James Bay is at the south end of the City of Victoria, in the urban part of Greater Victoria between the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Inner Harbour.
Routes
Many routes out of James Bay have vehicle traffic. Douglas Street and Blanshard Streets are heavily travelled. Douglas Street becomes a highway (the Trans-Canada) west to Colwood and Langford, over the Malahat and north up-island. It has a paved shoulder and bike lane, but the traffic on the entrance and exit ramps is significant. Blanshard Street runs up to Saanich and the BC Ferry terminal at Swartz Bay. It is a highway, called Highway 17 or the Pat Bay Highway. It has bike lanes, but significant traffic. Other streets go north: Quadra, Cook, Gorge Road, Cedar Hill, Richmond, Shelbourne. They have drawbacks including traffic, lack of bike lanes, limited visibility, curb lanes occupied by parked cars, elevation changes. One option is to go downtown along Government, Douglas, Blanshard or Quadra as far as Fort Street and east and north on Fort Street whch has a bike lane (as of 2019) The bike lane was redeveloped as a separated lane out past Cook Street as of 2017-18. Fort Street crosses Oak Bay Avenue which runs east out to Beach. Fort becomes the Cadboro Bay Road.There is 5 k. loop around James Bay on Belleville along the Harbour on the north, the streets at the west end, Dallas on the south, and Douglas on the east. There is longer loop around Beacon Hill Park by Cook Street, and some loops in the park. The is a new paved bike lane beside Dallas from Beacon Hill park to Ogden Point as of 2020 after Dallas Road was torn up 2018-20 for sewer reconstruction. These are usually safe in the evening but the traffic on Sundays is heavy between tourists, families with children, people walking dogs, and people taking elderly parents out.
In the first few years, many times , I went east on Dallas past Beacon Hill Park and the Ross Bay Cemetery and followed a nearly coastal route. Dallas continues until it runs into Hollywood Crescent and Crescent Drive, which also follow the coast. These streets connect to to Beach Drive in Oak Bay. The traffic along Dallas is steady. There are intermittent micro-congestions behind tour buses and the ubiquitous horse drawn carriage rides. There are sections where cars park at an angle facing the Strait. The drivers have little vision and can back into oncoming traffic. These conditions were mitigated by the new bike paths that opened in 2020.
In 2016 I began to take the Beacon Hill-Oak Bay-Uplands-UVic-San Juan option.
going southeast along Niagara, through Beacon Hill Park exiting on Park Avenue;
crossing Cook Street at May, turning north at Moss Street, crossing crossing Fairfield at the traffic light;
turning right on Thurlow and follow Thurlow to Kipling and Brooke to St. Charles. Then another block along Chandler to Richmond, and a short block to Richardson. This avoid climbs of streets approaching the heights on Richardson at the south end of the Government House area. I used this as a route to Richmond at Richardson.
From there, I often crossed Foul Bay Road and proceeded on Richardson (which becomes McNeill in Oak Bay) to Victoria, turned left and then turned right onto Windsor.
I turned left (north) at Monterey, to cross Oak Bay Avenue with traffic lights. I go north on Monterey and St. Ann to Bowker, turn left and then right to continue northbound to the edge of Uplands of Oak Bay on Musgrave.
I ride north and cross Lansdowne on Midland, continue on Upper Terrace until to ends at Cadboro Bay Road, opposite the end of Cedar Hill Cross Road.
I cross Cadboro Bay Road and ride west on Cedar Hill Cross Road to University Drive and turn there and cross the Univesity of Victoria. Sometimes I pass the University and turn north on Gordon Head.
I emerge at Gordon Head and McKenzie, at the NW corner of the campus, and on go up Gordon Head to Feltham. A left turn and an immediate right onto Longview brings me to San Juan, which runs west as road and trail as far west as Cedar Hill Road.
My main cycling-friendly route out of James Bay was north along Menzies or Government to the Legislature, and along Government and Wharf along the Inner Harbour to the east end of the Johnson Street Bridge. There is a cycling lane, as of 2019, along Government from Belleville to Humbolt and along Wharf to Johnson Steet.
The Victoria Canoe & Kayak Club is on Gorge Road just past Tillicum. My best route from James Bay to the club was over the Johnson Street Bridge, along the Galloping Goose to the park at the West Victoria Y, near the Selkirk Trestle. At that point it’s off the trail through the park to Craigflower and then on Selkirk, a side street t parallel to Craigflower, all the way to Tillicum. At that point a right turn onto Tillicum, across the bridge, a left turn onto Gorge Road and that’s it. It was 6.8 k one way, mainly off the main roads.
100% whole wheat loaves may be made with a bread machine in the whole wheat program. High WW flour formulas that aim for sandwich loaves with an moderately open crumb use a dough with enhanced visco-elastic properties; the dough is enhanced with vital wheat gluten or bread flour and enriched with fats – oil or butter – and sugar in the form of molasses, honey, milk, brown sugar or refined sugar.
