My noob questions

Anova Precision® Cooker First Cook Essentials
1

Have had my BT+Wifi 900W Anova for a few days now, and I’ve got a handful of Q’s:

  1. What part of the unit emits the heat? i.e. which part should I not touch with my hand? The entire silver metal part?

  2. Is it OK if my food containers (either bags or silicone baby-food type containers that I use for sous vide egg bites) touch / rest against the unit under water? Could this be a fire hazard?

  3. How long should the unit take to heat water to 172F? It seems to take 25-30 mins…seems awfully long, but is this normal?

2

Hi @domino66

  1. The heating element is enclosed in the “metal part”.

  2. Since it is kept submerged I think the metal is pretty much always kept at a moderate temp - safe enough for the vacuum bags to rub up against without issue - though good practice would be to keep the bags back a ways from the unit to encourage good water flow. Water conducts the heat from the submerged element away from the unit pretty efficiently so the metal containment doesn’t seem to get “really” hot.

  3. How long the unit takes to heat your water depends greatly on the volume of water in the container you are cooking in. I don’t know how big your container is but a smaller volume of water means faster time heating to the desired temperature. I use a big insulated cooler for most cooks, so I dump in hot water from a tea kettle during my preheat to help speed the process.

I hope these comments are helpful. The above are just my personal experiences and observations. Others may have something more or different to say or add.

2 Likes
3

For steaks hot water from the tap does not take too long to stabilize at the desired cooking temperature. I rarely heat the hot water from my tap on the stove. The only exception is if I am cooking vegetables and I am looking to shorten the time required to get ready.

4
  1. It’s not a fire hazard, it’s IN water. The meal part is going to be about the same temp as the water around it. The heating element is inside of that and doesn’t touch it. The circulating water keeps everything but the heating element at about the same temp.
  2. The biggest factors are volume of water. The starting temp of the water. And what the container is made of VS ambient temperature. And what you have it covered with. I use a small cooler for the container, holds about two gallons. I also use those packing pillows that a lot of things are shipped with these days so the water is pretty insulated.