The first recipe anyone wants having a go with Sous Vide is probably steak. No exception for me, but alas, I have frozen duck legs available on hand but not beef steak, so duck Confit it is.
The recipe actually takes 12 hours of cooking time, which makes me wonder if it is a waste of electricity. It certainly wouldn’t be a waste of effort, because there’s hardly any effort involved when you do it Sous Vide – just 10 minutes to apply salt and herbs, 10 minutes to rinse and place in water bath, and another 10 minutes of searing.
Ready for cooking
The circulation was much stronger than i expected
Aluminium foil plus lid covering the top
To minimize heat (and steam) escaping from the water bath, the setup I had in mind since long ago was to use my thermal cooker and covering the top using aluminum foil. It probably worked well, and the water bath remained largely intact without much evaporation. In my case, the Anova precision cooker doesn’t clamp onto the thermal cooker so well, so I’m not suggesting that you do it. At your own risk if you choose so.
I used the Anova app on my phone to set off the cooking with timer. Unfortunately, the app doesn’t allow you to keep track of the cooking time. I suppose the Wifi version might have this feature, but i don’t really need it anyway.
So how did it turn out? Really good. The meat was tender through and through. I made the mistake of using a stainless steel pan to do the searing, and the precious duck skin got stuck on the pan, arghh! I quickly switched to using a non-stick pan, and the searing was just fine. Well, i will definitely make this again. The duck legs cost me about S$3.50 each, and they’re quite sizeable. No more going to a restaurant and paying S$18 for a measly duck leg Confit!
Update
I now use a Silicone baking mat instead of aluminum foil to cover the pot. It is obviously easier to apply onto the pot and also helps to hold the circulator in place.
Silicone baking mat
