4 Reasons You Need a Pressure Cooker
This is not your Grandma’s exploding pressure cooker. Today’s pressure cookers can make your life easier and your meals healthier.
Monica Reinagel, MS, LD/N, CNS
Listen
4 Reasons You Need a Pressure Cooker
Pressure cookers are having a big resurgence these days! They are the hottest new cooking device—although they are actually not that new at all. Many of us remember the somewhat scary pressure cookers our moms or grandmothers had, clanging and hissing on the stove top and always in danger of exploding and spraying the contents all over the ceiling. But today’s pressure cooker is an entirely different animal.
I have four reasons you might want to consider investing in a pressure cookier, if you don’t already have one. They would also make great holiday gifts for someone who enjoys food and cooking. And if you already have a pressure cooker, I have a few tips on how to get the best results when cooking with it.
1.) Today’s electronic pressure cookers are safer and easier to use.
They sit on your counter top instead of on your stove and plug into the wall. They have locking lids and safety features that virtually eliminate the danger of explosions or steam burns. You can also program them to cook on a timer. Many models have settings that also allow you to use them as slow cookers, yogurt makers, and all kinds of other cool stuff. They range from about $60 to $150 dollars.
2.) Pressure cookers slash cooking time.
Cooking from scratch is a great way to save money and improve your nurtrition. Because they cook foods in a fraction of the time that you’d otherwise need, pressure cookers can make it a lot easier for busy families to put a home cooked dinner on the table at the end of a busy day.
Pressure cookers work by creating a tight seal that doesn’t allow air or moisture to escape. This raises the pressure inside the pot, which dramatically speeds cook times. A pot of soup or stew hat you might simmer for 2 or 3 hours on the stove can be done in 40 minutes. A pot roast that would take 8 hours in a slow cooker is done in 45 minutes. Start a pot of steel cut oats before you step in to the shower and it’ll be done before you can dry off. You can steam vegetables or bake potatoes or sweet potatoes in less time than it would take to cook them in the microwave.
The time-savings are especially dramatic when you’re working with dried beans. Instead of having to boil them for a couple of hours to soften, you can cook dried beans in about 20 minutes, assuming you’ve soaked them first. If you forgot to soak them, they’ll still only take about 40. So, if like, like me, you never remember to soak your beans the day before you want to cook with them, you can come home from work, pull a pound of dried beans out of the cabinet and be sitting down to black bean soup less than an hour later.
The decrease in cooking time along gives pressure cookers an edge in terms of healthy eating. But there are other advantages as well.
3.) Pressure cooking preserves more nutrients.
Many people worry that the increased pressure and cooking temperatures might be hard on nutrients in food. But in fact exactly the opposite is the case. When it comes to heat-sensitive nutrients like vitamin C and various B vitamins, pressure cooking can actually preserve significantly more nutrition than boiling or steaming, due to the drastically reduced cooking times.
To maximize nutrient content when pressure cooking vegetables, you also want to use as little water as possible, or choose recipes where the cooking liquid is consumed as part of the final dish.
To maximize nutrient content when pressure cooking vegetables, you also want to use as little water as possible, or choose recipes where the cooking liquid is consumed as part of the final dish.
4.) Pressure cooking makes minerals more bioavailable.
Another nutritional advantage of pressure cooking is that It does a better job breaking down and deactivating the phytic acid in beans and whole grains. As I’ve talked about in previous podcasts, phytic acid is a naturally occurring compound in these foods which binds tightly to minerals and make them less absorbable. While any cooking method reduces phytic acid, pressure cooking beans and grains removes more than other cooking methods. So, you may get even more mineral nutrition from your legumes by using a pressure cooker. Pressure cooking also improves the digestibility of plant protein.
Tips for success
If you decide to get a pressure cooker, or you already have one, here are a few tips to ensure your success. Although it is possible to modify recipes to work in a pressure cooker, I suggest that you use recipes that have been developed specifically for pressure cooking and follow the instructions to the letter—at least until you are more familiar with the techniques.
But don’t limit yourself to the recipes that come in the little booklet that came with your unit. Because pressure cooking is so hot these days, the internet is full to bursting with pressure cooking recipe websites and cookbooks, with tons of creative and flavorful options. Several members of my 30 Day Nutrition Upgrade group have recently gotten pressure cookers and are posting photographs and amazing looking recipes on a near daily basis!
If you are a new or experienced pressure cooker, feel free to share your tips, recipes, and/or questions on the Nutrition Diva Facebook page.
About the Author
Monica Reinagel is a board-certified licensed nutritionist, author, and the creator of one of iTunes’ most highly ranked health and fitness podcasts. Her advice is regularly featured on the TODAY show, Dr. Oz, NPR, and in the nation’s leading newspapers, magazines, and websites. Do you have a nutrition question? Call the Nutrition Diva listener line at 443-961-6206. Your question could be featured on the show.