Meat is the main source of animal protein. It contains B vitamins (thiamine, riboflavin, niacin), as well as fats, carbohydrates, minerals, water and enzymes. The latter make seasoned, ripened meat especially soft and valuable. When exposed to high temperatures, most of these nutrients are destroyed, so special cooking technologies have been invented to preserve them. One of them is long-term simmering of meat at low temperatures.
Let's look at the key benefits of simmering.
First, when meat simmers, its natural enzymes are not destroyed. Moreover, at the beginning of the process, chemical processes are catalyzed, which help it “ripen” right in the working chamber.
Secondly, as you know, the taste of meat is affected by the fat it contains. Under the influence of heat, it not only melts, its chemical composition changes. At low temperatures, these changes are not as great as compared to high heat, so the meat becomes softer, evenly tasty and juicy.
Third, the longer the meat simmers, the more tender it becomes. This allows you to use cheaper cuts and tough meat, resulting in a good quality product.
Here's what chef Heston Blumenthal writes about this in his book At Home: “Simmering is good not only because it helps the meat retain its juiciness. It effectively destroys connective tissue, which means you can work with a variety of parts of the carcass - brisket, flank, tongue, cheeks - preparing dishes from them that melt in your mouth. The main component of connective tissue is collagen. You need to break down this protein to soften tough meat, and slow heat is the best way to do this. Collagen consists of three polypeptide gelatin chains twisted into a spiral. This rope-like spiral is very strong, but when heated in liquid, it gradually unravels, turning into gelatin itself. If you cook carefully, this gelatin will remain even in lean meat, giving it tenderness and juiciness.”
Fourth, almost three-quarters of meat consists of water. At high temperatures, water quickly evaporates and the product becomes dry. Simmering at low temperatures retains maximum water in the meat,
extending its shelf life before serving.
Fifth, due to the fact that microelements and juices are preserved in the meat, you can reduce the amount of salt and seasonings, preserving its natural taste.
In order to cook meat correctly using the simmering method, you need to pay attention to several factors.
Age of meat.
Old ones cook faster, but dry out more and are stored less ready.
Temperature before cooking.
The meat must be placed in a heated chamber at a temperature of 3...4°C. Frozen meat will take 1.5–2 times longer to cook. Additionally, since frozen meat has suffered tissue tears, it will shrink more.
Cooking temperature.
The higher it is in the working chamber, as well as inside the piece, the more the meat will lose weight, as moisture comes out of it to the surface.
Desired degree of readiness.
The higher the required temperature inside the product, the longer it must be cooked.
How to determine the readiness of meat? Place a thermometer in the center of the piece. The correct internal temperature for red meat is: medium rare - 54...57°C, medium rare - 60...63°C, well done - 66...71°C.
Today you can increasingly hear the culinary term “sous vide”. What this is, however, not every housewife knows. And not every chef who is used to working “the old fashioned way” likes this word, since he is not familiar with it. Meanwhile, this technology is becoming more and more popular every day, since it allows you to cook food at low temperatures and at the same time preserve its structure. Thus, we receive environmentally friendly food in which all its vitamins and nutrients are preserved. At first, this method may be puzzling, but over time you will learn to appreciate all its delights and realize that sous vide is really great.
Sous vide - what is it? This question is primarily asked by those who have never heard anything about this method of cooking before. Sous vide is a technology for low-temperature cooking of food in a vacuum. The method appeared in France - a country of gastronomic gourmets and restaurateurs who know a lot about food. The inventor of the technology is considered to be chef Georges Pralu, who worked at the French restaurant Troisgros. Using new vacuum technology, the chef prepared foie gras in 1974.
But Georges Pralu was not the only person thanks to whom sous vide technology appeared. At the same time, another person came up with it. And it all happened like this: initially this elite technology was not created for haute cuisine establishments. The owner of a restaurant, part of a chain of fast food establishments, wondered how to cook tough and inexpensive meat much tastier than competitors do. To solve this problem, the restaurateur asked for help from his friend Bruno Gousso, a biochemist by training. He asked his friend to come up with a cooking method so that the dry meat would become juicy and soft. At the same time, the aforementioned chef Georges Pralu was thinking about how to preserve invaluable fat while cooking foie gras. Thus, the same stunning idea simultaneously dawned on two strangers: both chefs thought of packing the product in a vacuum, immersing it in water at the required temperature and simmering there for a long time. Therefore, it is quite difficult to understand who was first. It doesn’t matter, the main thing is that a new and ingenious food preparation technology has emerged in the culinary world. And since then, the vacuum method has been successful in many places on the planet.
