Overview of Anova Sous Vide Cooker

This is Part II of my Sous Vide Cooking series, focusing on the Anova Sous Vide Precision Cooker. You can read Part I, Introduction to Sous Vide Cooking, here.

Before buying new electronics and appliances, I always research online reviews. The Anova Sous Vide Precision Cooker, won high marks from The Sweet Home,  CNET, Gizmodo, and Sous Vide Guy. Anova brings significant expertise: prior to making immersion circulators, Anova focussed on lab equipment.

This updated cooker has a 900-watt element, an improved circulator, WiFi, and Bluetooth. It has a large dial that displays the current and target water temperature, as well as the cook time remaining. The bottom skirt can be removed for cleaning.

First Time Setup

You need to install the Anova Culinary mobile app on your smartphone. Then you need to pair your Anova cooker with your mobile app via Bluetooth. Finally, you need to configure your Anova Cooker for your WiFi network.

Using Your Anova Cooker

Returning to my example of cooking filet mignon via sous vide:

1. Season your steak and place it in a zip top bag.

2. Fill your stock pot with hot water and then secure your Anova cooker to the side of the stock pot.

3. Set your cooker for an hour at 130F.

4. Remove your steak from the water bath and zip top bag.

5. Sear your steak on a hot grill.

6. Let it rest, then cut and serve your steak.

WiFi and Google Home Connectivity

Ironically for someone who champions building a smart home, this is my first WiFi-enabled kitchen appliance. When Anova initially released the WiFi model, there seemed little benefit over a Bluetooth version other than your ability to walk beyond Bluetooth range. Last month, Anova added Amazon Echo and Google Home integration. This includes an interactive temperature and cook time configuration, called Guided Cooking.

Guided Cooking

Following is a sample interaction with Alexa or Google Home, provided by Anova.1

You: Alexa, ask Anova to help me cook a steak -or- Hey Google, tell Anova to help me cook a steak
 Alexa/Google Home: Steak has the following choices: A) Porterhouse, B) Ribeye, C) Strip, and D) Tenderloin. Which would you like?
 You: Ribeye
 Alexa/Google Home: How thick is your ribeye in inches?
 You: One point five inches
 Alexa/Google Home: The ribeye steak recipe has the following choices for how you can cook one point five inch thick ribeye: A) Very rare to rare, B) Medium rare, C) Medium, D) Medium well, and E) Well done. Which would you like?
 You: Medium-rare
 Alexa/Google Home: The precision cooker settings for Ribeye Steak using one point five inch ribeye cooked medium rare are 129 degrees for one hour. should I start your cooker with these settings?
 You: Yes
 Alexa/Google Home: I told Anova to start a cook for your Ribeye Steak at 129 degrees for one hour. Please refer to this recipe in the anova app for an ingredient list and full preparation steps.

Amazon Alexa / Google Home Interaction

Additionally, you can “Ask Anova to heat the water to _ degrees and set a timer for _ minutes,” or “Ask Anova how long it’s been cooking for,” or even “Ask Anova to give me help.” or “Ask Anova how long it’s been cooking for,” or even “Ask Anova to give me help.”

Recommended Cook Times

ChefSteps, a competitor of Anova, has a great sous vide cook time chart that you can download here.

Updated on May 14th, 2017