Sous vide, bag safety - Australia

Hi all,

I’ve had an interesting first couple of experiences using the ANOVA. My first recipe I cooked Scotch fillet (or rib eye) pork. I initially cooked it and then seared it. It was quite tender.

The only thing is the next day my 2 year old daughter threw up. I also felt queasy though not sure whether it was psychological.

Possible factors: I used meat from the freezer and defrosted it in the sink.
The quality of bag that I chose may not have been of high standard. No mention of it being used for a freezer or microwave safe (I chose the bag because it looked like the American Ziploc bag with the slinging leaver.

I’m a little concerned now. I don’t want my daughter to be sick again.

I would also like some advice on relation to what some people in Australia are using for their bags.

Any help/comments are welcome.

PS: I did cook salmon the next day from a freezer bag turned out nice I didn’t choose to give it to my daughter but tasted nice.

Thank you.

im aussie too, just been using glad and hercules brand ziplocs. seem to be fine and hold up to at least 75 deg c. they also dont seem to produce a taste or make us ill, had sous vide almost every day this week.

how unusual is it for her to throw up, and how long after eating? is pork a normal part of her diet?

I too, am an Aussie. I’ve not tried the ziploc type bags for anything other than Scrambled Eggs a la Heston, so can’t really help there. The Hercules bag I used did seem very soft and squidgy after the time but imparted no odd taste to the eggs. I vacuum pack because I can.

You can cook the meat from frozen state. Suggested additional time for a 1.5" steak is around an hour. Might take some experimentation or perhaps one of the experts could assist with timing advice.

Hey all thanks for the replies.
The first time cook was with multix slider sandwich bags. Second attempt was with the Hercules large storage bags which I’ll keep using from now on.

My wife had both meals or pork with multix and salmon with Hercules she had no illness.

I think I’ll stick with the Hercules brand or anything that says freezer or storage bags.

My daughter normally doesn’t get sick with eating pork. We ate at approximately 6 PM the night before. She woke up at 7 or 8 am. Threw up clear liquid initially. Then after breakfast threw it back up and that’s it. (Apologies for the graphic description).

May just have been a flu bug. They tend to just be 24hrs in variety. Food poisoning on the other hand can take you out for several days. Tends to be much worse - so, all the more reason to be wary of food safety around the young ones and the elderly!!

I didn’t see anyone ask you to what level of doneness you cooked the pork? (sorry, I’m still “old school” - I won’t eat rare or medium-rare pork - no pink, or I’m sending it back) :slight_smile:

No idea of the food climate in Aus - here in Canada, these damn distributors get meat from all over the world, so you’re playing a game of chance any time you be a little bit adventurous with rare meat (unless it’s a small, local butcher).

Hope your daughter’s right as rain!!! :slight_smile:

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At Costco you can buy Ziploc bags.

Hey there I used the Rib eye recipe on the app by J. Kenji López-Alt, cooked to medium rare. Followed through with a quick fry.

My daughter is doing much better thanks. She hasn’t been I’ll ever since thank goodness.

I may try coming duck breast as per instructions of a chef Jacob in a forum at 56 degrees Celsius for 2 hours using the Hercules brand bag. Meat is in the fridge hopefully it will work.

Fingers crossed.

I’m not an Aussie, maybe it’s just that at age 2, your daughter’s digestive system just isn’t ready for medium-rare pork.

I was feeling a bit funny in the stomach too though the next day. I have fried pork in the past though never did sous vide it. It’s not ever been a problem.

We could have over eaten too ie not leave much time between lunch and dinner because of the excitement of using the device and hoping an hour later or stomachs would be wanting more food.

That sounds plausible. Could also be that as an adult, your digestive system is more capable of handling med-rare pork. Or, as you mentioned initially, maybe the pork was just a bit off, possibly from the freeze or thaw or just because of the meat.

There is no compelling reason that you must thaw frozen foods before putting them in the water bath, you can just bag them and toss them in frozen. Add some extra cook time and you’re set.

I vacuum seal with a Sunbeam vacuum sealer and I’ve found the best bags (at a good price) are Vacuum Sealing Bags - Extend The Life Shelf Of Food | Pacfood . The big advantages I’ve found using vac bags over freezer bags are food longevity when storing in the fridge or freezer and ease of use in the sous vide. We tend to do a lot of longer cooks - 48 hour pork ribs and 72 hour beef short ribs - so I also tend to double bag.

For vacuum sealing, I just buy rolls from eBay. Only had one bad roll in 5 or 6 years of doing it that way. Pre-cut and branded bags are over priced.