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High Altitude Baking / Cooking

fawnridge (Ricky)

9 years ago

Even though we're many months away from moving to Colorado, I think I should begin to learn the process to convert from low to high altitude baking and cooking. If you live above 5000 feet or have experience in baking and cooking at high altitudes, please give me some tips. Thanks!

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fawnridge (Ricky)
Original Author

9 years ago

Yeah. I'm actually looking forward to snow in the winter instead of snowbirds.

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Comments (12)

lindac92
9 years ago
Don't forget to add time to hard boiled eggs.....and at 9500 I was never successful in boiling potatoes and my pasta was always mushy....yeast breads popped up like crazy and a little extra flour kept cakes and muffins from running all over.
PRO
Lars/J. Robert Scott
9 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I made a pizza in Mexico City once (at 7400 feet), and the dough rose like something from I Love Lucy. It is also difficult to boil beans - best to use a pressure cooker, according to friends in Mexico City. Your neighbors in Colorado should be able to help you.

So sad that Lee is gone. I think about her a lot and often, and she would have been able to help you.
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I am no expert at any of this, but I do have a comment or two on a couple of things in your list. Hopefully, someone who really has a clue will chime in. The Arctostaphylos should be a really nice ground cover, and should do ok. The leaves, dried, made as tea, are fantastic for chronic or periodic urinary tract infections. Personal experience. The berries, while 'edible', were pounded with dried meats and fats as late-cold-season 'emergency foods'.... But probably not something you would want to bake into a pie. The pinon pine does grow at high elevations in New Mexico. But I am not sure how it would do in Colorado. Farther north, possibly higher and probably colder. And even in lower elevations and absolutely prime growing conditions in New Mexico, they are **very** slow-growing...... If the trees absolutely thrived in your area, it might be 40 years before you can really harvest pine nuts from even a large nursery-grown tree. I don't know about your other possibles. But I suspect there are other options, as well. Have you checked with state and local government sites, and gardening clubs/associations in CO? You might find some other possibilities. By the way, I *truly* envy your cabin in that location!!
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Comments (20)
The weight on the vent is just ADDING to the atmospheric pressure. As calliope said, the assumption is that you are operating at or below 1000ft so atmospheric pressure is app 15 psi or greater. Recipes are written with this assumption so if a recipe says to process at 10 lbs weight (or 11psig by gauge) for a certain amount of time it is assumed that the pressure will be that 14-15psi plus the 10-11 as explained in the link calliope gave (actually you have to click on another link so I've put direct link below for pressure cooking at altitude). Weight is weight, you're correct we don't recalibrate our scales depending on altitude but you are missing the whole point that whether you are going by the gauge (which is calibrated, if not off, for sea level atmospheric pressure, so shows 0 psig - the g for "gauge") or the weight that is just in addition to the atmospheric pressure at your location which can vary widely. But as calliope said, if atmospheric pressure is lower then you need to compensate by adding weight and/or time - in the example given in the link below, at 5000ft the pressure is 12.2psi (absolute, not psig - "gauge referenced at sea level"), 2.5 psi LOWER than at sea level so theoretically you need to add 2.5 lbs of weight to the vent. Since the weights only go in 5 lb increments (and pressure cookers don't tend to use weights), you would in the cooking example add time as shown in the chart on the link. For pressure canning at 5000ft the NCHFP has you add 5lbs to whatever the "below 1000ft" weight is for the recipe, if you are using weights, and if you don't have a weight set then you just have to adjust the heat to maintain 2psig higher reading on your gauge than you would use at sea level (since chart - I'm using the one for tomatoes - goes from 4001-6000ft, they haven't done charts for every 250 or 1000ft). To the OP: I know you were talking about BWBing, and I'm glad you got your answer. Sorry for the hijack but it's important to address this issue since it was raised on this thread and you never know who's going to be reading it in the future. Here is a link that might be useful: Direct link to pressure cooking times at altitude This post was edited by ajsmama on Mon, Sep 30, 13 at 9:36
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I tried looking for you, I found this recipe. Take a look at it compared to the one you have and adjust from there. Or.......... use this recipe instead (see link bleow), she said they are the best blueberry bran muffins she has ever had. Here is a wonderful blueberry muffin recipe most of us have tired & love. Posted by ivamae (My Page) on Tue, Aug 10, 10 at 10:06 Blueberry Muffins - makes 9 large ones. The batter is very thick 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour 3/4 cup white sugar 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 teaspoons baking powder 1/3 cup vegetable oil 1 egg 1/3 cup milk ( approximately - see below) 1 cup fresh blueberries ( I used half of the pint container.) 1/2 cup white sugar 1/3 cup all-purpose flour 1/4 cup butter, cubed 1 & 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon 1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. ( I had it just a wee, wee bit less) 2. Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners. Combine first 4 ingredients. Place vegetable oil into a 1 cup measuring cup, add the egg and fill the rest of the cup with milk. Mix this with the flour mixture. I just stirred it in. I did not use the electric mixer as it is very stiff. Fold in the blueberries. It says to fill the muffin cups right to the top. I didn't fill them quite that much. Sprinkle with the crumb mixture. 3. To make the crumb topping: mix together the last 4 ingredients and mix with a fork ( I used my one hand to finish crumbling it.) Sprinkle over the muffins before baking. 4. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes ( I found 22 was about right) in the preheated oven or until done. It is so very easy and they freeze well, too. Here is a link that might be useful: blueberry bran muffins
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Hi, Ricky. I hope you're enjoying CO. In case you aren't still reading the FL gardening forum, I wanted to call your attention to this: http://forums.gardenweb.com/discussions/4814029/linda-wiltsey-sentsfromheaven-has-died?n=1
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dcarch7 d c f l a s h 7 @ y a h o o . c o m
9 years ago
"--- live above 5000 feet ----"

