Hope's Edge_ The Next Diet for a Small Planet - Frances Moore Lappe [102]
Cooking with grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds also means that in one shopping trip you can buy enough to last a few months.
Kitchen Shortcuts
KEEPING IT ALL WITHIN REACH
Preparation time is not just how long something takes to cook; it’s getting the ingredients to the cooking stage, too. That’s why the organization of your kitchen is all-important.
All that wasted space at the back of your kitchen counters could be a beautiful and handy storage area for your whole foods. All you need are large glass jars with tight-fitting lids. Giant peanut butter or pickle jars are good. Flours, seeds, beans, lentils, even pasta and milk powder can be kept within easy reach. The variety of color and texture will add an attractive touch to your kitchen, too. Also, being able to see all the ingredients can be a spur to the imagination. I inevitably end up tossing in a little of something that I had not planned to, just because I see it there on the counter.
Measuring utensils can also be in easy reach of your basic ingredients. Get measuring cups with long handles with holes in them for hanging. Hang them on hooks from a cupboard over your storage jars, if possible. Measuring spoons can also be hung on a hook. Just think how much time you might save if you never again had to fumble through the utensil drawer for measuring cups or spoons! As soon as I wash mine I hang them on their hooks. That way I never have to dry them and always know where they are.
SIMPLE KITCHEN TIME-SAVERS
No-hassle cooking with plant foods requires a few basic tools. The small investment of money will pay off in hours and hours of time saved. Here are some no-kitchen-should-be-without suggestions.
Pressure cooker. Even though I recommended using a pressure cooker in the first edition of this book, many friends tell me that they don’t use one. So let me underline again the usefulness of this old-fashioned tool. Beans that would require hours of soaking and cooking take only 35 to 45 minutes, with no soaking. Grains cook in less than half an hour; potatoes and carrots for soups and stews cook in a few minutes. I think using a pressure cooker is a matter of getting into the habit. Becoming comfortable with it may take some time, but it’s worth it. I have found the technique very simple, and have never had any trouble.
I also devised a foolproof method for pressure-cooking grains. I bought a stainless-steel mixing bowl that fits inside my pressure cooker and is about one inch shorter than the inside height of the cooker. I fill the pressure cooker with about three inches of water and put the grain or beans I am cooking in the bowl, with enough water to cover the food plus about one inch. I put the bowl inside the cooker and cook it per conventional pressure cooker instructions. This method is quick—I never have to measure the water, because I just add water to a level one inch above the food—and it is impossible to scorch the food because of the water between the bowl and the pressure cooker.
You can also use this method to cook two items separately in the same pressure cooker. Simply put one food in the pressure cooker, with the same amount of water as you would ordinarily use in a pressure cooker, and the other food in the stainless-steel bowl, with water to cover plus about one inch.
If you don’t want to try it my style, simply follow the basic cooking instructions that come with your pressure cooker, or see Appendix C. New pressure cookers are too expensive for some budgets, but a friend of mine found an almost-new one for $5 at a secondhand store.
Vegetable chopper. Never again pass over a recipe because you don’t want to take the time to chop vegetables with a knife. You don’t have to. If you are not as adept with a knife as Julia Child, you’ll want a vegetable chopper. I have a plunger-type blade in a round plastic case.
Salad spinner. Originating in France, this round plastic device (about the size of a big salad bowl) cuts my salad-making time at least in half. You simply put all the greens in it, cover with