Previous Features

Arlene Ward

Arthur Schwartz

Carole Walter

Christina Pirello

Christopher Kimball

Chuck Williams

Cinda Chavich

Crescent Dragonwagon

Diane Shaw

James McNair

Jimmy Gherardi

Judith Barrett

Kate Heyhoe

Laura Pazzaglia

Lauren Groveman

Leslie Glover Pendleton

Linda West Eckardt and Katherine West Defoyd

Lora Brody

Lorna Sass

Maxime Bilet

Miss Vickie

Osama El-Sayed

Penn Hongthong

Philipp Beyeler

Robb Walsh

Rose Levy Beranbaum

Stacey Hawkins

Tom Lacalamita

Toula Patasalis

Victoria Cooksey

Victoria Wise

We welcome Laura Pazzaglia as our Guest Chef. She is the founder of the popular hippressurecooking.com, a foodie website dedicated to educating consumers about pressure cooker techniques, recipes and trends. An authority on pressure cookers, Pazzaglia's website and recipes have been featured on Yahoo.com, Shine, Food.com and thekitchn.com.

Before the birth of her first child five years ago, Laura Pazzaglia had a successful career in technology, managing technical projects in the San Francisco Bay Area. Since then, she has lived in Austria and Italy, and had her second child, Adriana.

Using her cooking knowledge from around the world, she has become an advocate for technology in the kitchen, dedicating her time investing new cooking tools and gadgets and teaching foodies how to use them. She has spent the last five years working at home, perfecting her cooking and writing about her experiences.

When did you become interested in pressure cookers?

I was introduced to pressure cooking by a friend who, on a whim, invited us to dinner, and she whipped up a meal in no time. I picked up a pressure cooker at the supermarket (that is where you can find them in Italy), and started pressure cooking and not looking back! My Italian mother-in-law had been pestering me for years to get one, but I had to see it in action to be convinced.

Your website is called "Hip Pressure Cooking". Why the name?

When I was searching for Pressure Cooker recipes, what I was seeing was very un-hip! I see my website as a campaign, of sorts, against brown, runny foods and to attract new people to pressure cooking who might not have been exposed to it before. And my "campaign" goes beyond my own website....

• The photos I take of the recipes are publlished by very selective "photo recipe surfing' websites, which are frequented by foodies looking for inspiration. They can see, without any preaching, what surprising things can come out of the pressure cooker.
• I approach general interest foodie websites to write introductory or more advanced articles for the pressure cooker.
• I "syndicate" my recipes and articles, that is, they are reproduced with my permission, on popular websites like Yahoo.com, Food.com, etc. No part of the world is immune from my campaign! I also tackle Australian and British readers through their recipe websites and I just launched an Italian version, cucinarehip.it.

How do you come up with the recipes featured on your website?

I either build the recipes around what I would like to eat, what is in season or a need I see developing. I noticed lots of visitors were clicking on the meat recipe category and I only had one recipe in there! So, October was "Meat Month" - that was difficult for us because my family doesn't eat meat more than twice a month. The next series, "Soup Month:, was a little self-serving recuperation from cooking and eating two meat recipes a week for four weeks. It also gave birth to an article with 5 Amazing Tips & Tricks for Pressure Cooker Soups!

I've also started a "Beginner Basics" series to help everyone who has just gotten a pressure cooker for the holidays, or resolved to use the one more often. These recipes will have more detailed steps and also close-ups of the workings of the pressure cooker. The first recipe? My first recipe, mashed potatoes!

How does your international experience influence your cooking and recipes?

Globalization has reached kitchens too!
I have lived in four countries: one year in the UK, 8 in Italy, 24 in America and 3 in Austria and now I'm back to Italy (don't add them all up) - with frequent visits back to the U.S. I am fully fluent in English and Italian. Unfortunately, I am slowly forgetting my hard-earned German due to lack of practice.

