"If You Can't Take the Heat..."

I got what I came here for. We have sailed the northern waters, all the way up the Maine coast and almost to the Canadian border. Now what? If we’re not going “down-east”, then where are we going – “up-west”?

We’re not going anywhere because it’s foggy and raining again (surprise, surprise). But not to worry, I’ve got a little project I’ve been itching to work on, and a cold rainy day at anchor gives me just the opportunity. All this cold weather has gotten me in the mood for some slow-cooked pot roast; with some carrots and onions, maybe some mashed potatoes… Yum. Only one problem though; a three pound pot roast will take four hours to cook. We’ve certainly got the time, but the amount of propane we would burn in those four hours could really deplete our tanks. The solution – a pressure cooker!

According to a number of websites I’ve been looking at, cooking a pot roast in a pressure cooker will shorten the cooking time to forty-five minutes. But I’ve never used a pressure cooker before. My mother used to cook with one. How hard could it be? I brought one along on this trip that I picked up cheap (big mistake) at the grocery store about three years ago, but had somehow never gotten around to using (another mistake). I did remember to bring the instructions at least.

I decide to test it out with plain water. Oh boy, what a scary contraption. You have to heat the contents of the pot so that pressure builds. Then, the steam is supposed to escape through this thingy on the top that should “gently rock” back and forth. Well, once the pot is hot, steam starts escaping from a few other places, but not through the top. “It’s probably just not hot enough yet,” Rick says from his safe seat, far away from the stove. I wait for it to heat up some more. The steam is really hissing out now, and the sound is becoming increasingly high pitched. I'm still waiting for some movement from that top do-hicky, but it’s just sitting there, motionless.

The pitch keeps getting higher and higher. This can’t be how it’s supposed to work, right? Rick can no longer ignore what’s going on in the galley and moves closer to the stove, but we’re both afraid to get close enough to this bomb-in-the-making to turn off the burner. I can just hear Scotty from the Enterprise - “Capt’n, she’s gonna BLOW!”

Finally, Rick chances it and pops the do-hickey off with a fork, releasing an explosive jet of steam. After it cools down enough, we do some diagnostics. Basically, it’s a cheaply made piece of junk, and I feel lucky that we didn’t get hurt. That thing is going right into the trash. I end up cutting the meat into small pieces and making a stew. Two hours on very low heat, hardly using much propane after all. And the best part –--- it’s delicious!