Great way to get high! :-)

Not all food needs, or should be cooked at 212F, especially meats.

I just did a corned beef at 137F, and a roasted chicken at 144F.

Get a pressure cooker for those few foods which needs higher temperature.

Wasn't there a study in the news a few days ago that people in Colorado live much longer?

dcarch
plllog
9 years ago
Oy. Your baking! So I remembered a high altitude baking book that a friend had and checked Amazon. There's a whole slew of them, including a number from someone called The Muffin Lady. I bet you can find one with all the basics which you can use to reformat your favorite recipes. There's one called Pie in the Sky for which the subtitle includes various elevations. There are sure to be neighbors, new friends and blogs to help, but sometimes a good book is just what's needed.
PRO
Lars/J. Robert Scott
9 years ago
I saw no study about Colorado, but I did see this list, which puts Colorado at #11 for longevity, behind New York and New Jersey.
dcarch7 d c f l a s h 7 @ y a h o o . c o m
9 years ago
Colorado looks pretty good.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4a/American_Life_Expectancy_at_Birth.png

http://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/usa/life-expectancy-by-county

dcarch
writersblock (9b/10a)
9 years ago
Ricky, are you sure about this move?

http://ths.gardenweb.com/discussions/4646557/whats-view-out-your-kitchen-window-on-may-19th-heres-mine
writersblock (9b/10a)
9 years ago
May 19 is winter? I guess you will like it there. :)
tishtoshnm Zone 6/NM
9 years ago
I'm at about 6500 foot above sea level. I use less yeast in yeasted doughs. I prefer to do mashed potatoes in a pressure cooker and beans long and slow in the crockpot. Baked potatoes are always given a head start in the microwave before going into the oven. Most baked goods I do not modify, mainly from laziness. On most things, I do not find that the extra effort makes a tangible enough difference for my crowd to notice.

For the weather, the current storm is a bit of an anomaly. We have had a very, abnormally warm spring with some winter storms that come in that are doozies. In my part of New Mexico I am absolutely ready though for the weather to get on with it and behave a little better.
Lars
9 years ago
I used to go to Santa Fe (7200 feet) in the summer as a teenager growing up in Texas, and I found it to be quite cold in June, but then I was used to weather in the 100s, which I hated.
tishtoshnm Zone 6/NM
9 years ago
Lars, I moved to the mountains of NM after having lived near Palm Springs, CA for about 10 years. In Palm Springs, our rule was we did not turn on the swamp cooler until it hit 95 degrees outside which means that we did not need it at all here in NM (I am bout 40 minutes from Santa Fe, same basic climate). I thought the summers here were wonderful for quite a while. After living here for 10 years, I am not sure I would be able to handle a Palm Springs summer again.

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