By Claire Reilly

With the launch of the Sous Vide Supreme to the market, Breville has brought the benefits of professional-level cooking equipment to regular consumers. But for many consumers that walk into a retail store, sous vide will be a totally unknown quantity. How does it work? How difficult is it to do? What's involved in the finer points of using a Sous Vide Appliance.

With a little guidance from celebrity chef Pete Evans, Current.com.au got a hands-on lesson in the finer points of sous vide cooking. Our summary? The set-and-forget convenience of a slow cooker but with food that tastes like it was delivered straight from a restaurant.

For retailers wanting to get a better idea of how to sell this new breed of appliance to consumers, here's our blow-by-blow guide to cooking sous vide style…

Chef Pete Evans talks about the benefits of Sous Vide cooking.

Breville's Sous Vide Supreme holds 11 litres of water and features racks for spacing out food. Users set a precise temperature for the water bath inside the appliance — anywhere between 48° Celsius for fish and 75° for a well-done steak — and the water bath cooks the food evenly throughout.

Food needs to be vaccum sealed before it is cooked — Breville includes a vacuum sealer with the purchase of the Sous Vide Supreme.

In his demonstration, Pete Evans also prepared Sous Vide potatoes, beetroots and steak. Evans advised that steak should be grilled off after it’s removed from the bag for the final touch — Breville includes a Thermal Pro Grill as a bonus with the purchase price of the Sous Vide for this very reason.

Also included is a Sous Vide cookbook and spare vacuum sealing bags. Extra bags can be bought from retailers and Breville’s website.

Sealing the fish takes a few seconds.

In today’s demonstration for Current.com.au, the appliance easily fit five separately bagged pieces of salmon.

The salmon was cooked at 48° Celsius for twenty minutes.

After 20 minutes, the salmon is ready to be removed. According to both Breville category manager for cooking, Sharon Lenzner, and Pete Evans, sealed foods can stay in the bath for longer without becoming overcooked. In this case, the fish could happily wade in its bath for an hour.

The finished result — Sous Vide salmon with tahini and tabouleh.

You're only as good as your last Instagram update: Pete Evans takes a picture of his creation.