Sous Vide and Raw Garlic

In the General Sous Vide Questions Forum
I had read some time ago that raw garlic should not be used with sous vide cooking methods because potential problems with botulism. I was just on the PolyScience web site. They have some videos labelled as from William Sonoma demonstrating how to cook a turkey for thanksgiving, and they pop two cloves into the bag with the thighs. So, what's up?

I would expect both PolyScience and William Sonoma would be very careful with suggesting that could be dangerous to their customers. Has there been a rethinking on the prohibition of raw garlic and sous vide? Is the risk reduced since they were up at 150F for the water bath temp?

I'm curious to get other people's opinions.
Thanks
By Dean on Saturday, November 19, 2011 at 08:16 AM


2 Replies So Far

I know Botulism is a major concern with sous vide in general but hadn't heard it in regards to garlic specifically. The main reason I've heard for not using raw garlic is that it tends to be much stronger and more bitter than usual, so garlic powder is usually substituted.

I could obviously be wrong about this but that's at least what I had learned.
By Jason Logsdon on Saturday, November 19, 2011 at 02:45 PM
Agree with Jason. The usual caution is that raw garlic is too strong a flavor for sous vide cooking, though we have found that it’s perfectly useable in small amounts. Concerns about botulism are relevant if you’re storing garlic in oil for a prolonged period, but I don’t think a sous vide turkey recipe courts danger.
By Pete Johnson on Tuesday, November 22, 2011 at 06:18 AM


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