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Cooking food to crispy perfection is such a cumbersome task that’s been made easier by the pressure cooker that browns and crisps. It’s a little known fact that pressure cooking not only cooks food beautifully, but also browns and crisps it as well.
Why do we brown food?
Browning is a reaction that takes place when you expose food to high temperatures that blows out the moisture content, leaving behind crunchy browned bits. This is known as a Maillard reaction and it’s what gives your food such a deep caramel color.
It’s possible to achieve the same effect in your pressure cooker by manipulating heat duration and pressure.
Why do we crisp food?
Crisping is almost just another word for browning, just that it relates to the texture and crunchiness. And it’s what we all crave. We crave that crunchy layer that seals in the juices of the food. If you’ve ever eaten food in a restaurant and thought it was tasteless, chances are that it didn’t crisp up properly. Achieving crispy perfection is not something that happens by chance or by accident. It takes the right equipment, techniques and heat distribution to get your food to crisp up when it’s under pressure.
How do we use a pressure cooker that browns and crisps
Pressure cookers have been around for so long, it’s almost surprising that we’re only now discovering all their possible uses. They can now also be used to brown and crisp. The method is the same as deep frying, which is searing food in a bucket of oil or butter at a high temperature until it becomes richly browned and crunchy. But instead of the bucket, you’ll use your pressure cooker to do the same thing.
Just pop your favorite dish in the cooker, raise the pressure and sit back while the cooker does all the hard work for you. It’s faster, more efficient and most importantly it won’t leave your kitchen looking like a disaster area.
How does a pressure cooker brown and crisp food.
The process of how a pressure cooker browns and crisps food is quite simple. It involves three major steps.
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Achieving a high enough heat that will blow out the moisture present in your food.
What many believe is that the key to achieving browned food under pressure lies in cooking it at a ridiculously high temperature. It’s been shown that a sautéing operation at high temperatures can achieve the same thing as a meat sizzler, but the difference with your pressure cooker is the amount of time you have to spend on it. But in reality, not all tasty food needs to be cooked extremely hot. In fact, you can achieve pretty impressive results by cooking at low temperatures compared to what you’re used to.
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Populating the surface of your food with a layer of crispy deliciousness.
This comes down to the technique of searing and is quite simple. Once you’re done cooking your food, you’ll add a little more oil or butter and then searing the surface till it has started to brown. You can also achieve this by using a meat tenderizer—just make sure that it’s well washed first.
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Glazing your food after it’s left to sit for a couple of minutes.
This is the magic part and what makes your food crispy. The trick lies in the fact that after you’ve seared your food, it will rise to a boil in the pressure cooker. This means that it’ll be bubbling away furiously with all those lovely steamy bits sticking to it. Hence, when everything settles down and cools down, these parts will stick to your dish and create an extra layer of crunchiness.
Impressing friends at dinner time is never difficult these days thanks to your new pressure cooker. As long as you follow the steps precisely, your food will have an excellent layer of crispiness that seals in the juices and won’t leave you running to the kitchen every five minutes to drain the excess liquid out.
How do I achieve crispy perfection?
This is actually much easier than it sounds and can easily be done by anyone with a pressure cooker at home. And it’s definitely worth a shot during the holidays when you want to impress your family and friends.
Step 1: Cook until pressure has reached its highest then lower heat to maintain pressure. It’s the same temperature setting as you would be using on your stove top
Step 2: Let the cooker cook itself while at a low pressure for the specified time.
Step 3: Turn off the heat, puncture the lid and let it vent for 10 minutes. This will release all the pressure in it and reduce any excess moisture from your food.
Step 4: Remove lid, pop whatever you want to brown and crisp into your pressure cooker. Cook on high for a few minutes until the contents begin to show signs of scorching and browning around the edges.
Step 5: Quickly turn down heat to a gentle simmer for about 2 minutes or until you see steam rising from your food again. Remove from heat and let it sit for a couple of minutes. Your contents will have naturally seared themselves into perfect crispiness.
Tips for browning your food
You can achieve better results with high-quality ingredients that aren’t so highly watery
A pressure cooker isn’t exactly the best tool to use when you want to achieve a crispy outer layer on food such as potatoes, but it’s still possible to get some good browning results with them by adjusting the times above.
Step1: Cook until pressure has reached its highest then lower heat to maintain pressure. It’s the same temperature setting as you would be using on your stove top
Step 2: Let the cooker cook itself while at a low pressure for the specified time (for example, 3 minutes if you’re cooking potatoes).
Step 3: Turn off the heat, puncture the lid and let it vent for 10 minutes. This will release all the pressure in it and reduce any excess moisture from your food.
Step 4: Remove lid, pop whatever you want to brown and crisp into your pressure cooker. Cook on high for about a minute (in the example of potatoes) until you see steam rising from it again.
Step 5: Quickly turn down heat to a gentle simmer for about 2 minutes or until you see steam rising from your food again. This will seal in all of the juices and make sure that it’s evenly roasted all over.
Advantages of a pressure cooker that browns and crisps
- Give you freshly cooked food with a great aroma.
