I recently got my hands on a SearPro after seeing some kickass videos of it being used on Instagram. Here’s an unboxing video:
Then I finally used the fucker on some blue fin tuna belly:
This thing is amazing! I currently have the Searzall but the SearPro blows it away. It’s way more powerful, it spreads the flame just as much as the Searzall, and it gets the job done in a third of the time. Also – NO CHEMICAL SMELL/FLAVOR ON THE FOOD AFTERWARDS!!! Many searing torches fail miserably in that department. The SearPro is not one of them!
This thing fucking RULES! If you have any interest in shooting flames onto shit, then get this!
Nebraska Famous Steaks sends frozen steaks out to customers who purchase meat from them. Most people are familiar with this concept by way of other companies like Omaha Steaks. I had not heard of Nebraska Famous Steaks until they reached out to me. Their ask was simple: Would I like for them to send me some meat to try out at home and post some pictures, write a review, etc? My answer was fast: Yup.
Here’s what they sent me:
I was blown away. I wasn’t expecting so much!
I have to say, their filet mignon destroys Omaha Steaks. The filets I recently cooked up from Omaha were thin, while these were nice and thick. Quality was similar, however, at good choice.
The Nebraska Famous Steaks rib eyes had some really nice marbling throughout the muscle tissue, and a nice sized spinalis cap. I was impressed! And also excited to eat them.
I did my usual quick and easy cooking method for steaks at home: sous vide followed by blow torch. Here’s a video of the whole process, from unboxing through to plating.
And I took a shitload of photos, of course. I simply seasoned with salt, pepper and garlic, then seared, and then added some flake salt. We also ate this with some wasabi as well. Nice touch!
I decided to go bonkers this year on Superbowl Sunday with some Omaha Steaks tenderloin cuts that my wife and I received as a gift from her father. It had been a while since I used my sous vide machine, so I knew I wanted to use that.
I also figured this would be a good time to bust out the Searzall again, since the cuts were only about an inch thick, and, fearing a blasphemous overcooking, I didn’t want to put them in a pan to get that coveted sear on the outside.
Nothing new there. I’ve given you recipes for that before. The ringer here, for this meal I envisioned, was the Bitterman Salt Co. Himalayan salt block that I had chilling in my freezer. I keep it cold for serving sliced sashimi and raw fish items, but I thought it might be nice for medium rare, seared, thin-sliced tenderloin as well.
Essentially, I cooked the steak to rare at 130 degrees in the sous vide machine, right from the sealed Omaha Steaks bags (no seasoning beforehand). Then I popped the steaks into an ice bath to cool them down quickly and halt the cooking process. I know that the Searzall can continue to cook the steak’s interior with prolonged exposure, so I wanted them rare when they came out of the sous vide machine.
After blasting them with the Searzall, I had a good crisp on the outside and a perfect medium rare pink on the inside. Then I sliced them on the salt block, using that as a serving platter. I finished them off with a drizzle of Trader Joe’s black truffle oil, a few cranks of fresh cracked black pepper, and some ground sea salt.
Check out the video demo that I posted on youtube:
And some photos of the finished product:
It was a great, cool-temperature, lean beef dish that really packed a delicious flavor profile. The truffle oil was a great way to bring out the earthy flavors from the steak. Simple but robust. Try it at home!
I was watching some Mind of a Chef recently (Season One), and I saw some dudes using this fucking crazy-ass device called a Searzall. After some further internet research, I found that the creators (Booker & Dax Labs) did a Kickstarter campaign to get the ball rolling on their product.
Chef David Chang took a big liking too it. He actually has his guys use it at Momofuku Ko to get the fish skin nice and crispy:
The Searzall itself is actually just an attachment. To put the whole device together you will need other shit. I nabbed a blow torch, a can of propane, and a Searzall, because I want to flame my steak shit sometimes instead of finishing in a pan. Below I’ve included a few pics of the shit I used to assemble the Searzall:
SEAR THE FUCK OUT OF SHIT. Get medieval with a blowtorch! I use a Searzall on my sous vide steaks, because I’m a fucking badass with a massive bag dangling in the area between my asshole and my dick shaft. Listen to that fucking sizzle just before I flip it over:
So you probably get the impression that I love this thing; I do. It’s like having a power tool for cooking. It’s manly. But I think it takes some practice to really become skilled with it, just like a table saw or any other power tool in the garage or at the construction site.
For example, if you take your cooked meat directly from the oven or the sous vide bag and started searing it with a Searzall, you’ll ruin the food. You need to wait until that shit cools down significantly, otherwise you’ll end up adding too much heat to an already hot item. You’ll overcook the center of the meat, not just add crisp to the outside. Also, this works nice for fish. The skin and flesh get really crispy. But you need to give the fish a light spread of butter or olive oil first, so you have flavor and brown-colored crisp instead of pure, black, burnt fish skin charcoal.
This is one of the simplest things to make, now that I have a sous vide machine at home. I honestly don’t think I will ever order a filet mignon out at a restaurant ever again, because this shit comes out so fucking perfect at home.
