Pressure Cooker Bread.

[pugwash60]

I like cooking and make bread a lot. I've heard that you can cook it in a pressure cooker. Does anyone know the procedure? Do you put water in the bottom and bake it in a small loaf tin inside the P cooker or do you put the loaf straight into the pressure cooker and put it on the heat?
Does one have to adapt the dough in any way or is a normal bread dough fine?
I actually have an oven anyway but it's not great for bread so wondered about the pressure cooker method.
Thanks.

 

[Twister_Ken]

I've no idea, but it sounds as though it may be feasible. After all, there are plenty of steam bakeries around.

 

[duncan99210]

Google pressure cooker bread - more receipies than you can shake a stick at come straight back at you..... Now all we need is a pressure cooker.

 

[V1701]

Here's a good thread from Liveaboard. If you don't already have a pressure cooker I can recommend WMF, expensive but high quality, stainless not aluminium and come in a range of sizes. From Amazon and elsewhere...

 

[TQA]

Prepare the dough as normal but do the final rise in the pressure cooker.

Start the bread cooking at a medium heat say 5 minutes then turn to lowest heat for about 45 minutes. Remove loaf and turn over and return to the pressure cooker and cook for about 15 minutes more.

Times vary depending on stove and pressure cooker.

N.B. if you have a draft past the cooker that can change the way it heats so close the hatches!

I have made several varieties of bread this way including sourdough with good results.

 

[MASH]

Here's some useful stuff culled from another site - note the advantages of aluminium over SS, the importance of removing the rubber sealing gasket and use of "flame tamers" to even out the heat.

A quick search also provides recipes for bread cooked under steam pressure in foil covered baking tins too so there are evidently several different techniques.

Soda bread saves all the time and effort, no long kneading or rising; it takes about three minutes to prepare and is cooked immediately - perfect at sea, the end result is delicious.

Can't help thinking that a biscuit tin lagged with a cover made from an old fire blanket would do the same thing if you didn't have a pressure cooker (bet they're cheap on e-bay though, esp the older aluminium ones)

The traditional way to avoid draft problems is to move to Canada, or just not let soldiers into the galley...




"The following are my recommendations for baking bread in
pressure cookers taken from my own experience. Aluminum is
a better conductor of heat than stainless steel, and is,
therefore, the better pressure cooker for baking bread.
No water is used in the baking process when using pressure
cookers.


DIRECTIONS FOR A 4-6 QUART ALUMINUM PRESSURE COOKER


A 4-6 quart aluminum pressure cooker makes a great stovetop
oven for baking bread.


--Lightly grease the inside with vegetable oil and sprinkle
with cornmeal. Cornmeal works so much better at
preventing dough from sticking to the pot's sides than
does dusting with flour. And your bread doesn't look
white and have an unbaked look. Commercial pizza doughs
are all sprinkled with cornmeal.
--Place bread dough for its second rising directly in the
cooker WITHOUT using the perforated cooking rack.
--Brush top of dough with an egg white/water wash or with
milk to produce a light golden color. The top, otherwise,
will be very light in color and look undone. The sides
and bottom of the bread will be darker in color than the
top since they are in direct contact with the pot.
--REMOVE RUBBER GASKET AND PRESSURE REGULATOR (that item
which rocks) BEFORE BAKING.
--Place COVERED (i.e. closed) pressure cooker on a flame
shield (aka flame tamer, heat diffuser). I find this tool
essential in distributing the heat evenly across the
bottom of the pot. I always use it for baking bread in
a pressure cooker. A flame shield is a 2 layered metal
perforated disk with an airspace in between connected to
a stationary or folding handle. (It is also great for
cooking foods that burn easily due to direct contact to a
flame). You can find them in kitchen gadget stores, at
flea markets where vendors sell kitchen tools, and I've
seen them at Wal-Mart and at other stores that sell
kitchen items.
--Cook on LOW TO MEDIUM-LOW heat for the time directed for
standard oven baking.
--My bread has always cooked through, and I've never had
to flip it over to brown the top, which I believe will
cause the bread to cave in. The bread will have the shape
of a 3 or 4 layer cake when done. If the bread sticks to
the bottom of the pot, the flame was too high. You may
want to let the bread cool in the pot a few minutes
before removing it. If it's necessary, use a dull knife
between the bread and the sides of the pot to more easily
loosen the bread. Don't expect to get it perfectly the
first time.
--Do not open lid until the recommended cooking time is
over since your bread may deflate.


Because stainless steel pressure cookers tend to scorch and
not evenly cook bread when the dough is in direct contact
to the pot, it is necessary to put your dough in another
container inside your cooker. "

 

[Victoria Sponge]

I've not tried a pressure cooker, but my bread maker is down on the boat. It's brilliant, provided you have shore power, obviously.

 

[BobnLesley]

Stove-top bread

We bake bread onboard three or four times a season - whenever we've been too long away from a bakery - and have used both the pressure cooker and the skillet pans with good results; we usually use the skillets, but I think that's only because they're stowed nearer to the front of the saucepan locker.
My tip would be: when available, stock up ok Lidl Bread mixes (they're good for 6 months at least) the multigrain one's our favourite and the cost's usually less than for a bag of flour elsewhere; it makes it a one-pack operation, though for best results add a splah of oil to the mix and use a bit less water than recommended.

 

[pugwash60]

Thanks for the replies. If one's taking out the rubber washer and pressure thingy, does a saucepan do the same job?

 

[MASH]

PW, my guess is that pressure cookers are suggested as they're of heavy construction, you'll need a thick layer of good heat-conducting materiel all around to make it work as an oven and reduce hot spots. Cast iron should do fine too. Pressure cookers are just something that people have to hand, esp on long distance cruising boats. No inward curving lips on the p cooker though, it needs straight sides or the bread won't come out in one piece.

Dough in a tin inside a saucepan should work but you risk warping the bottom of a normal saucepan if it gets too hot. The handle might not like the heat either. Surrounding the saucepan with loose wrapper of tinfoil to make the heat circulate around the sides and out at the top might help too.

Putting the dough on a tinfoil covered trivet in the pc is going to be my first try, and not enough of it to touch the sides so air can circulate.

PS. There's a lovely p cooker on e-bay right now for 99p. In Poole!