Food cooked at low heat or controlled temperature – Sous vide

Foodman’s New Series Redefining Cooked Food – Part 2

The way bread rises is considered a sign of its ripeness. While it is not so. In the same way, our prejudices have stuck with vegetables, pulses, rice etc. Today, we are doing many experiments in food to keep ourselves healthy. Only one or two methods of cooking or cooking the same food are left. Most of us are confined to the gas stove and only a few to the oven. But it is not that we have learned to cook only on direct fire.

 In Rajasthan, the traditional “Daal baati“(Bati – A kind of bread made from dough made of kneaded flour and roasted on a low flame.) Baati is cooked in the ashes between cow dung cakes and wood embers. Which is cooked slowly on low flame or temperature. The same Rajasthani traditional food is cooked on slow temperature for 12 hours by burying the embers in the ground at night or during the day. In Gujarat too, the traditional “undhiyu” is buried in a clay  pot with coals and cooked at a low temperature for about 10 to 12 hours.

Similarly, in the traditional way of making “idli” in south India ,(Idli – a type of steamed bread made from cereals and pulses) idli is cooked in a low flame by pouring water in a clay pot or “matki”. It is not that this technology is used only in India. Western countries have also been influenced by Indian cooking and studied its effects, today food is cooked at low temperature industrially in many processed foods.

This technique is known as “sous vide” in western countries. In fact, it was used industrially for cooking sauces. When there was not much knowledge about food dye and the color of the sauce used to turn brown on high flame, the sous vide technique means cooking the sauce at a slow and controlled temperature, the color of the sauce remains red. This technology has been the inspiration for the invention of the pressure cooker. Even today, in rural and tribal areas of India, a kind of pressure cooker is made by sticking the lid on top of the pot with flour or clay. And its description is found in many of our mythological civilizations and history. Whereas in Europe and western countries its description is found 2 centuries ago.

By cooking on low flame, many nutrients of the food are saved from destruction. And the taste does not deteriorate either. Many vegetables, such as tomatoes and peppers, automatically separate from their skins when cooked on low heat. Generally you must have also felt that tomato remains in the cooked vegetable along with its peel. Human digestive system cannot digest the peel of tomatoes and chillies. In the same way, the skins are automatically separated from tomatoes cooked on low flame. respectively