Eating in a box

So I hosted what I dubbed a "Sous Vide Summit" at my house this weekend. What does that mean? It means getting a bunch of foodies interested in Sous Vide method of cooking, the result is a meat-a-thon of unbelievably tasty treats. I had a great time and am very glad to finally be back in the swing of having dinner parties. Although a bit of work prepping and cleaning, the fun with friends new and old is always a blast. Lots of pictures to share today so hang on to your hats for what probably will be a long winded post. So to start, my own contribution to this shin dig was possibly the easiest (not that seasoning, vacuum sealing food, and dumping the package into perfectly controlled water is hard by any means) my experiment was to show case various grades and cuts of steak each cooked at the magical perfect 134 degrees Fahrenheit or better known as Medium Rare. If you click in you can see the steaks raw side by side, we have from left to right, three rib eye steaks USDA Prim...

Well naturally after a trip to Costa Rica I *had* to do a bento on the subject. To be fair the only thing I did eat there that was in this lunch was the Gallo Pinto. The real inspiration is courtesy of my friend Kelly who picked me up from the airport and took me to his favorite bar for some Chifrijo which I talked about earlier . Kelly was nice enough to score me a book of Costa Rican traditional dishes, his estimate was that it was more like the normal day to day stuff that folks would cook in their own kitchen nothing too fancy, right up my alley. We start our meal off with Tortas De Carne, or simply put beef patty, I like to think of them as squashed meatballs. I will say one of the hardest things about this bento was sourcing some of the ingredients. I had the forethought to bring home some Salsa Lizano a local variant on Worcester sauce that the local use on *everything*. It's thicker than Worcester sauce, has the same tang but has a slight spicy component that makes it inter...