Happy 30th Birthday Greg!

Today is all about Greg. My best friend turns 30 today! 

Greg has been writing a few posts here lately, which you can find here, and will be writing some more in the near future! 

At the end of September, we will be celebrating our birthdays together by going on a short trip to Seattle and Portland. Greg has been working on a budget travel series which will be posted while we are away. There will also be posts on thrifty travel in other ways, like recommendations for good places to find deals online, how to pack efficiently and just use carry-on, and some reviews of travel products! 

Did you catch Greg's series on pressure cookers, called Under Pressure: A Succinct Guide to Pressure Cooking? He also wrote a great post on Dutch ovens, too. We just got our grill from CSN stores to review, and he'll be creating an exciting series on cast iron cookware shortly! 

The Down-Low on Dutch Ovens (Or Cocottes)

One of the very first times I cooked anything on my own, it was up in the Rockies over a campfire. Potatoes, carrots, sage, onions, salt, and garlic tossed in a Dutch Oven with a stick of butter, half on top, half underneath. After leaving it on the coals while my buddy and I went for a hike (don't worry, there were adults at camp watching the fire), I opened the lid on that baby and thought I was a culinary prodigy.

Ever since, having a Dutch Oven in the kitchen has seemed like a secret weapon. At least I thought it was secret, unknown in contemporary North America to nearly all but grannies, campers, and foodies—and then a few years ago, it seemed like they started popping up all over the place. 

I blame it on the truly delicious, though super-hyped, "no-knead" bread recipe featured in the New York Times. Of course, I'm not sure that that's the causation. Perhaps it was TV Chefs, the renaissance of French cooking in America, or the increasing availability of Staub and Le Creuset—but for whatever reason all of the sudden I see the Dutch Oven on wedding registries, in store windows, and in recipe books. 

But, friends also ask me what on Earth to do with one, and how to pick one.

So I thought I'd take a go at sharing a few thoughts. . .

Going Dutch on an Upcoming Review

The thrifty person in me can most easily justify purchasing new items for the kitchen. Greg and I cook all the time (okay, mostly him), and spend a great deal of time looking online and in shops for cookware. My experience with CSNstores was so great last time that we were inspired to write a 3-part series on Pressure Cookers! CSNstores' Cookware.com site has so many amazing brands of products for the kitchen in a variety of price ranges. We spent a long time yesterday looking at their selection, including a Dutch oven among other things. In fact, Greg had such a good time looking at the selection that he'll be writing a post on Dutch ovens later today, so look out for it!

What is the item that we settled on? Well, its for the kitchen . . .but the specific item is a surprise! You can bet that Greg will be cooking up a storm with it and writing a post or two (or three)!

A Tale of Two Cookers

Under Pressure Part 3: A review of the Fagor Duo Combi Package

It all starts in winter in Berlin. Imagine strolling around with a bit of a shiver. Last night you were in Rome, and despite jacket and scarf, it's like this wind has teeth. You should be soaking up the sights, you're aching to go to the Berlin Ethnographic Museum, but the real ache of knuckles, toes, and nose, drives you to find some heat.

Suddenly, you're in a cookware heaven, otherwise known as the flagship WMF store on Ku-Damm. There's sparkling cromargan steel all around, friendly staff, and a demonstration underway. Oh what a demonstration! (Here's a cheesy simulacra)

It was on just such a night that I fell in ardent love with the WMF Perfect Ultra Pressure Cooker. Its removable handle, even the integrated timer that would probably make me buy the battery-free Prefect Plus instead. . .  I've never had one in my own kitchen, but having seen it in action, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it. But alas, we were flying home carry-on only and I certainly didn't have its asking price on hand.

So I went home full of ardent and unrequited love. In a move to and from New Zealand, we'd passed-on two different decent cookers, and ended up with only our gargantuan 10 litre aluminum one in the house. I'd been meaning to get a new stainless steel pressure cooker for a while, and now I became obsessed—flipping through issues of cook's illustrated, talking to cooking friends, pouring over cook-books and internet archives. The long of the short of it?

I just received a birthday present in the mail. But there is in fact a twist; it's not WMF. Instead it's a package from Fagor, their Duo line Combi product which has a four and six litre base, a glass lid, a pressure lid, and a steamer basket (Image, Fagor USA). 

There are a couple of reasons for purchasing this model, the first being price. The WMF model I had my heart set on is not even available in Canada. It's lower price-point compatriot, the Perfect Plus was about $450 if purchased from a local retailer. I still have a picture of it taped to the door of my locker, but I'm not at all disappointed in my choice.

A Pressure Cooker Bestiary - Part 2

Pressure Cooker Varieties—And Some Material Concerns

Obviously, because they are more complex, and are built to stand up to higher heats and greater pressures, pressure-cookers are more expensive than regular pots of equivalent capacity. There are three mechanisms, and two basic material types found in stove-top pressure cookers on the market today. The combination of these, as well as over-all build quality will largely determine the product's cost.

There are three basic types of pressure mechanisms on the market today:

Weighted, Developed Weight or Sprung Valve, and True-Sprung Valves

Under Pressure: Part 1

Why You'd Want One

It's time for a confession. I'm a bit of a pervert. Where your summer cooking kick might come from barbecue, picnic lunches, or campfires, for me summer is the season of pressure-cooking, ice-cream, and pies. I grew up on the prairies, where cold winters pay off with hot-hot summers and longs days. When it's 40º C outside and no-one you know has air-conditioning, how the hell do you put a meal on the table without roasting inside?

I know other people eat a lot of sandwiches, but since I tend to make my own bread, it's not really a heat saver. And barbecuing is great if you have the yard, but if you're in tight quarters or are carless (easily transportable forms of fuel having a big environmental and wallet impact up here where it's hard to recycle mini-propane cans); it's not always an option. 

And well—soup in the summer is heaven. I know for a lot of people it's a winter thing, but for me it's a practical way to go through all the produce I pick up. At the farmers market last wednesday we bought pounds of tomatoes, fennel, onions, potatoes, garlic, spinach, broccolini, peppers, carrots—the list goes on. Lunch today? Fennel-lentil soup, ice-cold water, salad with tahini-garlic dressing, and cherry ice-cream at the end. I feel like an infomercial here— but the soup took 11 minutes to cook, and maybe 10 more to prepare.

Normally, that hot pot would be on the stove for about an hour. I'd have to stir frequently, watch the pot, and put up with all the insane heat the burner would release into my apartment. Now, pressure cookers are about more than just soup, but I think it's a pretty great example about their heat efficiency. 

I've been in love with pressure cooking since childhood, when my Mom would lug this mythic beast out of the cupboard with an air of trepidation to cook up a tough cut of meat,  or to make stew when errands had taken too long (I'm vegan now, but still admire my parents for buying the whole cow direct and using all of it). For a kid something a little magical, and seemingly dangerous, definitely equates with something cool. When I became a self-righteous ecologically minded hippie-wannabe, my love affair got a little bit deeper. I remember checking out "Recipes for an Ecological Kitchen," by Lorna Sass, circa 1992, and being blown away by the preface, where she talked about the philosophy of a kitchen with just a pressure cooker and a frying pan. I'm far far far from that vision, but when I'm living on the road, those two items are always the first two buys for the kitchen, so her book must have had a deep impact on me.