Keeping bags submerged is the only way to guarantee food is heated properly when cooked sous vide. Here's how to keep a stubborn floating bag under the water.
Kenji is the former culinary director for Serious Eats and a current culinary consultant for the site. He is also a New York Times food columnist and the author of The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science.
One of the most common sous vide difficulties that I get emails about is floating bags. A few things can cause a bag to float. The first is an imperfect seal—the air is trapped in there to begin with. (This is especially likely to happen if you are using the water displacement method to remove air from a zipper-lock bag, rather than an actual dedicated vacuum sealer.) With high temperatures or prolonged cooks, vapor can also form inside the bag as water is heated and evaporates, or as air bubbles trapped inside meat or vegetables escape. Bags can also float if the food you're cooking is less dense than water (think sous vide bacon with extra-fatty pieces).
With sous vide cooking, it's absolutely vital that your bags stay submerged and that trapped air bubbles are pushed to the top of the bag and away from the food. This is the only way to guarantee that your food is heating properly, which is important for both food safety and quality.
So how do you get a persistently floating bag to sink? Some people recommend sealing a heavy butter knife or spoon directly into the bag. This works, but it requires foresight; I can't always predict when a bag is going to float, and I don't want to have to open up a sealed bag to add a weight to it. Much easier is the method shown in this video.
All you've got to do is clamp a large binder clip on the bottom of the bag, then slip a heavy spoon into the mouth of the clip. The head of the spoon will keep it from falling out, and the weight should keep your food submerged. For especially stubborn bags, you can add a few spoons.
I keep a box of those binder clips with all my other sous vide gear. They're also great for clipping bags to the edge of your cooking container to keep things nice and tidy as they cook.
All you've got to do is clamp a large binder clip on the bottom of the bag, then slip a heavy spoon into the mouth of the clip. The head of the spoon will keep it from falling out, and the weight should keep your food submerged. For especially stubborn bags, you can add a few spoons.
Air pockets in sous vide bags occur when either the bag has been improperly sealed or the uneven distribution of ingredients causes a void. Roughly cut or whole vegetables with irregular shapes or meats with stiff corners (from bone or fat) can trap air within the bag.
The key is that you don't want air between your food and the bag, because it won't conduct the heat from the water. So if you can't make a vacuum, the thing to do is use a zip lock and slowly submerge your bag into a pot of water, or into the sous-vide container.
If you don't have a vacuum sealer, try the water displacement method to remove as much air as possible. Without oxygen, the bag naturally sinks to the bottom of the water bath and stays submerged throughout the cooking process. The double–bag method is another effective way to prevent floating sous vide bags.
With high temperatures or prolonged cooks, vapor can also form inside the bag as water is heated and evaporates, or as air bubbles trapped inside meat or vegetables escape. Bags can also float if the food you're cooking is less dense than water (think sous vide bacon with extra-fatty pieces).
Another solution for sous vide bags that are trying to float is to weight them down. The extra weight will counteract the bouyancy of the air or food and help hold the bag in place. There are many options for weighting down a bag, including: Put a few heavy butter knifes in the bag with the food.
Ensure that the bag is large or deep enough for whatever you're cooking to be completely submerged by water while the top remains clipped to the side of the container. ...
Keep the unsealed opening OUT of the water AT ALL TIMES.
At its most fundamental level, sous vide cooking is the process of sealing food in an airtight container—usually a vacuum sealed bag—and then cooking that food in temperature-controlled water. In French, the term translates to "under vacuum," which makes sense.
How to Seal Sous Vide Bags. We recommend folding over the edge of the bag to keep it clean before you start to put the food in. Then fill with your ingredients, checking with the vacuum-sealing machine manufacturer's instructions to ensure that you do not overfill. Overfilling can make it difficult to get a seal.
For optimal outcomes, we recommend the following rules of thumb: Don't hold foods longer at cooking temperature for double of their minimum cooking time (see Typhur Sous Vide Station guide for time and temperature). Keep the total cooking duration (including the hold time) under 72 hours.
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