[at-l] Non-instant food, pot cozys, and non-simmering stoves

[jmayer@rochester.rr.com (Jim Mayer)]

Hi all,

As I type, I'm finishing off a pot of regular BROWN rice that I cooked
without simmering.  It's quite good, especially since I dosed it with
some black-bean and garlic sauce out of my fridge... there are SOME
advantages to being off the trail!

Anyway, I recently built a "Photon" stove (thanks Don), and wanted to
experiment with cooking non-instant foods.  I've used a pot cozy before,
and I've heard some people report success with using one for rice, so I
decided to try myself.  Here are my results:

Conditions: my kitchen
Stove: sometimes the Photon stove, sometimes my kitchen stove.
Pot: an Evernew 0.9 liter titanium pot.

(1) White rice... works like a charm.  Just add the rice to the cold
water, bring to a boil, then put in the pot cozy for 30-40 minutes.  If
your cozy is well designed the pot will still be too hot to hold.  You
might want to use a little less water than usual, say 1 3/4 cups water
to one cup of rice.

(2) Pre-packaged rice & beans dinner.  I tried one of these (with the
addition of some veggie-sausage pieces).  I used the same procedure as
for plain white rice, and it worked very well.  Delicious, but a bit too
salty... good trail food!

(3) Instant brown rice.  Instant brown rice is only half as instant as
regular "instant" rice.  The usual recipe calls for five minutes of
cooking followed by five minutes of sitting.  Bringing it to a boil then
putting it in the cozy for ten or fifteen minutes worked for me.

(4) Oatmeal.  I couldn't find any old fashioned oatmeal in my cupboard,
but the "quick" (as opposed to "instant") oatmeal worked great with the
cozy.

(5) Brown rice.  This stuff takes forty minutes of simmering, so I
figured it would be a good torture test.  The cozy didn't quite work for
this, since after about fifty minutes or so the rice was edible but had
a bit too much of a bite to it and there was a lot of water.  I brought
it briefly back to a boil over high heat (simulating a non-simmering
stove) and put it back in the cozy for another fifteen or twenty
minutes... it came out great.  If I try this again, I'll reheat after
thirty minutes and see what happens.

Here are my observations:

(1) You can use a pot cozy instead of simmering.  If your cozy is well
designed, this approach will serve beautifully for white rice.

(2) If things are too wet or goopy, just blast the food again and put it
back in the cozy.  Very little fuel will be needed for this, as the pot
is already quite hot.  One additional shot will work for brown rice, and
I can't imagine waiting for anything that requires more cooking than
that!

(3) Cleanup is very easy, since anything that did burn or stick tends to
soften nicely during the unheated simmering.

I'm excited about this for a couple of reasons:

(1) It makes a greater variety of foods available to me.

(2) Regular rice takes up about half the space as the same weight of
instant rice, so the regular stuff packs smaller.

(3) I really like brown rice (I'll probably use the "instant" kind for
trail food, though).

Oh, and for the curious, I made the pot cozy out of Reflectix
<http://www.reflectixinc.com/>.  I buy the stuff at our local hardware
store/home center.  I also used an aluminum foil tape especially made
for use with Reflectix insulation.

Basically, I made a cylinder wide enough so that my pot (with handles
folded) fit easily, but closely, inside.  I marked the Reflectix, then
cut it to size (cut it just a little big, so the edges overlap).  I then
used the foil tape to make a cylinder.  I put the pot on a scrap of
Reflectix (to add some height), put the cylinder over the pot, and
pinched four pleats in the cylinder so that the sides bent down to make
a flat top.  I cut off the pleats and taped the top in place.  I also
taped the seams on the inside of the cozy, figuring that there would be
a lot of steam in there.  I taped the bottom edge as well, since the raw
edge tended to catch on the pot.  Finally, I cut a round piece of
Reflectix to exactly fit the bottom of the cozy.

The cozy weighs 1.8 oz and fits an Evernew 0.9 liter titanium pot.

To use, I just put the pot on the round bottom piece, fold in the
handles, and cover the whole thing with the top part of the cozy.

To carry, I put the bottom piece into the top of the cozy, then put the
pot inside.

Finally, I don't know how well this approach would work in cold
weather.  It may, for example, be necessary to reheat one or more times
if the weather is really cold.  I just don't know.

-- Jim