Quote from: George on May 09, 2012, 11:30 PM
I suggest there are at least two arguments against trying:
1. It goes against warnings on most pressure cookers, not to use them with such a low ratio of water to oil.
2. There are dire warnings of the danger on the Internet.
Just because one or two people try it a few times and nothing untoward happens, doesn't make it safe.
I'm saying the above as someone who used 100% oil to try cooking KFC type chicken in a domestic pressure cooker. But I took many precautions, and still consider it high risk.
Just to add to George's wise words of caution, I would like to report a highly dangerous occurrence in my own kitchen. I too made a high oil content base in a pressure cooker, and once the pressure had dropped to the point where the safety interlocks indicated that it was safe to open and remove the lid, I did so. All looked perfectly fine and tranquil in the pressure cooker. Then, totally failing to anticipate what was about to happen, I took my trusty wooden spoon and gave the base a stir. And I have never been so terrified in my life. The liquid, which was clearly at considerably over 100C, rose up in the cooker like a maelstrom. If it had been any higher, it would have gone over the top and my feet would almost certainly have been cremated. As it was, it just stopped short of the top, and I backed off like a scalded cat. When the turbulence had subsided, I gently and cautiously re-introduced the spoon, and the witch's cauldron effect re-occurred, at a slightly lower scale. Time and again, a gentle stir was all that was needed to cause all hell to break loose in the pressure cooker. And the explanation ? Well, oil is lighter than water, and boils at a far higher temperature. When the pressure has dropped in the pressure cooker, the water (below) is just below boiling point (whence the fact that no more steam is given off, and the pressure has dropped to a "safe" level that releases the interlocks). But the oil (above), which also has higher thermal inertia than water, is almost certainly well above 100C. But it doesn't give off steam, so the safety mechanisms are fooled into believing that all is well. But just the gentlest of stirs brings the near-boiling water (below) into intimate contact with the super-heated oil (above) and the results are terrifying : a boiling, turbulent mixture of oil, water and steam that occupies far more space than the individual components and rushes up inside the vessel and which could so easily overflow, if the original volume were more than about 1/3 of the capacity of the pressure cooker.
So, please bear this in mind : if you want to experiment with cooking high-oil-content bases in a pressure cooker, the choice is yours, but please please please take the greatest care once you have removed the lid, and do not stir until you are /certain/ that the liquid has cooled to a point where scalding (or worse) is no longer a possibility.
** Phil.
Topic: Anyone tried Julian's base yet? (read 135,384 times)