The Sous Vide method is associated with both cooking and storing food. The whole essence of the technology comes down to the following: a fresh product is packaged in a vacuum bag for cooking (if necessary, various spices are placed in it) using a special vacuum packaging apparatus. Then the bag is dipped into a tray of warm water and cooked at a certain temperature for a certain time. And then the “vacuum” product is put in. In the refrigerator chamber, such a product can be stored for a long time.
Before serving, meat dishes can be lightly fried on the grill or in a heated frying pan to enhance the aroma and create a golden crust. The sous vide cooking temperature is 50-70 degrees. Absolutely any products are suitable for this method, but this technology is best suited for preparing seafood and fish.
Sous vide technology is extremely popular these days. We have already told you what it is, now we will look at the advantages of this method. So, as a result of using vacuum cooking, the following goals are achieved:
1. During baking or frying, the surface of the meat is exposed to temperatures that are several times higher than the cooking temperature. The sous vide technology allows you to cook food gently, the temperature inside and on top of the finished product will be the same, nothing will burn or dry out.
2. Dishes will be more juicy, since low-temperature processing leaves cell membranes intact.
3. Vacuum packaging allows you to preserve all its smells and tastes in the middle of the product. It also promotes better penetration of marinades and spices into the product.
4. Correct selection of temperature and cooking time makes the food softer. In tough cuts of meat that are stewed or boiled, muscle collagen is converted into gelatin. As a result, even the cheapest cut can be prepared in such a way that it has a divine texture and taste.
5. Vegetables prepared in this way retain a crunchy and fresh texture, which is almost impossible to achieve with regular cooking.
Cooking using the sous vide method can last from 20 minutes to half an hour. This time is necessary for preparing omelettes, foie gras, and small fish. But tough pieces of meat and pork ribs take a couple of days to cook. The time required to heat a portion of food to the desired temperature depends not on its total mass, but on its thickness. The density of the food determines the amount of time it takes for the food to warm up to the desired temperature. The softness of the food affects the cooking time.
Delicate and soft foods such as lamb chops, pork and veal fillets, foie gras and shellfish will be ready to eat as soon as they reach the correct temperature.
Sous vide cooking has its downsides. If food is cooked for more than four hours at a temperature lower than 52 degrees, then there is a chance for the bacteria that causes botulism to grow. In such conditions, these pathogens feel as comfortable as possible. To avoid infection, you should choose higher temperatures for foods that take longer than four hours to cook.
Many gourmets prefer products prepared using sous vide technology. They know firsthand what it is, since most modern restaurants specialize in such dishes. These delicacies are good not only for their taste, but also for their long shelf life (for most of these dishes it is at least five days, including the day of production and consumption). But some products can be stored much longer, however, only if these periods have been verified experimentally.
So, fish can be stored for four to six days, but beef and veal can be stored for as long as 25-30 days. For pork, this period is slightly shorter: from 15 to 18 days. Poultry can be stored for 10-18 days, and the shelf life of vegetables breaks all records. It is 45 days.
The essence of this concept is hidden in the name - food should simmer under a tightly closed lid.
Languor- This is a method of preparing food, which is carried out in an oven or oven. In this case, the dish is subjected to uniform and at the same time not very intense heating for quite a long time.
But the main feature of this cooking method is that it is advisable to do all this in a Russian oven. Only in it does the stewed dish acquire a unique taste. Of course, today Russian stoves can only be found in villages. Despite this, you want to cook delicious food regardless of the conditions.
Modern cooking offers recipes for stewed dishes, which are mainly prepared in the simplest oven. To do this, it is turned on at the lowest power, and the ingredients of the dish are reliably isolated from hot air (for example, for this purpose, the food is covered with a tight lid or several layers of food foil).
You can cook a wide variety of foods using simmering - meat, cereals, vegetables or even fish. For example, the national cuisines of some Finno-Ugric peoples give stewed dishes a central place - almost all products that are used for food are necessarily subjected to stewing.
