I love pecan season (and so does our thieving herd of deer), but hate to crack and shell. Usually, I collect pecans, drag them to the feed store to be cracked, and beg people to shell for me. But this year, no more. I bought an old pressure cooker book at a thrift store, and voila, a quick and easy way to shell pecans. If you have pecans, invest in a pressure cooker – so worth it, it’s amazing. Plus, there’s lots of other great recipes for pressure cookers. I bought an Aeternum Pressure Cooker years ago, and never had a problem with it, or any of the scary horror stories people talk about.
Cracking Pecans with Pressure Cooker
Ingredients
- 1 cup water
- Pecans in shell
Instructions
- Must have pressure cooker, and a steamer rack that reaches the interior walls of the pressure cooker, so the pecans don't touch the water.
- Place 1 cup water in the bottom of the pressure cooker. Place steamer rack in. Fill rack with pecans. Make sure pressure cooker is no more than 2/3 full.
- Bring pressure cooker to cooking state (mine is when the pressure indicator is up). Time for 5 minutes. Release the pressure, remove the lid and cool.
- If nuts are moist, dry on low heat, in the oven.
- Tap with hammer or meat pounder to crack, and voila, the shell separates and falls off, easily!!!
- I used my meat pounder.
- Happy cracking!