This week's weather has probably made you long for hearty stews, casseroles and curries. However, these are all dishes that take a long time to cook – and that can mean a spike in the electricity bill.
This week's weather has probably made you long for hearty stews, casseroles and curries. However, these are all dishes that take a long time to cook – and that can mean a spike in the electricity bill.
Cooking accounts for up to 8% of the power used in an average household in South Africa.
So – possibly in an attempt to get some good news out there for once (and reduce consumption into the bargain) – Eskom (in partnership with The Star and The Angela Day Kitchen) has come up with the 49M Cookbook.
It's full of quick and easy recipes prepared using appliances that require little or no electricity – such as pressure cookers and Wonderbags.
There's a whole section on 'one-pot meals' – energy efficient because you cook all the ingredients, as the name suggests, in one pot using one stove plate only.
The 49M Cookbook’s one-pot recipes include spicy chicken and beans and sweet and sour pork.
A pressure cooker’s much shorter cooking times makes it one of the simplest, easiest, most convenient and cost-effective ways to save energy in a winter kitchen.
High-pressure cooking the 49M way includes recipes for Moroccan lamb shanks and quick and easy leek and potato soup – the shanks ready in 50 minutes and the leek soup in 8 minutes.
Conventionally, the shanks would need to simmer for 3 to 4 hours on an electric hob and the soup for 30 to 40 minutes.
The Wonderbag, on the other hand, is even more energy efficient.
This simple heat retention cooker was developed in South Africa and saves up to 30% on the electricity you consume for cooking.
Once brought to the boil on a heat source such as a stove plate, the warm pot containing the food is placed in the Wonderbag and continues to cook slowly without using any additional energy until finished.
The cooker is made of two poly-cotton bags filled with either recycled polystyrene balls or foam chips, which provide the insulation needed to complete the cooking process and keep the food warm.
Wonderbag recipes in the book include oxtail stew with dumplings and beef and beer casserole – both dishes requiring only 20 minutes of stove time and a further 5 hours of slow-cooking in a Wonderbag using no electricity.
As the book's publicity says, "electricity smart winter cooking in kitchens across South Africa – especially between 5pm and 9pm, the period of peak demand for electricity in the residential sector – helps to reduce pressure on the national power grid".
The good news is that the 49M cookbook is available to download for free.
Just visit www.eskom.co.za/idm and click on 'Residential'.
