Sous Vide Beef Barbacoa Tacos | Recipe by sousvidetools.com

Sous Vide Beef Barbacoa Tacos

COOK TIME: 36 Hours
PREP TIME: 30 minutes
DIFFICULTY: Easy
SERVES: 3

Ingredients

1 teaspoon cumin
1 chipotle chilli in Adobo sauce, chopped
1 tablespoon red chilli flakes
2 cloves garlic
Kosher (sea) Salt and Pepper
450g (1lb) Beef feather (or chuck) steak
1 avocado
1 tablespoon chopped scallions (spring onions)
Half tablespoon chopped jalapeno peppers.
8 corn tortillas
Olive oil spray
1 can black beans, drained
1 cup tomato salsa
2 limes
4 tablespoons cilantro
4 tablespoons sour cream

Equipment

Method

Nazima Pathan, one of our friends from Franglais Kitchen, was kind enough to provide us with a tasty recipe for Sous Vide Beef Barbocoa Tacos!

Nazima is a freelance food writer and parent of two whose recipes focus on being seasonal, family friendly and mostly healthy (with the occasional indulgence). This shines through in her delicious recipe.

sous-vide-beef-tacos

Take a trip to Mexico with this easy and healthy family meal. Slow cooked beef steak brought to tender perfection by 36 hours in the water bath, served up on corn tortillas with some guacamole, salsa and sour cream.

Sous vide cooking is a great way to get the best out of cheaper, more flavourful cuts of meat. We used feather steak but chuck steak or brisket would work equally well.

We use the cooking juices from the meat to soften the corn tortillas as we warm them – it helps make them soft and tasty.

This is a healthy, nutritionally balanced meal that will feel like a feast and is also suitable for gluten-free diets.

Method

Set up your sous vide cooker to a temperature of 82 Deg C.
Thoroughly combine the cumin, chipotle chilli with a little adobo sauce, the chilli flakes and crushed garlic cloves.
Trim the surface fat off the meat.
Rub the spice mixture over the meat and vacuum seal it in a suitable cooking pouch.
Place the bags containing the meat into the bath and cook for 36 hours. If you are using a thermal circulator and gaztronome, check the water level a couple of times during the cooking period, or cover it with a lid, a floating ball blanket (both available from Sous Vide Tools) or cling film, in order to reduce evaporation.
When cooked, the meat will be soft and tender.
Drain the cooking juices and reserve them.
Peel the avocado and mash it with a fork, mixing in the chopped scallions, a tablespoon of cilantro, chopped jalapenos, salt and pepper and some lime juice.
Warm the tortillas be heating a spray of olive oil in a frying pan.
One at a time, place a tortilla in the pan and heat both sides, then take a teaspoon of the cooking juice and spread over the tortilla to soften it and infuse some flavour.
The tortilla will be soft, so turn it carefully onto a plate and serve piled high with the meat, some black beans, salsa, guacamole and sour cream

Check out Franglais Kitchen for more of Nazima’s work.

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Post by Chris Holland

Our Chef Director Chris Holland worked as Head Chef at the prestigious Alderley Edge hotel before joining us. He has a passion for using the best produce and never compromises on quality. Author of our best selling book Sous Vide The Art of Precision Cooking, Chris is a expert on the sous vide technique.During the later part of my school days at Wardle High School Rochdale I always wanted to be a chef . I knew from the very start that my path to work was never going to be academic it was always going to be something practical and hands on.

As a young boy growing up I was inspired to cook with my Grandma who was and still is an inspiration to me . I have memories of helping make the cakes that she always had made for visitors and family alike . She made the most amazing cakes and I loved nothing more than eating the sweet raw cake batter straight from the bowl . We used to fight over who got to lick the bowl/spoon after the cakes were made. My grandma’s philosophy for cooking even on a shoe string budget was always to use fresh and seasonal ingredients either home grown or bought from the market.

School was somewhat of a drag for me as I was itching to learn to become a chef.

I started at Hopwood Hall college as a chef and instantly fell in love with it .To me it was the only real time I excelled in something and this inspired me to really get my head down and put in the hard work. College was the first time I really excelled in something and gave me the opportunity to laugh at the teachers who said I would never make something of my life!!!!

During the three years at college I also took on a part time position in a local hotel working the bar and restaurant first and then the kitchen. These were great days and gave me the opportunity to see how the industry ticks. I learnt a lot from those days both good and bad !! But I have to say I was itching to work only in the kitchen but it was a good insight into the catering world .

After completing college I moved away from Rochdale for a full time roll at one of Cheshire’s most talked about Hotel restaurants The Stanneylands Hotel. This was the school of hard knocks for me as I quickly realised that although excelling at college meant nothing in “The Real World”.

I loved every minute of the 18 hour days 6 days a week on minimum wage . Although difficult I feel that without this grounding I wouldn’t have achieved what I have today. After 18 months of hard graft I left Stanneylands and went with the Head chef to open a fine dining restaurant at Mere Golf and Country Club. The opportunity to work alongside Matthew Barrett was too good to turn down. I learnt so much from the ex-Ritz chef and working in a much slower paced role helped me develop a much better understanding of how to organise and run a kitchen. We were a very small team and teamwork was and still is the only way to go for me.

After 2 years at Mere I got the opportunity to go into The Alderley Edge Hotel as Junior Souschef. The Early days at the Edge were all about learning new styles of cuising which is invaluable in any role as a chef. I got the opportunity to grow and learn all aspects of every section which was inspiring . I was offered the opportunity at the age of 29 (2004) to take the role of head chef. For me this was when I really started to develop my own style of food.

After 9 years at the top winning Cheshire restaurant of the year , Chef of the Year and appearing on GBM amongst many highlights including cooking for many celebrities and famous people I decided to move on into development with Sousvidetools.

The main inspiration for this was to train and educate people . I always had a great passion for education but could never really see myself at a college . The job is super rewarding and I am proud to say we have become the leading light in sous-vide education in the UK . This is something I am very proud of . Food is my biggest passion and this is what keeps me interested the most . I love to travel and try out other countries cuisines. I am constantly inspired by ingredients and the pursuit of getting the best out of them without destroying their natural flavour .It is super important to me to continue to try and be at the forefront of the food scene this is what inspire me and the team to keep driving forward .

Technology is now widely used in the industry and I am super proud to say we have been a big part of spreading that message.

I am very lucky to be in the position I am and the drive to constantly improve our training and links to the next generation of young budding hospitality chefs.

TI feel that my experience over the last 25 years really enables me to get close and educate the “next generation” of chefs .

The industry which I love is really struggling to bring through new recruits and if I can help that process I will be immensely proud.

The food seen in the Uk has improved dramatically over the last ten years and I feel this will continue with the correct education. What happens next only fate will tell us...

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