Cookaholics Bulletin Board

I think you are right Josh. But in reality, you do save time in the PC, maybe not effort, if that makes sense. I think the reason they were used so extensively in Cuba was because while you still have the preliminary steps, you don't heat up the house or have to worry about maintaining temps.

CI gets a lot of criticism for the number of steps and the complexity of the recipes. However, for me I applied a lot of the techniques I learned while testing ATK recipes to other stuff and it did improve my food. I learned which to eliminate combine or ignore. However, it left me with a critical eye for reviewing recipes for missing steps or ingredients, i.e., poorly written ones and thus have saved me many missteps.

It is obvious to me that the ATK stuff is not aimed at long time viewers/users but at a new audience, which is why I stopped buying the cookbooks years ago. Now I learn from the kind folks is this board who teach me something new just about every day. Thanks.

I agree about CI, Alina, and I can't remember the last thing I bought of theirs. I finally let my subscription lapse, since I really couldn't think of the last recipe I got from them! After a while, we have made so many things that when we see a recipe we already have a favorite, maybe even an old CI recipe, and with some of the new recipes it just seems, to us, like they were changing their "perfect" recipe, just to have something new to print. Yet the "new crowd" they seem to be trying to appeal to has likely never seen the old recipe! So I guess the old crowd in considered expendible, since there are so many more potential new customers out there.

Josh,

I think you're right on both points. I had hoped that CI might be different in terms of their commitment to excellence regardless of mode of cooking, but clearly they are aiming this book at those who want to do a 'fix it and forget it' style of dump and run with good enough results. I noticed this in their slow cooker perfection book as well....plus they now have an "easy" slow cooker book out at Costco (for those who are too lazy to do the minimal prep work involved in the first one). They seem to be trying to compete with the Campbell's cream of mushroom soup people now. Frankly, I think the cream of mushroom soup recipes are tastier than that beef burgundy that the Pressure Cooker Perfection turned out. They might have worn out my last bit of forgiveness on this one.

That said, as I'm typing, I'm slurping down an awesome chicken soup that I made in the PC. I got the ratio of ingredients from the fastcooking.ca website (2lb chicken parts to 6 cups water if anyone is wondering) and did my own normal combo of aromatics, high pressure for 30 minutes and it turned out great. I did the stock in the morning before I went out, came home at lunch and made the soup on the stovetop in about 30 minutes all in (just tossed in chopped raw veggies, left over roast chicken meat, and noodles and simmered until everything was done). I think I'm going to start doing what Alina does, and just use my old recipes in the PC and tweak them until they turn out the way I want. It's really just the braising time that I would like to cut down, not necessarily the prep.

Carey,

I'll have to disagree about CI ever being committed to excellence in cooking. In my mind they always tried to be about excellence in (bad) marketing.

And, someone seems to have forgotten to told CK it costs twice as much to acquire a new customer than to retain an old one.

Nothing in the BCP family interests me in the least these days...and hasn't for many years.

Amy

Just to add to the CI bashing, just last week they posted a short survey on Reddit of all places. I responded to the post that they would have had a built-in place to ask marketing questions if they hadn't nuked their forums. He responded that they were asking on Reddit because the average age was lower than the forum members had been. Because old folks like us don't use tablets. :/

--Lisa

I guess they've made their choices, but I don't see anything that suggests they're relevant to a younger audience either.

Yah, I'm an old fart who doesn't keep up on trends or technology...

Now where did I put my typewriter...

Amy

A 62-year-old in a bow tie doing a poor impression of a 71-year-old in red socks and glasses is just not resonating with today's youth? Shocking!

Ok, taking Alina's advice, I adapted a tried and true recipe in the PC this morning: CI's slow cooker black bean soup. I made it as written, only soaked the beans overnight (per Miss Vicky's cookbook) and cooked at high pressure for 20 minutes with natural release. It worked really well. Maybe not quite as good as the slow cooker (I think some of the flavour gets lost from dumping the soaking liquid) but it's close enough that I'm happy to save the time on days when an 6 - 8 hour slow cook isn't convenient. Lorna Sass says you don't have to pre-soak, so I might try her method next time and see what I like better.

I have been doing CI's overnight salt brine for my Cuban black beans and have been really happy with the results. I do mine for 20 minutes for 1 lb. and release the pressure quickly. Can put them back on if not tender enough, but they always are. I am curious as to whether you've tried mine and prefer CI's.

Alina,

I haven't tried your recipe yet (I meant to, but I totally forgot). I'm the only one in my house who will eat beans, so by the time I had eaten through the last batch, my mind was a sieve for all previous things bean related. Ok..it is possible that my mind is just a sieve.