Steam cooking and pressure cooking

Steaming

Steaming is a method of cooking that uses steam: the water vapor produced by boiling cooks the food. In this manner the aliment is not treated by high temperatures and there is not a passage of nutrients, as in boiling.

If we do not want loss nutrients as proteins in our food, the steam cooking is the right method to use. Below you can find some tricks for adding more flavor to the aliment cooked with the steam:

• put some fresh herbs or spices under the food to cook;
• use broth instead of water;
• add some withe wine in the liquid;
• add some spices like thyme in the water;
• add whole aromas.

Pressure cooking

Also the pressure cooking decreases the loss of vitamins and mineral salts. Pressure cookers favor a better heat transport and keep the food protected from the factors that compromise the characteristics of foods: oxygen and light. The pressure cooking is a positive method because it uses a little water and the water-soluble nutrient losses are smaller than in the boiling procedure.

The negative aspect is that this technique employs higher temperatures, with loss of vitamins.

There is a curiosity about the pressure cooker invented in 1679 by Denis Papin: just from that kitchen tool was born the idea of the steam engine. Sometimes I wonder if we really know how many great ideas are born in a kitchen!