into the DSV. You plug the DSV into the wall. You fill the crock pot with water. You turn the crock pot on. You stick the DSV's temp probe into the water. You set a temp. If the crock pot's temp is a lot lower than the temp you set, the crock pot is on. If it's a little lower, it cycles on and off fairly quickly to ease up to the set temp. And once you hit that temp, it turns on only to maintain the temp. This, of course, only works with basic slow cookers with manual switches. Any fancy digital bullshit and you're hosed.

Does it work? Hell yes. It doesn't move the water around the way a real immersion circulator would, and it's maybe not precise to as many decimal points, but you'll get a constant temperature water bath, which is the point.

The biggest drawback to the DSV is that it appears to either be made of off-the-shelf components, or it was designed by people who didn't give a shit about ergonomics. Case in point. The cord for the probe is vast. At least six feet long. The power cord is maybe two feet long. And the crock pot plugs in at the plug end, not at the DSV end. Which means you've basically got six feet of probe, when the DSV and the crock pot can't be any farther apart physically than the total of the power cords for both devices. That's a lot of extra slack.

Also, "right side up" for the LCD display means pointing toward the DSV's power cord. This is upside down from what would be the most natural and give you the most cord length. So you have to twist the thing around so that the cord comes out the "bottom", or you have to read the LCD upside down.

Did I mention LCD? As in basic, unbacklit, calculator LCD? As someone with piss-poor contrast vision, I have, after a week or so, purchased a cheap LED light to rubber-band to the DSV just to save my sanity.

All these things strongly point to the DSV being made of bits intended for something other than a kitchen. Which is annoying. But the good news is, the nature of sous vide cooking means that the ergonomics of the DSV are only in play for about five minutes, once, out of anywhere from two to 36 hours of cooking.

Sous vide cooking is the ultimate "set it and forget it" technique. Get the water to the temp you want your food. Season your food. Bag your food. Remove air from bag. You can use a vacuum sealer for this, you can use a Ziploc vacuum thingy, you can just squeeze the air out of a Ziploc by hand. Doesn't really matter. Put bag in water. Wait. Take bag from water. Serve, or, optionally, brown then serve.

During this time, you never mess with the DSV. You never adjust it, you never fuck with it, and so the fact that it's really difficult to adjust doesn't come into play.

So far, I've used it on beef tenderloin, chicken, thick pork chops, and avocados. The meats all came out juicy and tender, although the chicken got cut, chilled, and used in a chicken salad, so some of the benefits may have been lost in the subsequent steps.

The avocados were part of an experiment in immortal guacamole. On Good Eats, Alton Brown once mentioned that putting avocados in a low temp water bath for a certain amount of time would denature the browning enzyme, leading to green avocados with raw avocado texture.

Now, he just said this, and didn't do this. And the Internet is surprisingly devoid of people who've tried it, gotten it to work, or refined the time and temperature calculations. What I can tell you is, two hours at 110 didn't seem to do anything adverse to the texture, helped the ripeness, and, if four days in the fridge is any indication, did very little for the longevity of the guac. Oh well. It didn't hurt.

Overall, I'm sold on sous vide. It's an important element in the home cook's arsenal, but generally out of reach due to expensive equipment. But for $135 plus the cost of some plastic bags, the DSV can make it happen at a much more reasonable price point. Next plans, long-form braising of corned beef and pork belly. That's another area where I think it'll shine.


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