Fine dining is full of highfalutin French words. You’ll see them at just about every French restaurant in the country. Prix fixe for a price-fixed menu. Une degustation for a tasting menu. Apertif for a pre-dinner cocktail. Amuse-bouche for a bite-sized snack. If they don’t trip off your tongue, the words will definitely trip it up.

 We’ve been speaking a lot of French lately because there’s a new French word that’s traveling the tongues of American chefs these days. It’s sous vide, and it’s one of the most delicious words we’ve ever tasted.

 That’s because sous vide, French for “under vacuum,” describes a unique “Cryovacked” cooking technique whereby chefs place ingredients inside a vacuum-sealed plastic bag that’s cooked at a super low temperature-usually around 140 degrees Fahrenheit-for a super long time-sometimes for as long as 24 hours-while submerged in liquid. You can cook meat, chicken, fish, vegetables and even fruit sous vide. And when you do? The result is fantastic food. It’s juicier (sous vide naturally tenderizes food by slowly breaking down its fibers), prettier (sous vide prevents food from breaking down, thereby preserving its texture and color), more flavorful (sous vide produces more concentrated flavors, highlighting natural tastes) and-supposedly-more nutritious (sous vide, because it is so gentle and requires very little oil, butter or stock, is said to preserve the nutritional qualities of many foods) than your typical rich French fare.

We know, because we’ve tasted sous vide preparations firsthand-twice! First, we sampled sous vide swordfish in Las Vegas at Andre’s, courtesy of Chef Andre Rochat, who told us in a special interview all about his Cryovac cooking technique. Then, we tasted Chef Daniel Angerer’s Cryovacked Shrimp Carpaccio at Klee Brasserie in New York. Both were amazing, and turned us into true sous vide converts.

We’re not the only ones, though. Top chefs around the country, including Thomas Keller, Joel Robuchon, Charlie Trotter and Wylie Dufresne, are falling in love with sous vide.

Although their fascination is new, the technique itself isn’t. According to The New York Times, sous vide has been around since the late 1960s and was first popularized in 1974 by Chef George Pralus, who eventually opened his own Cryovac school.