The most suitable utensils for cooking dishes using the simmering method are considered to be ceramic: these can be pots, bowls or pans with a tight-fitting lid. It must be remembered that absolutely any stewed dish requires long-term heat treatment - pots with meat, vegetables and other products can be cooked in this way for six to eight hours.
The main and obvious advantages of stewed dishes include their delicate taste and pleasant texture. Soups, porridges, and meat dishes prepared by simmering are very easily distinguished in taste from similar dishes prepared by stewing or boiling. Simmering is used in the preparation of stews, goulash and rolls.
By the way, you can also simmer dishes that contain dairy products - cheese, milk, cream, sour cream. In Rus', milk was simmered everywhere, which acquired a pinkish tint and a delicate, unique taste.
Sometimes simmering can be simulated in a special slow cooker or oven, for which a small amount of boiling water is periodically added to the dish. This prolongs the cooking process by suppressing the acceleration of liquid evaporation.
However, such dishes often turn out not very tasty, as if they were boiled down. Although, for example, meat is boiled just as well as in true stewed dishes, it is not possible to recreate the characteristic taste of stewing in any other way, except for such cooking in a real Russian oven.
This method is especially suitable for cooking meats with thick fibers and meat from older animals. If we simmer the meat for two to three hours, we will get a dish with a soft texture and great taste.
Based on materials from findfood.ru
Unfortunately, not many chefs love and know how to cook stewed dishes, since their heat treatment takes too much time. True, if you like incredibly tasty meat or tender porridge, aromatic vegetables or thick soup, you should definitely try cooking them using the simmering method. In fact, there is nothing complicated about languor.
Read the recipe carefully. Pay attention to the point where it talks about languor. There are two options for starting languor:
The skill of a housewife largely depends on her ability to observe. Of course, this comes with experience. But still, you should know that the temperature of the simmering dish should be 94-96ºC, which is several degrees less than the boiling point. If you have a thermometer designed for high temperatures, you can use it to practice determining the temperature of cooking food.
But you can do without a thermometer by learning recognize signs of longing. During simmering, a few bubbles rise to the surface of the dish, but when boiling, the number of bubbles increases significantly.
As soon as the water begins to “shudder,” the heat must be reduced so that the dish simmers and does not cook.
To help housewives, I present two recipes that seemed simple to me, found on the Internet.
Slow-cooked chicken
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Wash the chicken and dry with a paper towel. Coarsely chop the onion into slices, lemon into circles (or slices). |
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Rub the chicken with seasoning and ground red pepper outside and inside. |
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Stuff the chicken with onions, garlic and lemon. Stab with a toothpick. Coat the skin of the chicken well with mustard. Grease the pan with oil, place the chicken there and place in a preheated oven at 230 degrees for 15-20 minutes until the back of the chicken is browned. Then reduce the temperature to 100-120 degrees, cover the pan with a lid or foil and simmer the chicken for 2.5 hours. |
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We take out the chicken, take out the filling and cut the chicken into pieces. Serve the finished chicken with your favorite side dish or just vegetables. |
Meat in pots
I want to describe the method of cooking meat, which, from my point of view, makes the meat the most delicious! This method is called languor. This is when the meat is cooked for a significant time at a low temperature, usually 65-70 degrees C.
So, let's begin!
First you need to find this very meat, choose it. If you couldn’t choose, don’t worry, any will do. I’ll tell you a secret - one pot can even contain a mixture of different meats, for example pork and beef. (lamb lovers - don't mix, lamb is very specific...). I will say even more - in this case of preparation, even the fattest pieces will do, they turn out the most interesting - the lard is melted, mixed into the broth, then absorbed back, gorging! If there is bologna on the meat and you think cutting it off will be a long process, slaughter it. Just rip off as much as possible of what you can rip off. During the cooking process the bologna will fall off on its own :o)
It's simple. Take spices according to your taste, as you like. I make do with the old tried and tested recipe - salt, peppercorns, bay leaf and celery or parsley root.
And they forgot the ray, the ray! And don't forget to add salt!
You will add what you like best. Take a small leaf of bay leaf. I add it at the end of cooking, half an hour before. It's perverted, of course, but I like it that way.
