Meat – How much should I season meat before sous vide cooking

meatseasoningsous-vide

I’m referring mainly to salt. I’m starting to Sous vide steaks and chops etc. I do a fast hard sear after the sous vide is finished.

When the steak comes out of the bag I pat dry very thoroughly and remove the sprigs of herbs garlic etc. Then I lightly brush with oil and salt pepper etc and sear in butter oil mixture.

My question is how much to season with salt and pepper before the sous vide. I’m tending to go easy on that as I don’t want an overall salty flavour. But I see many recipes talk about ample seasoning for the sous vide stage (one upvoted answer on this board even capitalised SALT!).

Or should I do that and not salt the meat before searing?

Best Answer

Ahh, a long-debated question in low-temp cooking circles. Dave Arnold, an early low-temp (sous vide) cooking instructor, ran a test when he was an instructor at (what was then know as) the French Culinary Institute in NYC. The three variables were (a) salted - cook - chill, (b) unsalted - cook - chill, and (c) salted - direct serve. His testers preferred the unsalted, and could distinguish all three samples. So, they do present differently. Now, your process may differ from his, and he also admits that, at that time, more testing was required. I think, these days, there is agreement that if your cooking time is going to be a couple of hours or less, and you are going to serve right away, salting before the cook step is fine. However, on long cooks (12, 24, 48 hrs or more) you probably want to salt after.

Having said that, you and your diners, might prefer it one way or the other. There really isn't a right or wrong answer. I would suggest your own "triangle" test. Just do two steaks or chops in different bags. Salt one. Cook them the same. Serve three pieces (two the same and one different), blindly to someone (or have someone serve them to you), and see if you can pick out the piece that is different. Then, decide which you prefer.