Genius, That's What I Am

Cooking beans or legumes of any kind has been a pain in the hiney for the most part since I've been living on my own. Why you ask? because I have no pressure cooker. Now that may not seem like a big obstacle but what that means is that it would take me 6 to 7 hours to cook beans. No lie. And they STILL didn't come out tender like I like them. I would soak them overnight to try to decrease the time it takes to cook them, but to no avail. I had to set aside a whole Sunday afternoon to dedicate to being at home so I could watch the beans (I've come to learn that beans in Angola are different from beans in the U.S. They're extra hard or something, because beans in the U.S. don't take that long to cook even without using a pressure cooker.)

So I was desperate to find a solution to this irksome problem. I need to eat lots of beans (for protein) and I had resorted lately to buying canned or bottled pre-cooked beans here and there, but I don't want to create an unhealthy habit so I needed a more permanent solution. And that's when it hit me: If I don't have the time nor the money to hunt down a decent pressure cooker, I'll MAKE MY OWN!
And so, in an amazing feat of engineering skills and innovative brainstorming, I give you, the Elisa Pressure Cooker Extraordinaire:


It worked like a charm. I'm not even kidding. The beans were tender as can be and the infused flavors of the condiments were absorbed by every delicious grain. I had some major water spilling going on until I learned how to work with the right amount of water... so I created a big mess. But it was SOOO worth it, the beans took about an hour to cook.

Mission: Accomplished :)