Much “whole wheat” bread multigrain bread. Multigrain covers many blends made with 50-90% flour being high protein white flour and some whole wheat flour. Loaves with high white flour content may use, and carmelized sugar products (e.g. molasses) for sweet flavour and brown colour. These loaves deliver the energy part of nutrition – starch – like sandwich bread and other processed carbohdrates. A multigrain loaf high in white flour can be baked in a bread machine with the basic bake program.
Bread machine recipes have to be customized; each machine needs a different amount of yeast to ferment to produce enough carbon dioxide to inflate the dough and make the dough rise within the time limits of the program. The best way to find the right amount of yeast for a bread machine recipe is to understand the manufacturer’s recipe for basic bread. The amount of yeast depends on the type of yeast and amount of salt in the recipe. I use instant yeast, and I write recipes in tables.
The manufacturer’s recipe for the whole wheat program is a suggestion of how produce a goof loaf with whole wheat flour, water, salt, added gluten, sugar, fats, and dry yeast in 4 hour program. Zojirushi’s recipe for 100% Whole Wheat Bread provides medium (1.5 lb.) and large (2 lb.) loaf formulas for the Zojirushi machines with large pans such as the BB-PAC20. I used those recipes to find out how to leaven 100% whole wheat for that device, a precaution to avoid overflowing or collapsing loaves.
The Zojirushi medium (1.5 lb.) recipe says to use 3.5 cups/420 g. of whole wheat flour recipe. The manual recommends measuring by scooping flour into a measuring cup – i.e. lightly scooped and less dense. This is a 3 cup recipe by weight. The manual says 4.2 g. [1.5 tsp] active dry yeast. 3 cups of whole wheat flour can be leavened with 3.6 g. of any instant yeast [a little more than 1 ¼ teaspoons]. It used a teaspoon of salt which is much healthier than many whole wheat recipes, but can be reduced using the usual calculations. Because I try to use 33% or 50% of the sodium (salt), than a recipe prescribes, I have to make a corresponding adjustment to yeast. The rule of reducing salt and yeast in the same proportion by weight works with whole wheat.
The dough made with the Z. recipe is enhanced with vital wheat gluten at a ratio of 1 tbsp. to 1 cup flour (8 g. to 139 g.). This exceeds the often generous prescriptions of Beth Hensperger for a 100% whole wheat loaf in the Bread Lovers Bread Machine Cookbook. The Z. dough is enriched with sugar, >43 g. for 417 g. of flour in a medium loaf (35 g. refined sugar, 7.5 g sugar in 10 g. molasses, lactose in milk powder) i.e. about 9% of dry ingredient weight. The recipe bakes into a denser bread than I like, which is fixed by reducing the water by a few teaspoons to get a loaf that rises, crowns and holds a loaf shape. Bakers hydrate whole wheat flour more intensely that bread flour to get suitable dough. Some of the water comes out in the baking. Whole wheat loaves have to be left to cool and dry out a bit. I find that in a machine, I can just leave out a little water. I can happily bake and eat this bread. I haven’t tried to toast it.
I have baked Beth Henspergers “Tecate Ranch Whole Wheat”, BLBMC (p. 126), a 100% whole wheat flour loaf enriched with canola oil, honey, and molasses a few times. It gets sugar from honey, molasses and milk powder (lactose is milk and dry milk is a sugar) . It may have as much or more sugar than the Zojirushi formula. BLBMC named it for a spa in Baja California that served “Zarathustra” bread; the spa used Zoroastrianism as one its themes. Exotic naming was a staple of marketing several times, in different decades of the 19th and 20th centuries. For an SF reading of the name, consider watching 2001: a Space Odessey, listening to the fanfare of Thus Spake Zarathustra. This could inspire a vision of black monolith. With gluten and adequate yeast the loaf rises and crowns nicely. I adapted the BLBMC source – it uses too much yeast (and is not low sodium). I get a loaf that rises, crowns and holds a loaf shape with just a little less water.
Adding gluten offsets the tendency of whole wheat to produce dense loaves by providing enough additional elasticity to use the CO2 produced by fermentation to provide some crumb and lift. The sugar weakens the gluten slightly, which enhances pan flow.
Organic stone ground flour doesn’t require changes to recipes. It seems to lead to slightly more open and rustic crumb. I am not able to find a flavour difference.
I have a Flax seed multigrain loaf recipe with 2 cups of bread flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour for a medium loaf. I am adapting my sister’s Flax Seed Whole Wheat bread with 2.5 cups of whole wheat flour, 1 cup of white flour, oatmeal, sunflower seeds, flax seeds, poppy seeds, flax meal, and 1.75 cups milk. It works in her machine, producing a loaf with an open crumb. I have adapted it for the Zojirushi BB-PAC20 for low sodium – this is a work in progress.
Original or classic cyclometers measure and display distance, time and speed. The devices could be powered by button cell batteries. These units had (or if in use, have) a magnet that clips onto a spoke which rotates the magnet past a sensor. They count rotations and process data to display speed, distance and time. The original models had a wired sensor; more modern models have wireless sensors. These devices need to be programmed with the circumference of the wheel to calculate how far the bike moves forward each time the wheel goes through a full revolution. The tire will flex under load; the distance travelled is a little less than the circumference of the inflated tire measured unloaded. Cateye had a chart in its manuals, listing the circumferences for dozens of tires, including several 700c tires from 700c x 18 to 700c x 40. Similar charts are online in support articles by Sheldon Brown and by volunteers in the public knowledge base at newwheel.net. I had a Bontrager (Trek) computer on my Trek hybrid – it gave the user choices of tire size in a menu rather picking a circumference in the menu. These systems assume uniform tire sizes, inflated to the rated/marked maximum. The circumference of a tire on a wheel is affected by the tire pressure. It is small inaccuracy, only a centimer in 200 (½ of one percent).
