Romanise,

Thanks for your insights and advice. However, cooking under a very
slow flame (just enough where the water simmers) and cooking under a
high flame (where there is a "rolling" boil) has the SAME TEMPERATURE.
The only difference is that water evaporates faster in the second case.
Also, the temperature in both cases is 100 C. In a pressure cooker,
it's about 110 C using low or high flame.



Pressure coocker works on principle of buiding up pressure. That is why
they say 'for so many whistles'. If one wants to save fuel and has time
she can stand by the cooker and keep flame just right so the weight on
cooker dances but does not let steam off and give out whistle.

Brablo wrote:
Romanise,

Thanks for your insights and advice. However, cooking under a very
slow flame (just enough where the water simmers) and cooking under a
high flame (where there is a "rolling" boil) has the SAME TEMPERATURE.
The only difference is that water evaporates faster in the second case.
Also, the temperature in both cases is 100 C. In a pressure cooker,
it's about 110 C using low or high flame.

All pressure cookers need to be put at high flame untill pressure
builds up that will lift the weight up. only than one can reduce flame
sufficiently to keep the weight dancing. Most people will reduce flame
but will keep sufficiently high so there will be several whistle blasts
befor which they will turn flame off. Even so they will not lift weight
right away, only after about 10 minutes when pressure has dropped.

I suspect you are not much familiar with the use of pressure cooker.

Romanise,

Thanks a lot my friend. I need to re-learn this damn Manttra cooker.
It sucks, and maybe i do as well.

Thanks a lot.

anyways, my rajma is pretty good, even though it took 6 hours.



Romanise wrote:
Brablo wrote:
Romanise,

Thanks for your insights and advice. However, cooking under a very
slow flame (just enough where the water simmers) and cooking under a
high flame (where there is a "rolling" boil) has the SAME TEMPERATURE.
The only difference is that water evaporates faster in the second case.
Also, the temperature in both cases is 100 C. In a pressure cooker,
it's about 110 C using low or high flame.

All pressure cookers need to be put at high flame untill pressure
builds up that will lift the weight up. only than one can reduce flame
sufficiently to keep the weight dancing. Most people will reduce flame
but will keep sufficiently high so there will be several whistle blasts
befor which they will turn flame off. Even so they will not lift weight
right away, only after about 10 minutes when pressure has dropped.

I suspect you are not much familiar with the use of pressure cooker.

I cook beans at least once a week in the pressure cooker. The toughest
beans take no more than 45 minutes. I don't soak the beans. Never put
salt or any acidic product in with the beans. It will really slow down
the cooking. Also, pressure cooking tends to kill spice flavors.
Season and flavor the beans after cooking.

It sounds like something ain't working. Nothing should take that long
or use that high a proportion of water. Is the steam only coming out
of the weight? I don't know what pot you have, so I don't know what
regulator assembly it uses, but steam shouldn't be coming out of
anywhere but the regulator. Start the pot on high heat; when the steam
starts coming out of the regulator, or the stem shows the suggested
number of rings, turn the temp to the lowest setting that keeps it
steaming, and cook for about 30 minutes; let down the steam by running
cold water over the pot until all of the steam indicators go down and
the pot will open. DON'T FORCE it open!! Check for doneness. Mash a
bean with your finger. (It'll be really hot - be careful). If it's
soft enough, you're done. If not, put the lid back on and cook a bit
longer - use your judgement - maybe 10-15 minutes more at a time.

Be careful. Things with starch, such as beans, will burn on the
bottom. Too high heat for too long will burn it. On an electric
stove, once it boils, move it to another burner on low to keep it
simmering.

On Oct 31, 11:57 am, "Brablo" wrote:
i buy dry, hard kidney beans from an indian grocery store. i never buy
the
canned ones, because it has chemicals such as calcium chloride and
other things. also, it's more expensive.

when i make kidney bean curry (called rajma in indian), i soak it
overnight with a little salt and garam masala spice powder. this way,
as the hard rajma beans expand, it absorbs some of the garam masala and
salt.

my problem is that it takes me a very, very long time to make rajma.
in fact, it takes about 5.5 hours IN A PRESSURE COOKER. moreover, i
must use about 8 cups of water to 1 cup of rajma.

is this normal, or is my pressure cooker not working? my pressure
cooker is made by "mantra corporation" (made in india, bought in the
USA).

Now I know what I was doing wrong! One local Indian guy on the
Internet gave me a pointer. Instead of pressure cooking at a very low
flame, I pressure cook at a very high flame. When doing so, I only
need to pressure cook for about 45 minutes or so. This, of course,
occurs after I've soaked over-night.

So the key is to have the pressure cooker on top of a HIGH FLAME!