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Tuesday, February 1, 2011

the can cooker

This is a can cooker.

It's literally a 16 quart aluminum can, than can be used to cook food on the stove or outdoors.

It's very easy to use; You put your food in the can, put it on the stove or BBQ grill, and it cooks.

Which sounds to me, exactly like what you would do with a cast iron pot.

Food is cooked in the can cooker by steaming; You add a sufficient amount of liquid along with your food, to make a steamed one-pot meal.

I had a theory, that anything you can cook in a can cooker, you can cook in a cast iron pot.

I wondered if there was any "secret" to this can cooker; Does the shape of the can make a difference in how the food turns out? What about the vented locking lid?

I would soon find out, when I tried a modified version of the first recipe on the website.

I put the following in my 9 quart pot, on my indoor stove:

1 lb shrimp, 1 lb scallops, fresh broccoli, 8 half ears of corn, a quartered onion, some minced garlic*, fresh basil, dried basil, seasoned salt, black pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, 1 can beer, 12 oz white wine, 2 squeezed lemons.**

*fresh garlic cloves would have been fine too.

**leave the lemons in the pot while cooking, and remove when done.

The original recipe also called for crab legs and lobster tails; I omitted those to save money.

I let it cook on medium heat for 30 mins, then reduced to low until it was done.

It didn't take long, maybe an hour.

It was delicious. I don't believe there's any secret magic to the can cooker, that would have made it that much better; The cast iron pot did a fine job.

It could have used a little less liquid, but that's just a learning curve.

More recipes to come.


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