Topic: Can I use a pressure cooker for cooking curries?

[terryh]

Hi,
Does anyone use a pressure cooker to reduce the cooking time when making a basic sauce ? I use a prestige curry pot pressure cooker to make my base and wondered if there is any downside to this,taste wise. It seems ok to me and the family like it but I'm always trying to improve the taste to resemble a BIR curry, with the minimum of effort of course !

rgds

Terry

[mike travis]

Hi Terry,  I have used a pressure cooker when doing my boiled rice. Cooks in only 4Min's and never sticks. As for using it for a base sauce, I think the problem would be how much you can put into the cooker. I think they recommend you only fill it about half full. So it would properly be OK for a small batch, but not for some base recipe`s on here, pity.... ;D. 

[terryh]

Thanks Mike. Yes I can only make enough for about 6 portions,however I enjoy the Saturday ritual of preparing and cooking the sauce. I,m not in to freezing large batches of things so I don't mind, but I can see the problem if large quantities are prepared.

Terry

[Jethro]

The only down side to using a pressure cooker that I can see is that by reducing the cooking time quite dramatically you might not get the fusion of spices which is more a matter of time than temperature.
One thing they are very good for is the final cooking stage of a curry (and I'm talking authentic recipes here not BIR) due to the fact that they keep the moisture in and not a lot of water needs to be added due to evaporation so you do not dilute the original spice mix, particularly in a dish that needs slow cooking (mutton springs to mind).

[terryh]

Thanks for that Jethro, maybe I'll get round to testing a recipe both ways.

Terry