Darcy v. The Pressure Cooker, Round Three

It had me against the ropes, doubting my abilities as a cook, wondering if I had wasted all that money buying the Fagor instead of something cheaper, but then after a long round that started Sunday night I finally claimed victory in the pressure cooking beans battle. This time it was chickpeas.

After a mushy round two a few weeks ago I sat down with Google for a few minutes and learned that America’s Test Kitchen (producers of Cooks Illustrated magazine as well as a great public television show) recommend brining the beans. That’s right. Going against all conventional wisdom that beans and salt should not touch until after the beans are cooking they recommend soaking dried beans in salt water (3/4 Tbsp. of salt per quart of water) prior to cooking the beans. I gave it a try and the results were beautiful.

I got the beans soaking Sunday night in four quarts of water with three tablespoons of sea salt. When I drained off the soaking liquid yesterday evening there was not a split skin in the entire pound of chickpeas. I exaggerate not. I rinsed them thoroughly to remove all of the salty water then dumped them in the pressure cooker as usual with fresh, unsalty water and cooked as I had been all those other times. The results were stunning. Every single chickpea remained whole and intact. Not a speck of mush was to be seen, and they are the best tasting chickpeas I have ever put in my mouth though I say it myself. I see chickpea tabouleh, hummus, and all sorts of beautiful curries in my future.

I can’t wait to try it again with another batch of black beans. Yippee!

How Many More Have to Die?

This week another person died from the new e. coli strain. First beans and then cucumbers were blamed. Then “they” said, “Maybe not.” It could very well be that cucumbers are the vehicle by which nearly three thousand people were sickened by the virus, but they can’t be the cause. That would be a biological impossibility, and I’m stunned that anyone connected with investigations into this new e. coli would suggest such a thing.

E. Coli is an intestinal pathogen, meaning it infects animals. Cucumbers are not animals. Cucumbers can be contaminated by e. coli certainly, but that would mean coming into contact with a substance that had come from an infected animal. The most likely culprit would be an irrigation water supply that has been contaminated by factory farm waste.

Factory farmers, in their quest to fulfill our insatiable hunger for cheap meat, routinely pump their animals full of antibiotics just to keep them alive long enough to make it to market because they live in such cramped and unsanitary conditions. These feces-filled farms are breeding grounds for all sorts of bacteria and other dangerous microbes. Long-term use of broad spectrum antibiotics, as any medical doctor will tell you, eventually renders the antibiotics ineffective. Viruses and bacteria are adept at mutating new strains that are resistant to standard treatments. These new strains are present by the trillions in waste matter from these animals, which not only contaminate the meat the farms produce, but also surrounding water supplies which are used to irrigate crops.

Tragically children are especially vulnerable to these diseases. Is your beloved meat really worth risking your life or the lives of your family? How long will it be before we realize that we are doing this to ourselves because of our desire for a mere food product? It would be laughable if it wasn’t so sad.

Darcy vs. The Pressure Cooker, Round Two

Once again I pulled the pressure cooker out of my pantry and set about cooking up beans: black, kidney, Great Northern. I had soaked all three varieties overnight and got to work early Saturday afternoon. And once again I had beans that smooshed everywhere, only they didn’t taste overcooked this time. I was starting to get frustrated until I realized the reason for all the smooshiness wasn’t overcooking, but that several beans had split while soaking. Without intact skins to hold the bean together the split beans smooshed all over the whole beans making a bit of a mess, tasty mess though it was.

 

So back to the drawing board. The next attempt will include garbanzo beans and a brining technique. I have read that soaking the beans in salty water will prevent splitting. No split skins will hopefully mean no pressure cooker with a layer of smoosh on the bottom. We shall see. The next round will take place in a week or two and of course I’ll give you the blow by blow here.

Tricolor Veggie Whole Wheat Pasta

Last week I was reading The Italian Issue of Bon Appetit magazine and was inspired by the article "How to Make Perfect Pasta" and the technique they used. Rather than make one of their recipes I wanted to try creating a dish on my own and turned to the Italian flag for inspiration. I pulled red bell pepper, zucchini, half an onion, and some fresh basil from the fridge and got to work. Here’s what I came up with:

Tricolor Veggie Whole Wheat Pasta

2 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

½ red bell pepper, thinly sliced

½ medium zucchini, very thinly sliced

½ small onion, thinly sliced

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 cup whole wheat fusili, penne, or other short pasta, uncooked

¼ tsp red pepper flakes (or to taste)

2 tbs chopped fresh basil

1 tsp nutritional yeast

Salt to taste

Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan over medium high heat. Add the veggies and garlic, sprinkle with a little salt and sauté until the veggies are tender and there is some color on them. Meanwhile bring two quarts of water to boil in a large saucepan. Add a small palmful of salt to the water and then add the pasta. Cook until about two minutes from al dente. Drain the pasta, saving about ½ cup of the pasta water, and set aside.

Once the veggies are tender, reduce the heat to medium and add a little of the reserved pasta water to the pan. Simmer for a couple of minutes to make a pan sauce. Add the pasta and red pepper flakes, stirring the pasta constantly for about two minutes, until the pasta is al dente and coated in the sauce. If necessary add a little more of the pasta water to loosen up the sauce. Remove the pasta pan from the heat. Stir in the nutritional yeast and basil and stir until the yeast is incorporated and basil is wilted. Add a little more salt if necessary, drizzle with a little more olive oil and serve.

Makes two small-ish servings or one pasta lover’s size serving. :-)

 
Thanks to Bon Appetit for the fabulous article and techniques that inspired this dish.