Each country has its own measuring standard, specialty ingredients and names for things. For example, liquid vanilla is readily available in the United States, but in Europe vanilla in an envelope is much more common. I want as many people as possible to use my recipes so I write them in metric and American standards, I also do not use any prepared or packaged ingredients because, frankly, I don't see a need for them, but more importantly they are not usually available worldwide.

Catering to everyone does not make my recipes boring, though. I do throw in a few surprises once in a while, like the Rabbit Cacciatora recipe or the Octopus and Potato Salad with advice on where to find these ingredients.

In Italy, I rely on an "advanced network of pressure cooking housewives", and one mother-in-law, who share their pressure cooker knowledge, advice, tips and recipes. My neighbor, Giuseppina, gave me a great tip about not cooking the potatoes and octopus together, which I then shared with my readers on the website.

With the use of technology, I hope to bring the same kind of supportive network and hand-holding I had when I was just getting started to someone sitting in front of their computer wondering what to do with this "mysterious" pressure cooking object hidden in their pantry or still in the box.

Of all the recipes you've created for the pressure cooker, what is your favorite?

As soon as I've finished converting, photographing and eating a recipe, it is instantly my favorite. I can't wait to get it on the internet to have everyone try it and tell me what they think and how it worked out for them. The best part about publishing to a website is interacting with your readers, and also learning about what they are pressure cooking.

Though, I do make pressure-cooker risotto, creme caramel, and soups several time a month.

Many are intimidated by the pressure cooker. What advice would you give for "first timers"?

Start with the easy and simple recipes, boiled potatoes, soups, beans etc; that are sure to be successful; then, try to tackle the more challenging ones or come up with your own.

On my website, I classify my recipes by Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced so that there is something for both the new and adventurous cook.

What are your plans for the future?

I want to help the introduction of new technology into the kitchen, explaining how it can be helpful, rewarding and delicious. I just launched an Italian-language version of "Hip Pressure Cooking, Cucinare Hip!" and hope to get more Italians pressure-cooking. Many Italians receive pressure cookers as a wedding gift here but they are afraid to use them!

I'd also like to break into the print world to reach more people through newspaper, magazines and books. I don't want to just copy recipes from my website into a book. I have some ideas to do something really innovative to inspire and entice the readers to pick up their pressure cookers more often and make amazing things with them.

Rabbit Cacciatora
Serves 6-8

This recipe only requires a pinch of salt because the rest of the saltiness will come from the salted olive brine. If you substitute the olives for another type, adjust the seasoning accordingly.

1 rabbit about 2lbs or 1kg, legs separated and body cut into 3 or 4 slices
1 cup of flour
1 onion, diced
1 carrot, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
1 garlic clove, smashed
1 sprig of rosemary
1 spring of sage
1 pinch of salt & pepper
1 cup red wine
1 28 oz. or 400 g. can of whole tomatoes, drained
1 cup of black gourmet salt-cured olives (Taggiesche, French or Kalamata)
Olive Oil

For Marinade:

3 bay laurel leaves
1 bunch of parsley
1 onion, roughly chopped
1 cup of white wine
1 cup of white vinegar
enough water to cover

1. Marinate the rabbit meat for a minimum of four hours prior to cooking by placing the rabbit pieces in a large bowl with parsley, bay leaf, roughly sliced onion, one cup of vinegar and one cup of white wine and enough water to cover the rabbit. When 4-24 hours have passed, discard the marinade, strain and dry the rabbit meat pieces before cooking.
2. Fill a measuring cup with salted black olives, then add water to the 1-cup mark; set aside and do not discard the water.
3. In your open pressure cooker, with the fop off, on a medium flame add olive oil. When the oil is hot, lightly flour the meat pieces and place in the pressure cooker to sear. Turn over once and when browned on both sides pull out of the pan and set aside. Turn off the flame and add a splash of wine in the hot pan and scrub all of those delicious bits of seared rabbit stuck to the bottom of the pan and set aside to use later.
4. Add a tablespoon of fresh olive oil and soften the chopped onion, carrot, and celery with the sage and rosemary sprigs and a pinch each of salt and pepper. When the vegetables have softened add the meat back in the pan with one cup of red wine. Let everything simmer in the wine in the uncovered pressure cooker for about 10 minutes, swooshing the contents around occasionally.
5. Give the contents one last stir and then add the olives with their liquid, brown bits you set aside from browning the meat, tomatoes and close and lock the lid of the pressure cooker. Turn the heat to high and when the pressure cooker reaches pressure lower the flame and begin counting 14 minutes cooking time. When the time has passed, release all of the vapor, unlock and open the lid and move contents to serving dish. If the tomatoes are still whole, give them a light squeeze with the tongs - and don't forget to remove the remaining stems of the rosemary and sage sprigs!

