FOAS, the the STC 1000 is not a PID controller. I think it is just a digital thermostatic controlled relay. It can control a heater and a refrigerator at the same time and it has some delay logic in turning the heater/refrigerator on/off. For the heater, I use a stove heating element or a domestic hot water heating element. They are very cheap and they last a long time. In general, they are high wattage/220v heaters (2,000W to 4,000W). However, you can run them at 110V and the wattages become about 1/4. Angie, yeas the Cal 9300 is expensive and they don't even give you the thermocouple sensor with it. I like the cheap PIDs because they have dual displays, set themperature and real time temperature. I am very impressed that you have done Op-amp work. Programing op-amps require real electronic know-how. Anyone else who may be reading this thread, FYI, a sous vide cooker cannot make crepes. LOL! dcarch

Oy. I'll have to check. Dcarch, do you have suggestions? ETA: In the preamble to his basic techniques chapter, he compares a convection steam oven's lack of consistent enough temperature (stated to be insufficient for using his tables) to water bath, and, in the next paragraph, explicitly states his converse, in the topic sentence, as "circulating water baths heat very uniformly". From that one may infer that he does, indeed, mean circulating. I was trained at a young age to read Engineer, and this is a prime example of the lingo. Sigh. And I'm grateful to FOAS for the link. There may well be some trial and error going on here... That's another great thing about starting with cooked. Not going to poison people with the experiments. :) But mostly, there's no point in partially cooking meatballs, and they'd squish too much if they were raw. I did one bag of turkey balls which weren't frozen enough before I vacuumed and they sort of squished too. Not big wet squishy, just not as solid as the ones that were frozen hard through. If they come out a little funny shaped, no one will care...but me. :( Much better booboo than undercooked!

The Anova box was on a promotional e-mail. I really didn't need it at all, but I'm very pleased with it. The e-mail was entitled "Hurry before they are gone", though it was a pre-issue promotion. Since it arrived immediately, I have to think they were already ready to ship. I don't know if the "hurry" was a marketing ploy or if they're not going to be keeping these in stock permanently. I just was in the mood, having just done the cheese. It's not like blintzes are daily, or even monthly, food. It'll just be so much easier to open the cheese, take its temperature, cut the curds, etc., if the whole deal is on the counter, and a roaster pan has too much evaporation and is too in the way... Anyway, sometimes I get all happy from having a new, mostly useless, toy, and I'm delighted. I think it's the blackest thing I own. It's like black hole black. Even white light doesn't bounce off it. Kind of beautiful and spooky. Here's the flyer: Anova Box Re blintz flavors, I think too much sugar overwhelms the distinctively blintzy flavor, though it does well for disguising having the wrong cheese. :) OTOH, nothing wrong with a sweet blintz with blueberries or mint. Or raisins. If you want traditional Northern European, they're served with sour cream and applesauce. You don't combine the two, but many will alternate bites, to maximize the tickling of the taste buds. My applesauce secret is to cook the apples down in TJ's sparkling apple cider rather than sugar and water. It keeps it very apple-y and has just the right amount of sugar, not too much. (The latter part is why I use that particular cider, but any would do. If it's too sweet, there's always water. :) ) On the blintz making, I can only hope for intelligible instructions. Do you have a hand crank rotary egg beater?

I think I do 135 (usually look it up). I don't mind the milkiness. I know only one egg in 20K has salmonella, and the growers I buy from have generally better practices and less endemic disease, and I have no problem tasting raw batter. Still, if I'm making mayonnaise or sweets or something, and really need pasteurized eggs, I want to err on the side of caution. i have Anova immersion circulator, and I got a lid when they were on sale. It's just a silicone cover with a cutout for the circulator. You could make the same thing from a garage sale Tupperware top or even a scrap of plywood. It goes on my 2 qt. Anchor Hocking measuring jug, which is heavy enough to support the circulator, and I can do at least half a dozen eggs in not much water waste, and no rolling around or breakage, especially being to see through the side to make sure the eggs don't block the circulation holes in the stick.