Sous vide is all the rage for those who love cooking and gadgets in equal measure. While the Anova Precision Cooker gets a lot of press, we’re putting its slender competitor the ChefSteps Joule through the paces.
What Is Sous Vide Again?
When we reviewed the Anova Precision Cooker last year, we dove into the details of sous vide. Effectively, sous vide is a fancy French word meaning “under vacuum.” You place food in a plastic bag or glass jar, then put it in water.
Then the sous vide device adjusts the water temperature and the food is cooked in the water bath, slow and steady. The devices are very precise so your food is cooked consistently every time. Compared to using an oven (where the 375 degrees you dial in might not actually be 375 degrees but 382 instead), when you dial in 132.5 degrees on a sous vide unit, you get it.
While that sounds like something fussy, don’t mistake the precision for complication. It’s a method that’s as complicated as you want it to be. ReviewGeek’s editor, Jason, is a huge sous vide fan and owns multiple Anova units and accessories, but he’ll be the first to tell you that you don’t have to go all in to reap the benefits. You can also just toss some food in a Ziploc bag, let it sink slowly into the water to naturally push the air out, and leave the sous vide device to do all the hard work for you. It’s entirely up to you.
The ChefSteps Joule Sous Vide hopes to be all you could need, and be your first choice over the well established Anova Precision Cooker. So, how did it perform?
Getting Started: Simple and Foolproof
The ChefSteps Joule Sous Vide is smaller and sleeker looking than the Anova Precision Cooker. It almost seems like something Apple would have come up with, right down to the intuitive and friendly looking packaging as pictured. Only 11 inches tall and weighing about 1.3 pounds, it’s actually small enough to toss into a drawer or cupboard without it getting in the way. It’s definitely a little smarter looking than the Anova, but that comes at a price.
RELATED: Anova Precision Cooker Review: Sous Vide Is So Easy, It Almost Feels Like Cheating
Namely, the ChefSteps Joule Sous Vide depends entirely on app connectivity to use it. There’s no display on the top of the device like with the Anova, so any time you want to check on it or tweak a setting, you need to dive into your phone’s Joule app. That’s not a massive hardship if, like me, your phone is always with you, but it’s something to bear in mind (especially if more than one person in your household will be using it or you want to use it without always fetching your phone).
Setup is very straight forward. Just plug the ChefSteps Joule Sous Vide in and load up the Joule app. There’s a clear button on the app for pairing up your new Joule, and the app and device do most of the rest of the work for you. I just had to enter my Wi-Fi password. There’s a choice to name your Joule as well which could be useful if you have multiple devices. A 5-minute update later and I was ready to cook.
The First Cooking Session: Juicy Chicken
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Source : ChefSteps Joule Sous Vide Review: Expensive But Exceptional