The only catch here: you need a sous vide machine (the vacuum sealer and Searzall are optional). They can be pricey, but if you have the balls, you can make one yourself like a real man (or have your cousin make you one, like I did) for a quarter of the cost of a store-bought machine.
Step 1: Buy filets
Step 2: Season filets however the fuck you want. I used salt, pepper, garlic powder, garlic oil and crushed red pepper.
Step 3: Place filets into vacuum seal bag and seal it the fuck up, with some butter and herbs inside (thyme and rosemary are always nice).
If you’re a poor bastard and can’t afford a vacuum sealer, you can use ziplock bags. Place your meat into the bag and begin to submerge the bag into the water bath. Once you are all the way close to the zipper, zip it shut. The water surrounding the outside of the bag will push out all the air from inside – poor man’s vacuum sealer. If you do this, you may want to put a smooth, clean rock in there too, just for good measure, to keep the meat from floating.
Step 4: Set your temperature to however the fuck you like your steak cooked. I put mine at 138º F for a nice medium rare / medium. I’m dealing with grocery store meat here, people. Don’t give me any bullshit about that being too well done.
Step 5: Wait. About an hour or two. Don’t panic, assholes! You can’t overcook your steak in a sous vide bath. That’s the whole point of it!
Step 6: Remove your steak from the water bath and re-season it a bit, if so desired.
Step 7: SEAR THE FUCK OUT OF IT. I used a Searzall, because I am a fucking badass with a massive bag dangling in the area between my asshole and my dick shaft. Listen to that fucking sizzle just before I flip it over:
But you can easily just toss this baby into a real hot cast iron pan with some more butter and herbs to get that brown and crispy coating. That’s how my cousin does it – see his results below:
As for mine? Check it out below… Seared to a fucking crisp on the outside, and pink as a snatch inside:
Step 8: Pour yourself a hefty glass of Scotch whisky.
The ice sphere is so much cooler than the ice cube. The ice cube is such a square.
Step 9: Drink it, then refill it, and then EAT while you drink that second glass of Scotch. Here: watch me devour one of the filets in under two minutes and then lick the damn plate.
Step 10: Jerk the fuck off and brag about how awesome you are, which I clearly did in the video above, shit the booze out of your system, and then fall asleep drunk and naked in the bathroom.
Feel free to use any cut that you want for this. I recently did the same thing with some Mosner grass-fed rib eyes, with some added duck fat to round them out. See below for the setup and results:
Recently my cousin sent me a text message with some pretty alarming and exciting photos and videos.
Yeah, that’s right… the motherfucker made his own sous vide machine, cooked up some filets to medium rare, and then seared them the fuck off in a cast iron skillet to get some texture on the edges.
What exactly is a sous vide machine, for you non-food nerds? The words translated from French mean “under vacuum.” It is essentially a hot tub for meat. How it works: you place vacuum sealed meats into the water bath and leave them there until the meat comes up to the proper temperature, which is set and regulated with a water heater and temperature controller. You can’t overcook the meat! You get perfect medium rare shit every time, evenly cooked through and through.
As you can imagine, I was flipping out at what my cousin had achieved. I browsed some DIY sous vide instructional websites a few years back when I was living in a house on Long Island, but it seemed like a ton of effort. I thought to myself, “I’ll just get a real-deal machine someday.” But once I saw these things from my cousin, I knew it was time to pull the trigger.
Lucky for me, my cousin is super handy and craftsmanlike when it comes to stuff like this, and he has access to a bunch of great tools like dremels and drill presses.
A flurry of texts immediately ensued. It’d be fun to build one together, I thought. THIS LINK is the instructional we worked from. My cousin ordered a bunch of the materials online…
I pulled my cooler out of the closet, which would serve as the main cooking vessel or “hot tub” (and it saved me some bucks for not having to buy a plastic tub).
and I ordered a vacuum sealer via Amazon Prime…
I also nabbed a blow torch, a can of propane, and a Searzall, because I want to flame that shit sometimes instead of finishing in a pan. Plus, this works great if I ever do fish – the skin… oh maaaaan it gets crispy…
I sent the dimensions of my cooler lid area to my cousin:
He used this to figure out how to cut the plexi down to size to serve as the top portion that suspends the water heater in position. He also built the temperature control housing, and wired the power supply for the temperature control unit and heater probe (thermometer).
I was initially concerned that the hinged top of my cooler wouldn’t close properly with the plexi in place. It turns out that closing the top tight isn’t too big of a problem when you’re using a nicely insulated vessel like a cooler. Also, we dropped the plexi to a lower lip within the cooler, so the thing closes nicely now:
Then you suction this to one of the walls. Essentially this is a water circulator. It keeps the water swirling around so that there are no warm or cold spots within the bath, which makes for a nice even cooking temperature.
BOOM! I can’t wait to fire this fucker up. I’m going to pick up some fish and beef right the fuck now.
