Table of Contents
Introduction
Its so easy and fast to make meals in a pressure cooker, we cant imagine why everyone doesnt use one! You simply fill it up with your ingredients, put on the lid, set it on the stove, and crank up the heat, and in 70 percent less time than youd need to cook the same meal using conventional cooking methods, youre sitting down to a delicious, homemade meal.
This wasnt always the case, however. In the 1940s and 1950s, manufacturers produced inexpensive, low-quality pressure cookers that were prone to rupture, explode, and send supper to the ceiling. Over time, cooks relegated their cookers to the back burner and turned their attention to more reliable modern appliances such as the microwave oven.
Fortunately, todays pressure cookers are equipped with a bevy of safety features that make them 100 percent safe, fool-proof, and able to cook practically any kind of food to perfectionfrom corn on the cob and roast beef to chocolate fudge and lemon cream pie. After decades of suffering a bad reputation, pressure cooking is finally enjoying a well-deserved Renaissance, with nearly 2 million cookers sold every year in the past 5 years.
If youve been afraid to buy a pressure cooker for fear it might destroy your mealor maybe even your kitchenthis book will erase those fears and show you how to turn your pressure cooker into your very own personal chef.
For starters, pressure cooking is one of the fastest ways to get a meal on the table. If youre making pot roast, stews, or homemade spaghetti, a pressure cooker can collapse cooking time from several hours to several minutes. When youre crunched for time, a pressure cooker can mean the difference between eating nutritious, tasty meals and being forced to resort to that other kind of fast food, which is often high in fat and calories, low in nutrients and fiber, and devoid of taste.
Pressure cookers are also an economical way to cook, allowing you to feed the entire family for what youd spend on one meal at a restaurant. Your pressure cooker excels at turning inexpensive cuts of meat into tender, juicy morsels, and at turning a handful of inexpensive grains and vegetables into a savory soup, stew, or curry.
Unlike conventional cooking methods, which wash out valuable nutrients, pressure cookers preserve the flavors, colors, textures, and nutrients of foods, so you get more vitamins, minerals, and fiber for your food dollar. In addition, the high cooking temperature used with pressure cookers kills off most harmful bacteria and helps prevent food poisoning.
A pressure cooker is an extremely versatile kitchen appliance that allows you to prepare nearly any type of food in practically any way, including steaming, boiling, sauting, pureing, roasting, baking, braising, poaching, steam roasting, and stewing. With a pressure cooker, you wont have to invest in a steamer, an oven roaster, baking pans, saut pans, sauce pans, skillets, dessert pans, slow cookers, or a microwave oven. Besides dollars spent on pots and pans, youll also save on kitchen counter and cabinet space!
The pressure cooker makes cooking so easy, we predict youll become a more confident and adventurous cook. You, too, can create homemade soups, stews, sauces, and stocks without being glued to the Food Channel or going to an expensive cooking class.
We love the pressure cooker, but we admit its not a wonder machine. There are a few things it cant do, such as produce a fluffy omelet, a crispy pepperoni pizza, a savory gazpacho, or a fragrant loaf of yeast bread. But when you understand your pressure cookers limitations as well as its full potential, you may wonder how you ever made a meal without one.
How This Book Is Organized
Part 1, Getting Started, teaches you everything you need to know before using a pressure cooker for the first time. We explain how a pressure cooker works, how theyve evolved over the years, and why theyre faster and more efficient than conventional cooking methods. We also show you the many different ways you can cook using your pressure cooker, the best foods for pressure cooking, along with some necessary accessories. Tips for cleaning, maintaining, and storing your pressure cooker so it lasts for years are also shared.
Part 2, Sensational Starters, shows you how to use your pressure cooker to make fast, easy, and delicious dishes that start off any day or meal right. Youll find recipes for dips, appetizers, finger foods, and salads, as well as egg-based dishes that work great for breakfast, brunch, or a light bite any time of day.
Part 3, Soups On!, demonstrates how to use the pressure cooker to make fast and delicious homemade stocks, soups, and chowders from scratch. The recipes in Part 3 run the gamut, from vegetable soups and stocks, to meaty soups with foreign flair, to tasty poultry soups, to seafood-based soups.
Part 4, Sultry Stews and Curries, shows you how to create innovative stews and curries in record time using vegetables, meat, poultry, seafood, and a dash of seasonings and spices. From homey chicken stews that warm a cold winters night, to sophisticated five-alarm curries that ignite everyones taste buds, youll find a stew or curry for every occasion.
Part 5, Everyday Entres, demonstrates how to use your pressure cooker to create effortless entres and one-pot wonders, with recipes for everything from Monday night suppers to special company dinners. You also learn how to make amazing main dishes that revolve around beef, poultry, pork, ham, and lamb.
Part 6, On the Side, teaches you how to make scrumptious side dishes that add interest and variety to a meal. You learn how to make amazing grains without the hassles of soaking, as well as sauces, toppings, and condiments that add fun and flavor to any dish.
Part 7, Sweet Surrender, reveals the secret sweet side of pressure cooking and shows you how to make delicate desserts and melt-in-your-mouth confections that give any meal a grand finale. From cheesecakes, custards, and puddings, to fruity desserts and fudge, these recipes are guaranteed to satisfy the most discriminating sweet tooth.
Extras
Throughout the book, we give you sidebars that provide extra information, helpful tips, and fascinating facts. Heres what to look for:
FOODIE FACT
Check out these sidebars for fascinating food facts, culinary trivia, and amusing quotes about food. Youll impress your friends and sound like a real foodie!
PRESSURE POINTER
Pressure Pointers are full of helpful tips and suggestions to make pressure cooking faster, easier, safer, and more fun.
STEAM SPEAK
Cooking has a language of its own, and if you dont know what something means, it could affect the final outcome of the recipe. Check out these sidebars for helpful definitions and explanations.
