Upgrades... for my cupboard and our blog

I upgraded our blog to the beta version! I think they'll eventually do away with the old version so I thought I'd just give in early. Apparently you can do a lot more with the upgraded blogger... so yay! You might need to change your sign-in to a google account for some unknown reason so I'm sorry for the hassle chefs.

The upgrade that is even more exciting is to my ever-growing list of kitchen acoutrements. I bought a pressure cooker! While I was looking into an indian dish to make for our last meeting, I thought I would tap into my Aunt Ann who is a master Indian chef. She's not Indian but she raised her kids next door to another housemom who happened to be Indian. Being like all of my family, she soaked up as much as she could from this kind woman. Now I could reap the benefits! After asking Aunt Ann which dish I should make, she took no time to suggest Dahl Mahkani. Making this dahl would require yet another purchase of cooking equipment which was perfectly fine by me. Shopping...

I'd never seen a pressure cooker in action so I didn't have the slightest clue what to expect. One fine wintry Sunday I picked up my express fagor cooker and lugged it home to my apartment. Upon opening the box, I saw my big 4 Qt Steel cooker and the thick instruction book that hid underneath. I figured I should follow the instructions since there were exclamation marks and promises of harm if they were not followed to the letter.

I added my ingredients and locked the lid in place and waited to see what would happen. While researching pressure cookers, I read testimonials of fellow chefs who had their cooker blow up and explode the meals inside to a million splattering pieces... so I was a bit unnerved watching my pot gain momentum. I kept my eyes on the prize and waited for for something to happen. It came alive! The hissing that the steam escaping the lid creates is very strange and unnatural at first but like anything else you get used to it.

In a fraction of the time it would normally take, I can now cook meals in my trusty little pressure cooker. How can you not buy into this from the fagor site: "In today's time-starved world, any item that allows for quicker food preparation while retaining essential nutrients and vitamins is something everyone can appreciate- and that's what we offer our customers." As with any new purchase, I'm dreaming up ways to get some use out of it right now...