Question about Sous Vide

[Rlpeterson78]

This year for Christmas, it is our turn to be together for all my kids that are married and my grandchildren. We have so many people that we can't fit in our house now so we have rented a house about 5 hour drive for us. Last thanksgiving we were closer to my home that I took my Pellet smoker and smoked at Turkey and a Brisket.

This year I think the drive is too long for me to take my smoker and I was wondering if I could pre-smoke the meat and put it in a vacuum bag then use my Sous Vide to heat them up to optimize temp for the meal? Has anyone done this? I have taken left over smoke pork ribs and vacuum sealed them and put them in the freezer and heated them in the Sous Vide and that worked.

[DaveD]

This will absolutely work. I did the very same thing last year when we hosted over a dozen people for a BBQ feed. Got everything cooked and vac-sealed in the couple of weeks prior, and then just broke out a big tub and put everything in there. Everything was ready together.

The key is using meats that can sit at the same reheat temperature, which means mostly low and slow stuff. Can't reheat to food safe temps on medium-rare beef, for example, without ruining that beautiful medium rare and rendering it grey and lifeless (don't ask me how I know!). If you are making turkey and brisket, that should work, you'd probably want to reheat to about 150 so as not to risk taking the bird any higher, and that's warm enough for the brisket too (although I usually SV reheat at 175 or so).

Good luck!

[Rlpeterson78]

What did you do after vac-sealed the meat? Did you freeze it or just refrigerated it?

[Karon Adams]

sure you can. Since it's just the Y and I, we can't eat a whole pork butt. so when we smoke, we breakit up and vacuum.

We break into large chunks that will feed the two of us for a meal. leave it as whole as possible. then we bag and vacuum it while iut's still warm. this keeps the gelatins and moisture IN the meat, we add a couple of spoons of sauce. JUST enough to make cerain we get a good seal between the plastic and the meat.Drop it into an ice water bath adn once cool freeze it. if you can get some dry ice, put it under that as soon as it cools inthe ice water to freeze fast. when travelling, pack it again in dry ice.

When you need it, put it in a sous vide for about 1 hour -90 minutes, depending on the amount of food and power of your sous vide. it is usually actually a little better than fresh because the freezing process actually makes the meaat more tender.

[Santamarina]

Works great. I’ve done larger chunks of brisket and pork shoulder that get sliced/pulled after reheating, and I’ve sliced/pulled then vac sealed and froze. Works great both ways and is a fantastic way to get good barbecue without having to cook day of.

[randy.56]

Yes, just like your last paragraph, I'm taking 4 slabs of baby backs 5 hours away Wednesday. Doing it the same way.