Don’t bother with dinner if you bought a steam cooker

Speed and convenience become secondary when it comes to the health of your food. The “tasty – healthy” dilemma has been solved in a simple and ingenious way – steamers, appliances for cooking with hot steam, were invented.

Can’t ruin food in the steam bath

Steaming is not a European culinary achievement. And American cookbooks don’t even mention the ability to cook with steam, hence our lack of a steam cooking tradition. This method of cooking is thought to have been popular in Asia, especially China.

Our usual ways of cooking, unfortunately, turned out to be not so harmless. So with your favorite fried cutlets or chops in our body get products of burning fats, these substances are classified as carcinogens, and they are the culprits of the most dangerous diseases of the human body.

That is why the dietary table is always deprived of fried foods. It would seem that you can not fry – boil. But here again, everything is not so smooth. During the cooking process, the nutrients vitamins, minerals are washed into the broth and many of them are destroyed.

In addition, both methods of heat treatment noticeably reduce the volume of products, lose their shape and natural color.

Steam cooking is a godsend in this regard. On the one hand, extremely useful properties not like fried, for example , on the other hand, the most careful attitude to the “elementary” composition of vegetables, meat or fish, in other words, steam does not deprive the food of its useful properties.

But the specific aroma and flavour, the retained color e.g. carrots or paprika and the food shape are also important for gourmets. Steam cooking makes it possible to meet all these difficult requirements.

When cooking with steam is quite difficult to spoil the products, to boil, overcook, as it sometimes happens with inexperienced hostesses. You always have a nice, juicy dish to serve.

True, not everyone immediately likes the more bland flavor and lack of crispy crust of steamed cutlets. But if you get used to it, you will gradually become more and more fond of steaming food, and the steam cooker user becomes a big fan of such food with time.

Steam cooking is also able to provide some auxiliary services. For example, to warm up bread or cakes, meat loaf, which has lost its juiciness overnight, or cauliflower, boiled rice or buckwheat.

Steam can create the right conditions for yeast dough to rise, defrost, poach and keep food hot until the family around the table. In the steam cooker you can cook as usual in water or in a steam bath, that is, you can traditionally boil, stew vegetables, cereals, pasta, meat.

Steamers are purpose-built for sterilizing cans, jars or baby bottles at home.

It won’t run away, won’t burn and vitamins will be preserved

The steam cooker provides special conditions. The closed space of the unit is filled with hot steam which surrounds the food from all sides. So the fish or meat heats up faster, and therefore reaches the readiness.

The hot steam heats more evenly than the red-hot oven air. The heat energy of the steam condenses on the surface of the food and is gradually transmitted inside. In this case steam has a high humidity and thermal inertia.

This is despite the fact that the temperature of the hot steam is 100 ° C, and, for example, during frying the products are subjected to higher temperatures, but they are heated only at the bottom.

This relatively low temperature and allows the preservation of most of the useful substances. Products do not come in contact with oil or cooking liquid, vitamins and minerals remain intact and losses from breakage are much lower.

For the same reason food does not lose its taste and aroma. You can therefore use less salt and spices when steaming.

The steam creates an interesting effect on the surface of the food: it seems to seal the pores, these corks and resist the loss of substances, they also allow you to keep the shape.

But this kind of preservation turns out to have another interesting quality – the smells of steamed foods do not mix. Therefore it is not considered bad form to cook fish and meat together with dessert in a steam cooker. Steamed dishes also do not know “shrinkage-truss”, the weight of the food does not become less than before the cooking process.

There are no known mishaps during steaming: one thing burns, another escapes. Steam allows you to cook the dish perfectly, without spoiling it by ineptitude.

Steaming is a fairly quick way of cooking, fish cooks on average 15-20 minutes, meat and poultry depending on the size of the piece – 15-30 minutes, potato slices, peas, broccoli – 20-25 minutes.

