Cooking on a boat: pressure cooker for (nearly) gourmet sailors

When your boat trip is just one day long, lunch can consist of just a sandwich, some canned tuna or a more delicious meal at one of the “water front” restaurants along the coasts of Istria, Dalmatia, Côte d’Azur or the Emerald Coast, famous for their “unforgettable” prices.

Life on a boat is very often a bad copy of life ashore, if you do not convince yourself that living aboard means cooking while sailing and enjoying, far from any berth, the delicacies that can come out of even a small cabin cruiser.

This may not necessarily be possible only on yachts of twenty meters and up, but surely this unwritten rule applies to all cabin cruisers that have a stove with at least one burner, and especially if you know how to heed the valuable advice of Elisabetta Eördegh, revealed in her booklet“Per non morir di fame” (Not to starve) published by Editrice Incontri Nautici.

However, do not be misled by the author’s exotic name, which might prelude a vademecum of a thousand ways to prepare sausages, for, I assure you, my name being Gennaro, that the recipes suggested are instead authentically and exquisitely Mediterranean.

The author, a Genoese by birth and a Milanese by adoption, has sailed around the world for years and thus has experienced on her own skin the tips that she now spreads to all the people of sailors plying the seas.

Tricks and recipes are punctuated by frequent aside that downplay any possible anxiety and pursue the ultimate goal that is clearly expressed in the title of her work and then specified in the subtitle that summarizes the contents of the book: recipes and tips for cooking on a boat.

Under the announcement of the first recipe – pasta in a pressure cooker– Elizabeth Eördegh exorcises the fussy gourmet: “Come on, foodie people, don’t turn your noses up at once! I know that on your trips you go in search of pappardelle with hare sauce, trenette al pesto or tagliatelle with ragout made the old-fashioned way. But be practical, here we are in the cramped kitchen of a boat and it is important to be able to use one pot, save water, gas and time”.

(ed. I already said not to be misled by the last name…she was undoubtedly born in Genoa!).

Joking aside, we know how handy an enclosed pot can be on board, easy to handle when the boat is rolling or pitching, not to mention risky when it comes to the inescapable moment of draining pasta.

Pressure cooker is a good option and is also used for risottos and especially for the dried legume soups that the unpronounceable Eördegh offers among the sixty-four recipes in the book.

Chickpeas, lentils and beans can be prepared easily thus dispelling the myth that you have to soak them overnight to cook them. The pressure cooker in the boat works real miracles and even allows you to bake bread when you do not own an oven.

All recipes are characterized by simplicity and are appetizing, designed specifically for the cramped spaces and limited tools of a boat, and then collected, selected and tested.

In addition to recipes, the book also includes other valuable tips for those who cruise and therefore need to know how to store fish, vegetables, eggs, and other perishable foods. A small chapter, for example, illustrates specific cooking tools, while others discuss invaluable advice on how to eradicate cockroaches, fight seasickness and manage the garbage box while respecting the surroundings, yes, but without feeling compelled to stink up one’s boat.

Thanks to the author’s ironic streak, the reading flows quickly and the size of the booklet allows for a suitable space to store it in any type of boat.

If you are a sailor, now is the time to test, in the stable kitchen of your home, Elisabetta Eördegh’s tips and, just to whet…your curiosity, we suggest you try the recipes specially conceived for that pot that, when it became popular about 40 years ago, was nicknamed “atomic pot”.

Enjoy your meal and, as usual…. fair winds!