The above picture has absolutely nothing to do with anything. It's just that I took one look at the expression of resigned desperation on Mama Tigger's face and thought to myself, "Oh yeah. I remember that." Actually, the feeling is not gender-specific. I know lots of Daddies who would stand up and testify, too.Went on an archeological dig to organize my freezer to day. I know I'm not quite finished because I just realized I haven't dug up my stash of lemon drop chili peppers yet. That's practically the culinary equivalent of finding golden artifacts in a pharaoh's tomb. Ah well. I'll do some more excavating tomorrow. Today I got sidetracked with using some of the recovered items in a chicken and rice one-pot meal in my trusty pressure cooker.
I do loves me my pressure cooker, especially when the weather gets warm because you don't have to have the burner on very long to do the job. One cup of Arborio rice in the mixture and it still only took 6 minutes under pressure. The rice was perfect and so was everything else.
This is quite an attitude adjustment from my feelings of unease about the earlier, older models of pressure cooker. Unease? Pffft! I skipped unease and jumped straight to stark terror. When that little jigger started jiggling on top of the vent I KNEW the damned thing was going to blow up. I figured the food would be on the ceiling and thick slabs of hot metal would impale me to the far wall. Mom used to laugh at the way I'd cautiously stick my head around the corner to check the jiggle motion. I didn't care. I was way too young for impalation. And I still am.
That all changed a few years ago when I treated myself to what folks call the "new generation" of pressure cookers. Got a dandy Fagor and it doesn't jiggle even a little bit. (Fagor is made in Spain but I don't know if the factory is mainly on the plain, with or without the rain. Sorry. A little humor under pressure there. Heh.)
Okay. You're right. I'll go to my room now. I'm sure I'll be better behaved tomorrow. Right after I find my chili pepper stash.
9 comments:
Dee, I'm intrigued with the concept of the pressure cooker but have been hesitate based on a story I heard growing up about a pressure cooker which came and went before I was born. Probably time to revisit the concept, eh? Thanks for the brand referral.
Hummm - may I come out from behind the wall now???
My mother used to have this old pressure cooker that would jiggle and wiggle and scare the bayjayssus out of me! For what ever reason, she'd stand there, right in front of the thing and I do believe she would put a fork tong through the hole in the top and let some more steam out!!! That thing would steam and hiss and...well, you've got the picture. I'm still traumatized! lol
I do hear the newer ones are nice - but.
Hey - where'd you get my photo of me, after I had my son??? ;)
Hmmmm... "humour under pressure"... Hmmmm!
I used to love my old Prestige pressure cooker. Then the microwave came along and the old whistler fell into very rare use. And then it disappeared in one of Graham's de-clutter exercises. Sigh :-)
Back in the 30s and 40s, my grandparents had a forty quart unit they used to make cranberry sauce to sell to their neighbors up on the coast of Maine.
It actually did blow out the safety relief thing and the ceiling was stained for years. They can be powerful, but low pressure so not to worry.
Oh wait, those are the ones that kill!
Wendy, as far as I know, Fagor and Kuhn Rikon are usually the two highest rated of the new generation of cookers and both have 10-year warranties. If you go to:
http://missvickie.com/index.html
there is a ton of info about the beast. Miss Vickie would benefit from the skills of a good line editor but she really knows her cookers.
Kate, we may be sisters separated at birth judging by the similarity of our reactions. (grin) Truly, though, the new beasties have multiple safety features. I don't think they CAN blow up.
John, I'd never heard of the Prestige and, lo! There it is at Amazon. How about that? Maybe there will be a new one in your Christmas stocking?
Okay, Ralph, you're talking about the BIG puppy. I don't know if they've modernized that size but if they haven't, I'd be too skeert to use it. I'm such a wuss. Fortunately, Mom wasn't. She canned a lot of venison in quart jars in hers. Talk about yummy!
I remember the cooker and I remember being afraid of it so didn't stick around to watch mom.
There was a little black rubber plug in the top of mother's pressure cooker that was supposed to blow if the pressure got too high. It never did, but I do remember the smell of burnt meat when she got busy doing something else. We did not eat the cremains and it took a day of soaking before we got them entirely out of the pot.
Looks like you bought a good one, Dee.
I recently inherited my Grandmother's 1950's pressure cooker (Prestige like Johns) complete with jiggly bits and yes, I've been too scared to use it too. My mother finds this amusing in much the same as yours apparently. She reminds me of the Russian lady in the 'we can do it' poster when I think of her laughing at my fretting :)
Bill, thank you for that link to the Fagor page! I hadn't seen that before. Yes, it really is a "good one."
Lou -- another sister separated at birth. (grin) Why do I keep getting the feeling our mothers were a lot tougher than we are? (sigh)
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