Two adults, small kitchen, one free shelf. The slow cooker does chilli, pulled pork and stews and I have never once been unhappy with the result. Everything I read about sous vide is steak, and we eat steak maybe twice a month. Is there a category of food where the water bath genuinely wins, or is this already solved for the way we cook?
For your actual list I would say it is a downgrade. Chilli and stew want browning, reduction and evaporation, and a sealed bag gives you none of those - you end up searing separately, straining liquid off and reducing it in a pan anyway, which is three washing up items for the same bowl of food. Buy it when you want a specific steak or a batch of chicken, not to replace a pot that already works.
Agreed on stews, and I would still take the pork shoulder in a bag over the slow cooker version for texture. But you are right that it costs an extra pan and forty minutes to get there.
Cheap steak, chicken breast, custards, and anything you want to cook on Sunday and eat on Wednesday. If none of those are in your rotation, keep your shelf.
Practical note on the counter space worry: a stick circulator lives in a drawer and clamps to a stockpot you already own, so it is not the same footprint problem as the slow cooker. Time-wise it is worse for your current menu, not better - eight hours in a slow cooker becomes a longer cook in a bath and then a pan to finish. It only pays off if the thing you want is precision rather than convenience.
I bought one, used it enthusiastically for a month, then about six times in the following year, and the reason was exactly what you suspect - the food I actually cook does not need it. It came back into rotation only when I started batch cooking lunches. If you are not going to batch, the honest answer is you will love it in January and forget it by March.
@cast_iron_carl · 6mo ago · 2 replies
I own both and use both, and the honest division is that the slow cooker wins anything you want to fall apart in liquid, and the water bath wins anything you want to stop at a specific texture. Chicken breast is the one that converted me - it is the difference between edible and actually good, and no slow cooker will do it. Pulled pork in a bag is a fun trick and it is not better than yours.
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@tension_dial · 6mo ago
Chicken breast and eggs, for me. Everything else I could live without and those two changed what I cook on a weeknight.
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