Eater has a longer article on how sourdough, and bread in general, is back in fashion and the changes being inflicted on the millenias-old staple by tech bros.
“I spent a lot of time — I don’t want to say ‘debugging,’ because that sounds really technical — but just working on recipes and trying to teach myself and there really weren’t a lot of materials out there at the time to do that,” he told me by phone this spring. “With bread baking, you kind of follow an algorithm to produce a result and that result isn’t always what you think it’s going to be, so you kind of have to step back and debug and diagnose the steps along the way. How did I go wrong here? That’s because technically the temperature might not be right or the dough strength might not be right. That iterative procedure and working through those algorithms kind of appeals to engineer. There’s the precision part of it, but also, when it comes down to it, technical people like to work with their hands. You want to construct something and I think bread is a good way to do that.”
(Score: 2) by insanumingenium on Wednesday November 21 2018, @06:11PM (2 children)
I have never heard of using it to caramelize onions. But it doesn't seem intuitively to be a great option.
Caramelization starts happening rapidly around 160c according to wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
Maillard reaction is probably also happening (even if it isn't the primary effect with onions) at very similar at 140-165c according to wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
But an instant pot is only good for like 15psi at most (and as I understanding working pressure is more like 11psi), and stovetop pressure cookers seem to top out around 22psi (yes pressure is in freedom units because those are the sources I quickly found).
Take the boiling point of water at best case 38 psi absolute (since the pressure cooker is relative to atmosphere obviously, and I am rounding up for science) then according to the first answer I found [engineeringtoolbox.com] you are only going to make 129c.
Baking soda of course lowers pH which speeds both of these processes.
Now the bottom of the vessel will obviously reach higher temperatures even if only in hotspots, and will therefore allow some caramelization, but optimal caramelization would seem to require holding a consistent temperature around but preferably above 160. Time to rig up an electric element to a sand bath and do some experimenting.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday November 21 2018, @06:27PM (1 child)
This is the link I actually wanted to share. It goes into greater detail about the case for using a pressure cooker to caramelize onions:
https://www.seriouseats.com/2016/01/the-food-lab-pressure-cooker-caramelized-onions-onion-soup.html [seriouseats.com]
I enjoyed the results from when I did it. I might try it again tomorrow if I have leftover onions.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday November 22 2018, @05:48PM
Intruiging... I'm half tempted to go pick up some onions to try for this afternoon's feast, but I think I'll wait for a more leisurely day to experiment.
Thank you - that's a much more informative page than just a recipe. Hopefully the combination of high altitude (-3psi) and the instant pot's mere 11psi "high" won't push me below the magic temperature.