Lessons with the steamer on

Steamed dishes use only water, although sometimes manufacturers graciously allow you to add a little white wine if the recipe calls for it for example, the cooking liquid will become the base of a sauce .

Before steaming, the food is seasoned and salted. It is recommended to use less salt, because steaming accentuates the natural flavor of food. Meat and fish are seasoned with aromatic fresh herbs, vegetables or marinades.

Steaming is considered to be the ideal way to cook vegetables. The steam cooks them quickly and with a delicate flavor. Vegetables do not lose their juices, so that all the most delicious flavor remains inside.

Most vegetables look beautiful after steaming, but salads, as well as spinach and beans from the steam lose their color, so they first need to blanch.

Cut the vegetables in such a way that the pieces are equal in size, so that cooking is uniform. When steaming several kinds of vegetables, start with the most resistant ones carrots, potatoes, green beans and gradually add the more delicate ones.

Diet soft meat is obtained only from the most tender slices. Chicken, pork, veal or beef fillets are used for steaming. Meat becomes juicy and flavorful if wrapped in lettuce.

Meat is cooked very carefully for fear of overcooking it. Over steamed meat resembles a “sole”, so it is better not to overcook the meat than to overcook it. Steamed meat can seem boring, so it is customary to add a lot of seasoning and cooking sauce to it.

Fish is one of the most “grateful” foods for steaming. A piece of cod or salmon can be cooked in just 15 minutes. Fish does not break in the process, retains juiciness.

The specific flavor and aroma become particularly strong – the steamer is a godsend for fish lovers. You can tell when a fish is done by the fact that it is no longer glistening and can be pierced forklessly.

Do not overcook the fish either. Fish can be cooked whole or in fillets. A bowl or a mold must be greased with butter or vegetable oil, then lay chopped herbs dill, green onion, thyme, fennel , bay leaf, add a little garlic, ground ginger.

Any fish will benefit if it is drizzled with lemon juice or covered with thinly sliced lemon slices. Fish can be marinated for half an hour before steaming white wine, lemon juice, and soy sauce are the best foods to use.

Hot steam quickly defrosts foods from the freezer. But do not use steaming to defrost puff pastries or cakes, the moisture will make them “fall apart”.

Fruit is also no good, because it boils too quickly.

But fish, thin portions of meat, potato slices are defrosted without loss, you just need to put them in as thin a layer as possible.

The steam cooker can bring back the freshness and juiciness of food cooked the day before: steam helps warm up buns, rice, pancakes, roasts, and return them to the taste of freshly cooked food.

Beware of the steam!

– It is not advisable to place the steam cooker close to walls or cupboards which could be damaged by the steam released e.g. the bottom of drawers .

– Do not touch the steamer when steaming, use protective equipment to remove the lid, food trays.

– To avoid burns, open the lid carefully, keep the inside away from you and let the steam out gradually.

Where it comes from?

At the base of the steam cooker there is a container for the water, in the center of which there is a heating element, this is where the water, brought to boiling point, turns into steam.

This takes a few minutes. In order to start the steaming process more quickly, the manufacturers use a simple device, variously called a steam booster, turbo ring, concentrator, “Quick Steam”, etc. d. This device is a small container with a hole for the heater, which is installed around it.

This container limits the volume of water, here it is heated first, and due to the small amount very quickly. The water in the remaining volume will also come to a boil, just a little later. The user must install the ring before the container is filled with water, that is, in fact, choose the speed at which his vegetables or fish will begin to cook.

Nailed it?

After 7-10 uses of the steam cooker, a boil may form on the heating element, the amount of which depends on the hardness of the water used.

To descale requires:

1. Pour table vinegar 9% to the maximum level in the water container do not use any other liquid for this purpose .

2. Turn on the steam cooker. When cleaning do not install condensate tray, steam trays, lid and rice bowl.

3. Specify the time on the timer 20-25 minutes. After the specified time, turn off the appliance, allow the steam cooker to cool, drain off the remaining vinegar.

4. Rinse the container several times with clean water.