And here comes the meat! 
Don't forget the peppercorns: 
You will also need tomato sauce - I prefer my own. It contains the remaining spices - adjika and garlic. 
We put it all in a pot, fill it with water, and into the oven. Add water less than 2 centimeters from the edge, otherwise half of the meat will be scattered throughout the oven. The question of cold or hot is debatable. I tried this way and that - same result.
There is a small digression here. Simmering is 3-4 hours at a temperature not exceeding 70 degrees. Celsius, of course. But in modern times, meat can never be sure of its quality. Even if you personally killed the boar. Therefore, I bring the temperature to boiling point. In the oven settings, this is 230 degrees Celsius. Naturally, water boils at 100, which means it will simply be faster.
As soon as it boils (here you need to watch for the first 15 minutes, don’t let it gurgle too much), you immediately need to lower the temperature. This will give confidence that from the point of view of the sanitary epidemiology, we killed someone right away, the rest will die in the remaining time.
This “let it boil” thing reduces the cooking time to 2 hours. My pots are on low gas for this clock; by the way, I measured it at about 63 degrees.
After about an hour, such smells are in the apartment that you want to grab these very pots from the oven and start them... well, don’t choke.
Nevertheless, you need to arm yourself with a rolling pin and use moral and volitional effort to drive everyone away from the oven!
10 minutes before the end of cooking, you can refresh the peppercorns or bay leaves in a pot.
When everything is ready, let it sit in the oven without heat for another 15 minutes.
Use the remaining time before the end of cooking to prepare your favorite salads and side dishes. I personally eat this meat with three - pea or mashed potatoes or pasta. Just look - the pasta must be decent!
And go ahead, bon appetit. The sous-chef approved of all this, only he thinks that they don’t eat meat with bread! 
I think this recipe will be your hit for many, many years to come, delighting both your family and guests.
If you are into cooking, you have come across the definition of “languor” more than once. This is frying in a small amount of boiling water. In other words, we work with an intermediate stage between boiling and frying or stewing pre-fried meat. Simmering is not a discovery of modern cooks. Even in Ancient Rus', this method was used in the oven, like other cooking methods. Simmering is somewhat similar to poaching, but takes much longer. Now we will look at what this process is and what it is used for.
This culinary technique consists in the fact that the dish is processed for a long time at a low temperature under a tightly closed lid. Recommended temperatures range from 65 to 100 degrees Celsius. It should be evenly distributed throughout the dish. You can simmer anything: porridge, meat, fish, vegetables, dairy products. They taste incredible and are completely different from their stovetop counterparts.
After simmering, the milk tastes incredibly pleasant; it acquires an orange-pink color and a subtle smell of cream. Porridge prepared this way comes out incredibly tender! It is especially suitable for cooking meat dishes that have a thick fiber structure or meat from adult animals. If you cook one kilogram of meat this way for several hours, it turns out very tender and tasty. Before cooking, it and the vegetables are fried at a temperature of more than 170 degrees in a preheated container with a thick bottom in vegetable oil or fat, stirring occasionally. After this, add hot water or broth and simmer under the lid over low heat (temperature less than 100 degrees). During the cooking process, you need to add liquid in small volumes, because it evaporates. The whole secret of the unique and bright taste is that the temperature increases gradually, without reaching a boil.
REFERENCE! The duration of cooking is determined by the products that make up the dish. Thus, vegetables need much less time than meat. When preparing jellied meat, consider the size of the pieces and the type of meat. If it is tender meat or the meat of a young animal, then it will arrive in much less time.
A multicooker is a unique kitchen unit with which you can cook any type of food: fried, boiled, stewed, and so on. The tightly closing lid makes it easy to create the necessary conditions and temperature for stewing and simmering.
In general, if you want stewed food, it is preferable to cook it in the oven, as was done in Rus'. However, due to the fact that in modern conditions this is impossible, you have to perform this process in a slow cooker. In this kitchen unit, you can recreate the taste of a dish, similar to what was obtained in a real oven. Let's look at what the process of simmering in a slow cooker is.
It is fundamentally no different from ordinary languor. The only difference is that, thanks to the programming and automatic shutdown mode, everything in it is automated. It is not necessary to follow all stages of preparation. A product that is subjected to heat treatment becomes very tender, soft, juicy, tasty and has a pleasant consistency.