Octopus and Potato Salad
Serves about 6-8

Octopus has a bad reputation for being tough and rubbery when cooked at home. However, if you know the secrets to tenderizing it you will be able to make this exotic (outside of Italy, anyway) salad with just the right bite!

When you buy fresh octopus, you need to either freeze and thaw it or beat it vigorously to tenderize it before cooking. If your fish-monger has fresh octopus ask him if he will tenderize the octopus for you. Otherwise, when you get home spend about half an hour banging on the stiff invertebrate or flinging it against your neighborhood's rocky landscaping to counteract the rigor mortis or...you can just put it in the freezer.

I let the octopus defrost for a day in the refrigerator before using it for this recipe.

Many recipes might direct you to cook the potatoes and octopus together to save time. If you do this, be prepared for "purple" potatoes because the pigment of the octopus skin will seep into the cooking liquid and in turn color the potatoes.

1 octopus of about 2 lbs. or 1 kilo
2 lbs. or 1 kilo of potatoes (about 6 medium)
3 cloves of garlic
1 bunch of parsley
vinegar
olive oil
1 bay laurel leaf
1/2 T. of peppercorns
salt

1. First, remove the head, slit it in half and turn it inside out to empty its contents and the little attached things including the eyes. Then, remove the beak in the center where all of the tentacles meet. rinse the octopus under running water.
2. Wash and scrub the potatoes well and place them whole, unpeeled, in the pressure cooker. Add enough water to just cover the potatoes half-way with a pinch of salt.
3. Close and lock the lid of the pressure cooker and turn the heat to high. When the pan reaches pressure, lower the flame to minimum heat and begin counting 15 minutes cooking time under pressure.
4. When the time is up, release all of the vapor, remove the potatoes with tongs (reserve the cooking water), and peel them while they are as hot as you can handle. I use tongs and a fork to get started - they are so easy to peel when they are still steaming hot!
5. Next, cook the octopus. Add more water in the pressure cooker (enough to almost cover the octopus), 1 whole garlic clove, the bay leaf, the whole peppercorns and bring to a boil before adding the octopus.
6. Close and lock the lid of the pressure cooker and turn the heat to high. When the pan reaches pressure, lower the flame to minimum heat and begin counting 15 minutes cooking time under pressure.
7. When the time is up, release all of the vapor, and check the octopus for tenderness by seeing if a fork will sink easily in the thickest part of the flesh.

If not, close the top and bring it to pressure for another minute or two and check again.

1. When the octopus is ready, remove and drain it. Remove any remaining skin from the octopus by lightly dragging a knife blade on the back-end and sides of the tentacles - only remove the skin from the suction-cup if you want to remove the suction cups. Chop the head and tentacles into small bite-sized chucks.
2. While the octopus is cooking, you can prepare the vinaigrette by putting the following in a small jar or plastic container: 1/2 cup of good olive oil, 4-5 T. of white wine vinegar, two crushed garlic cloves, salt and ground pepper to taste. Close the lid and shake, shake, shake to blend.
3. Dice the potatoes in pieces roughly the same size as the octopus chunks, unite them with the octopus, cover in the vinaigrette and sprinkle with the whole bunch of chopped parsley.