- Cooked food has a rich caramel brown color. the food cooked has an appealing color that makes it delicious even before the first bite.
- Heats and browns quickly with all of the moisture locked in.
- Quickly and effectively crisps food under pressure.
- It controls the distribution of heat, both spatially (within the pot) and temporally (so that no part of the food gets over cooked or undercooked).
- There’s less water loss because moisture is forced out as steam and it doesn’t leach into the food itself, which helps to retain flavor.
- It uses less fuel than other cooking methods, thus saving money and reducing greenhouse gas emissions and your carbon footprint. Go green!
- It’s safe, can be used on many types of foods. Very versatile. any food you want to cook; you can count on the pressure cooker.
Disadvantages of a pressure cooker that browns and crisps
- The pressure cooker is messier than other cooking methods. The food tends to spatter a lot when you’re using one, especially if you don’t have a splatter screen, or if you’re trying to cook something liquid like soup or pasta. This can be minimized by wearing gloves and by placing the food in foil pouches or on parchment paper so that it doesn’t slip around the bottom of the pressure cooker.
- It uses up your electricity supply faster than other cooking methods do because it needs a higher pressure setting.
What can you cook on a pressure cooker.
Ideally, a pressure cooker is designed to cook anything cookable. There are some foods however that pressure cookers perform exceptionally well;
- Dry roasts, chops, poultry and fish.
- Beans, lentils and other legumes like split peas
- Soups.
- Baked goods, breads and desserts.
- Stews, casseroles and stews.
- Pasta
- Potato dishes like hash browns, French fries and baked dishes
- Rice dishes like paella and risotto
- Veggies
Pressure cookers that crisp and brown food.
This model is a pressure cooker, slow cooker and rice cooker. If you want crispy brown food at a fraction of the time, this is what you need. The cooking pot is made of stainless steel and will neither rust or stain. A removable nonstick pot that holds 6 quarts I love this model because it offers so many different modes of cooking. It has 2 settings for pressure. The normal setting is 250°F, which means that the pot accepts recipes that include ingredients like onions and garlic (which can’t be cooked with normal pressure). The fast setting is a whopping 18 PSI, which means that you can cook your food in 1/4 of the time compared to other pressure cooker models. It also has a sauté function that allows you to brown and crisp your food before it gets cooked.
This is another pressure cooker that takes a lot of the guess work out of cooking. What I really like about this model is that it has a pressure indicator in the lid which will tell you what pressure it’s at. This is super useful and will save you a lot of time having to test your food and check on it before it’s done. The pressure range goes from 5-30 PSI, so you can be assured that you’re cooking with the right amount of pressure that your food needs to finish in time.
This is an amazing high quality pressure cooker that offers quite a few functions including browning your food. It comes with a digital timer that will count down the cooking time. It also has a browning function where you can add oil before cooking to enhance the crispy brown results. All I can say is that this thing is wonderful.
This is a great model for all of your cooking needs. It’s a 6-quart cooker with two side-by-side shelves to hold plenty of food. This model has 6 different functions, so you can be sure that you’re getting the most out of your pressure cooker. The steam function will soften your food and make it more tender so that it falls apart easily.
This is a slow cooker, rice cooker and pressure cooker all in one. I love this model because it has a timer on the front and comes with a recipe book that includes recipes for all of your favorite foods. The cooking pot is stainless steel, dishwasher safe and can be used on all of your stovetop electric and burners. Again, I love that this model has a timer so you can make sure that you’re using the correct cooking time.
This is another great model that will help you prepare tasty healthy meals quickly for your family. It has a digital timer and will automatically adjust for larger or smaller cooking amounts. It has a quick-release function that will keep you from having to touch or lift the lid to release pressure. It also has a rice and steamer functions, so you can use this as your one stop shop for all of your cooking needs.
This is a great model that offers quite a few functions and is loaded with useful features. The stainless steel cooking pot is dishwasher safe and comes with a removable inner pot to keep your food hot while you’re using your pressure cooker. The multi-function padlock is really important so that you can prevent kids, pets or guests from accessing the most important feature of this pressure cooker, the quick release valve.
This model is a pressure cooker with a 3-ply base that makes it easier to cook large amounts of food. It has 15 pre-set modes and a time delay function. This model also comes with a digital timer and countdown so that you can keep track of your time. It’s a great model that I would definitely recommend. This is another one of the most popular models on the market right now.
This is a great model that comes with 3 steam settings, as well as a safety lock so that kids and pets can’t open the pressure release valve. It also has a digital timer, countdown and cooking chart. I love the fact that it has different color indicators for all of the different modes so you can easily distinguish which mode you’re using when you’re not cooking. This is another great model and my personal favorite.
Conclusion
If you love to cook as much as I do, then you know what it’s like to want to cook healthier for your family. It’s great when we can prepare our own meals at home and make sure that we’re eating well. One of the best ways to accomplish this goal is by investing in a good quality pressure cooker. One that crisps and browns. One that cooks fast and doesn’t require a lot of guess work. And one that comes with a timer so you can cook your food the way it needs to be cooked. The best pressure cookers will take out all of the guess work and allow you to prepare healthy meals for your family in a fraction of the time.