It is known that during prolonged cooking, the main part of the beneficial substances and elements is boiled out of the dish into the broth, and a considerable amount of vitamins is destroyed. Obviously, such a dish is not healthy. On the contrary, due to the fact that simmering requires a minimum of water and maintaining a low temperature, which slightly warms the product, there is no significant damage to nutrients when cooking in this way. Vegetables subject to languishing do not lose their color, brightness and structural integrity.
Low-temperature baking technology is the most advanced and economical cooking method.
Long-term simmering of products while maintaining a certain temperature makes them juicy and perfectly cooked. Modern ovens and devices designed for this allow you to cook using this approach.
The term "sous vide" is translated from French as "in a vacuum." Thanks to this technology, cooking at low temperatures has become possible. The process takes longer than other heat treatment methods, but this method achieves several goals:
To understand why the method is remarkable, let’s get acquainted with the basics. The essence of the method is simple: the products are vacuum-sealed in a special plastic bag, after which they are cooked in water while maintaining a constant temperature, usually not exceeding 70 degrees (for vegetables the limit increases).
The most important thing is precise control of temperature and time. Sous vide provides results that cannot be achieved with traditional cooking. With it in the house there will always be delicious food that has retained all its beneficial properties.
If you learn to bake meat using low-temperature technology, you will forever remain an adherent of this method. The technology is especially relevant for fish. It must be borne in mind that it remains tender within very narrow temperature limits, so it is important to carefully monitor the time.
The sous vide method is ideal for young housewives and experienced cooks who want to surprise their guests. When cooking meat at low temperatures, it must be placed in a vacuum. However, many people wonder whether such results can be achieved without special equipment.
Firstly, you can completely do without a vacuum sealer in the kitchen. Cling film comes to the rescue, which needs to be tightly wrapped around the food on all sides, leaving no gaps and squeezing out air. Another alternative is plastic ziplock bags. They are lowered into a large container of water so that the upper part with the clasp remains above the liquid.
When cooking meat food in a water oven, excess air is released from the bag. But since the vacuum obtained by such methods is not complete, long-term storage of ready-made dishes is excluded.
The operation of modern devices consists of a combination of three key elements: the presence of a thermostat, a heating element, and a water tank. Thus, low-temperature cooking of meat without an oven becomes possible. What to do if the farm does not have such a device?
You can simulate low-temperature conditions when cooking meat. To do this, use any capacious container of water (for example, a saucepan) placed on the stove or in the oven. Therefore, if you like any beef recipe, you can always try it.
Special water ovens for sous vide have a number of advantages:
The average temperature of cooked meat ranges from 55 to 70 degrees. If you lower the temperature for cooking to 56-70°C, you will be able to retain all the juices and unique taste in the food. Before you heat the oven to a low temperature, you need to make sure that it can maintain it, otherwise the food will remain soggy.
It is best to cook meat at low temperatures in an electric oven with top and bottom heating. First, the piece can be lightly fried in a frying pan, and then placed in a bag and left to bake for several hours. A special thermometer helps check the degree of readiness. In this way you can prepare delicious dishes with any type of meat - from chicken to lamb.
A gas oven heats up very quickly, so it is difficult to protect meat from extreme overheating. It does not need to be turned on in advance. The meat should be removed from the refrigerator an hour before cooking, and then placed in a shallow dish and turned on the oven.
Cooking food using the above technology is not easy, but it allows you to get ideal results. However, sous-vide has a number of minor disadvantages.
Low-temperature cooking of meat does not trigger the Maillard reaction, which is responsible for the formation of a golden brown crust of the finished dish. It appears when the temperature exceeds 150°C, which is much higher than the technology requires. Therefore, to give the product an appetizing appearance, it must be fried before or after simmering.
If a temperature of less than 52 °C was chosen for low-temperature cooking in the oven, and it takes more than four hours, the chances of the growth of botulism pathogens increase. This danger can be avoided by setting a higher temperature for foods that are cooked for longer than 4 hours.
To achieve an ideal result and implement sous-vide in its original form, which is used in restaurants, you must have devices created for this: a vacuum sealer and a thermostat, a device for maintaining a constant temperature.
