>Date: Fri, 25 Aug 2000 08:58:40 -0400
>From: Roy Parker <billwill@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>Subject: Pancakes & Beans
>Message-ID: <39A66D80.9F16E36E@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
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>
>Beans and pressure cookers can be dangerous because of the foam
>generated. The foam cam block the steam escape valve and there can be
>trouble.
>ADZUKI beans have less foam and are great in a pressure cooker.
The newer (second-generation) pressure cookers can safely
cook beans. They (at least the ones I'm familiar with) have
three separate safety releases. To be in trouble, you'd
need all three safety releases - one of which is a large
opening on the side of the cover - to be blocked.
I'm basing this statement on pressure cooker cookbooks -
several of them - and from my own experience. I cook beans
in the pressure cooker all the time.
Also, the instruction booklets which came with my pressure
cookers specify that beans *can* safely be cooked in them -
both of them, two different makes. One calls for adding a
tablespoon of oil, the other doesn't.
These second-generation pressure cookers (without the
jiggle top) are made by Magefesa, Fagor, Kuhn-Rikon, and
others. I have a Magefesa and a Fagor.
You can see what these second-generation cookers are like,
if you wish, at Magefesa's web-site:
http://www.magefesausa.com
I have also read in several cookbooks that you can safely
cook beans in one of the older, jiggle-top pressure cookers
if you add a tablespoon of oil. I have done it myself a
couple of times before I had the second-generation cookers,
but it made me nervous. In fact, the jiggle-top cooker
always made me nervous: the new ones are ever so much
nicer!
Pat Meadows