It’s Farmer’s Market Time!

The weather is warming up and that can mean only one thing: summer is coming and with it farmer’s markets will be popping up all over the landscape. Farmer’s markets are a great opportunity for communities to bring consumers together with local growers, bakers, beekeepers, ranchers, and more. Buying at your farmer’s market supports the local economy, promotes a health environment (by purchasing those blueberries and peaches from a local farm rather than those trucked to Walmart from 1500 miles away), and gives you the opportunity to meet the person who grows your food. Concerned about pesticides and chemical fertilizers? Just ask. More and more growers are following organic growing practices, but cannot afford the fees for USDA organic certification, allowing them to use the familiar organic logo.

There are at least two summer markets near my home and last Saturday I visited one of them. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much there in the way of produce, but I found a local baker who makes excellent bread. I will definitely be buying from her again.

If you don’t have a farmer’s market in your area, you can still buy local seasonal produce at your natural foods market. My Whole Foods hosts a farmer’s market once a week during the summer, and year round they clearly mark local produce and other products in the store. Prominent signage also keeps customers informed about what produce is in season at the moment.

 
What about you? Do you shop at farmer’s markets?

One Year . . . And Counting

Today marks one year since I started eating vegetarian, and what an interesting year it has been. I’ve tried foods I had never tried before, recipes I had never made before, and I’ve loved every meal of it. I can’t imagine ever going back to a meat-eating lifestyle.

Making a conscious decision to leave behind eating animals is one of the best decisions I have ever made in my life. From it I have gleaned an awareness of how important food choices are for one’s overall health. When I purchase food that is good for me, good for the environment, and reduces the demand for meat it does more for me than contribute to my physical health. Making a compassionate decision with my wallet is also good for my spirit. At the risk of sounding new age-y or mystical, being connected to my food in such a good way just makes me feel better all around.

I cannot imagine that the Lord ever intended for His creation to be used and abused in the way it has been over the last several decades. Once confronted with the evidence of factory farming, I knew I had a decision to make. I could continue to provide money to companies who exploit animals (and even people) for profit or I could spend my food budget dollars more wisely. It is a question of stewardship, and I have made the choice to distance myself from factory farming, from pain and misery, and from poor health.

It’s not always easy and sometimes it’s downright inconvenient, but doing a good thing isn’t always convenient. Sometimes it means eating peanut butter or salad more often than I would wish, or having a small snack and delaying a meal, but it’s worth it. Lord willing, I look forward to many years of vegetarianism ahead of me.

Darcy vs. The Pressure Cooker, Round 1

Several months ago an acupuncturist and expert in Eastern medicine recommended that I buy a pressure cooker. Since I eat so many beans she thought I could save money and eat better even if I only used it as a bean/rice cooker. She said I could cook beans in mere minutes with no added sodium and they would taste better too since they wouldn’t be swimming in canning liquid for who knows how long. They also store well in the freezer. Potentially I could have the equivalent of a pantry full of beans for a fraction of the price of canned. I filed away this information until a week and a half ago when I finally bought that pressure cooker.

While doing some research, I learned that Macy’s carries Fagor pressure cookers, a great brand (no affiliation), and I decided that if I wanted a cooker that would last me for years with no trouble then I needed to invest in a good one. I couldn’t be happier with my purchase though I was rather intimidated by it at first. I took it home, opened the box, flipped through the instruction booklet and cookbook and then put it away. It looked even more complicated than I had originally thought. Also I had not a dry bean in the house. OK, I was really just trying to work up my courage to try it out.

The next time I was at Whole Foods I bought one pound of black beans to experiment with and set them to soak over Friday night. Bright and early Saturday morning I was in the kitchen ready to attempt to trust what Fagor was telling me: that I could get fully cooked black beans in only 8-10 minutes. I had read all the instructions (yes, I’m that type of person) and even watched the demo DVD. It seemed pretty straight forward.

Pressure cookers work best with gas ranges, where adjustments to heat respond more quickly than with electric ranges. Alas, since I have an electric range I had to choose between one of two methods for cooking. With the two-burner method you turn one burner to high (for building up pressure in the cooker) and another burner to low (to maintain pressure for the actual cooking). You can also use a one-burner method with which you set the burner to medium (for building up pressure) and then turn it down to low for the cooking. I decided to try the two-burner method.

Into the pot went the beans, water, and vegetable oil (to prevent the beans from building up foam in the pressure cooker). I locked the lid in place turned the burner up to high and waited. Sure enough after several minutes the water started to boil, building up steam pressure within the cooker. The pressure indicator popped up and a blast of steam shot out of the operating valve. I set the timer, moved the cooker to the second burner and watched and waited.

Here’s where I started to lose confidence. The instruction booklet said there should be a steady, gentle flow of steam from the valve. Hmmmm. My idea of “steady and gentle” might be a “trickle” to Fagor or vice versa. I still wasn’t trusting that beans could cook completely in only 8 minutes so I opted to keep the heat up a little higher than what my range considers low and waited for the timer to go off. As soon as it did I moved the cooker to an unused burner and waited for the pressure to drop naturally (per Fagor’s recommendation). Once the little pressure indicator retracted I unlocked the lid and found half a pound of quite overcooked beans. Wow. I was disappointed that I had overcooked them but was delighted to discover for myself how well this pressure cooker works.

The beans were usable anyway. Some went into a pot of soup that night, and another bunch went into a pureed black bean dip for a party. I can’t wait to try it out again. My shopping list already includes kidney, garbanzo, great northern, and of course more black beans. Now I just need to find more room in my freezer.