How to Cook with Steam Why Cook with Steam? Get Started with Steam Dive Deeper

How to Cook with Steam

Steaming Basics

Most of us think of steaming as a cooking method you perform on the stovetop with a basket and a pot of water. This is a great method for cooking foods like dumplings and vegetables, but steam can do so much more than that.

The Anova Precision™ Oven allows you to add steam or control the specific relative humidity inside the oven when you cook. Not only does this mean you can steam just about anything (no pot of boiling water needed), it also means your cooking is more precise and your food is more tender and delicious. Adding steam to a high-temperature cook increases efficiency, speeding up cooking time while preserving the moisture in your food. And using it at low temperatures makes it possible to replicate traditional sous vide cooking without a pot of water and a plastic bag.

Anova Precision Oven 2

Why Cook with Steam?

  • Quicker Cooking
  • Moisture Retention
  • Steam-Roasting
  • Professional-Quality Bread Baking

Imagine putting your hand in a 300°F (150°C) dry oven. After a minute it'll get uncomfortable, but otherwise, you're fine. Now, imagine placing your hand above a pot of vigorously boiling water. Within a second, your reflexes will rightly yank your hand away from danger, even though the steam above the pot is only 212°F (100°C). This is because steamy air carries a lot more energy than the same volume of dry air. Humid air is also a far better conductor of heat than dry air. This means that cooking with steam can deliver heat to food much faster than cooking in a dry oven.

But keep in mind, once the heat reaches the food's surface, the rest of the cooking speed is governed by the heat transfer within the food, which always moves at the same rate. This means that the speed benefit from steam cooking will be much more dramatic for thin foods like steaks and green beans than for thick foods like a prime rib roast.

When you're cooking in a traditional oven, the moisture in your food evaporates into the dry air. However, cooking in a low-temperature humid environment is a different story. When air is at 100% relative humidity, it can't absorb any more water. That means that the water in your food has no choice but to stay put.

This is only true at temperatures below the boiling point of water. At higher temperatures, moisture evaporation still takes place. This is a good thing! It allows for browning and caramelization.

It may sound counterintuitive, but you can also incorporate steam into recipes where you want to get a browned, charred exterior on foods. Because steam carries all of that energy to your food more quickly than dry air, you can quickly roast foods like broccoli and potatoes and end up with a tender core and crispy exterior.

Anova Precision Oven 2

Artisan bakers use specialized steam injection ovens to achieve crusty loaves of bread with an open, airy crumb. Steam is critical for this type of baking; it provides heat to the bread quickly so that the loaf gets maximum oven spring (the period of growth at the start of baking before the crust has set). Steam also slows the exterior from setting too early and contributes to the creation of a shiny, crispy crust.

Anova Precision Oven 2
Anova Precision Oven 2

Get Started with Steam

In the Anova Oven App, you can select the Steam Quick Start or add steam using Manual Control.

With a Precision™ Oven 1.0, you can adjust steam on the oven handle in 5% increments.

With a Precision™ Oven 2.0, select one of the following cooking modes: Steam, Steam-Roast, Steam-Bake, or Sous Vide Mode (more on that below). You'll be able to adjust the steam or humidity percentage from the next screen. You can also use steam in the Manual Cooking Mode by adjusting the steam percentage under the oven temperature. Keep in mind that you cannot adjust the convection fan with steam turned on.

Anova Precision Oven 2 DIVE DEEPER

How Does Steam Work in the APO?

In a stovetop steamer, you get one setting: full steam at 212°F (100°C). But with the Precision™ Oven, you can add as little or as much steam as you'd like over the full temperature range of the oven. Depending on the oven temperature, the injected steam will function a little differently.

Below 212°F (100°C)

The amount of steam is measured in terms of relative humidity. Relative humidity is a measure of how much water is in the air; you might already be familiar with relative humidity as the term that's often used in weather forecasts. A high level of relative humidity feels muggy and a low level of relative humidity feels dry. If you set your cook to 185°F (85°C) with 75% steam, the oven will maintain an internal relative humidity of 75%.

Above 212°F (100°F)

The steam percentage indicates the amount of power used by the boiler to generate steam. In this mode, steam generation is constant and steady throughout the cooking process. If you open the oven door, the boiler will kick on high for a few seconds to replenish lost steam before returning back to the normal rate of steam generation. At these temperatures, you can think of 100% steam as the maximum amount of steam you can push into the oven. Lower percentages are fractions of that amount, so 50% steam is half as much steam as 100%, and so on.

Anova Precision Oven 2

Why Have Two Different Modes?

We built the Precision™ Oven's boiler to operate in two different ways because the concept of relative humidity does not apply when the oven is hotter than the boiling point of water. As you get hotter than 212°F (100°C), the maximum possible relative humidity plunges from 100% to very small numbers. Rather than have you worry about the math, we've made the steam controls the same, no matter the oven temperature you set. The result? Your sous vide steak will cook in an environment of 100% relative humidity, with the boiler just sipping water and energy to maintain stasis. But your basmati rice and whole artichokes are bathed in powerful, continuous steam to ensure predictable, consistent cooking.