Most units could be calibrated to one bike; a few could be programmed to two bikes. They may pause and appear to “sleep” if the rider stops for longer than a couple of minutes. It depend on the device, default settings and user choices. Setting them up is time consuming and balky.
The monochrome displays were visible even in bright sunlight and under low light conditions.
GPS
GPS was not available to cyclists until the US goverment allowed non military users, after the year 2000, to receive satellite signals from Global Positioning Satellites and calculate position on the ground to within 5 meters. This provided enough accuracy for navigation and tracking distance and speed. A cycling GPS head unit will measure distance accurately and “save” the ride in memory. It may lose a few meters as the device may need a few seconds to recognize when the rider has started to move after halting. The device may lose satellites in tree cover, and falter in calculating velocity or elevation changes. The rider usually has to power the device on, and the device then usually starts to record the session as a new ride or a lap. There are some nuances to setting up a device. Setting up and learning the unit requires time and attention, as changing anything during a ride takes time and reference to manuals and resources that may not be available.
Garmin, having produced watch sized GPS units for runners in 2003, began to produce and sell the Edge GPS receiver for cycling in 2005. Garmin added functions including rear radar, lights, power meters, electronic shifter controls, touch screens, colour screens, maps, navigation and voice prompts in more evolved and expensive head units combined with peripherals. The units for sale bundle primary functions with functions used occassionally by some users, and with some specialized functions and features. Garmin has added GPS functions using the alternative satellites of the Russian Glonass system and the EU Galileo system. Competitors including Wahoo have entered the market.
Basic models do not display a map or provide navigational prompts. Some can be paired with smartphones which may, if they are using wireless data, be able to display maps. A large screen displaying a map is useful if the rider can stop and check, but can be a distraction. The marriage of the GPS cyclometer to cloud computing, big data and social apps means cyclists are sharing their location data with the device manufacturer network and its partners. If the device network servers are hacked, as Garmin was in July 2020, users can lose access to functions that depend on the servers in the cloud. It may not matter much if the cyclist is only using the head unit to display and record distance and speed.
Smart Phones
It seems to be efficient to use a smart phone app on a phone that you already own, and to not acquire a head unit but there are trade-offs.
Smart phone mapping apps will tell a user where the user is on a map but do not necessarily calculate distance and speed in real time. These apps use the GPS receiver and sensors in the phone, and the location services of the OS ecosystem. The GPS receiver is not as good as a dedicated GPS head set; these apps do not appear to record distance as accurately as GPS headunit or a classic cyclometer. Google had MyTracks, an app that ran in Google Maps, but killed it in 2016. The cycling, running, walking and hiking apps push ads, harvest data and self-promote paid apps with better “features”. I am not happy mounting a phone to handlebars or using battery power and cellular data.
The Nafufians, hunter gatherers in Jordan, were making bread with wild cereal 12,500 BCE. The master formula for ancient bread is to grind dried grain into a paste or flour, add water and yeast, let the stuff ferment, tear it in pieces and cook the pieces on a hot surface. People know how to grind and mill flour, and bake bread before the science was understood. The master formula for a loaf of bread is to make paste of flour and water and handle the paste until to becomes a mass of dough and put pieces of dough on the hot surface and bake it.
The wild cereal evolved into wheat, which grew in the Fertile Crescent and Egypt (and North Africa) when the climate was wetter. Wheat has been grown in Western Europe, on the Eurasian plains and the North Amercan plains. Most bread is made with wheat flour. The supply chain for a consumer of flour or bread is farmer (land, seed, work, machinery) to mill (machinery to refine wheat to flour) to bakery to retail store to consumer. The interactions between actors along the chain have changed wheat, flour, baking and bread. Wheat can be classified based on millers’ descriptions or botanical taxonomy. Wheat evolved, under the direction of plant breeders into varieties of a short grass that produces high carb seeds. Farmers grow cultivars of annual wheat. Organic agriculture criticizes the wheat monoculture and the use intensive chemical fertilizers. Millers want wheat that they can mill into white flour. Bakers want white flour that can be mixed and baked into white bread.
White bread became a widely available commodity. White flour became a standard miller’s product, a commodity, and staple for consumers after the development of steel roller milling. White flour is highly refined – the bran and germ of the wheat kernel are milled out. White flour does not require refrigerated storage. It is shelf stable. White flour is nearly pure starch. White flour, in the U.S.A, is identified and labelled as being in one of several categories including Bread (or strong), All-Purpose, Pastry and Cake.
Bread flour is milled from high protein “hard” wheat (Canadian All-Purpose is high protein like US bread flour) and has more gliadin and glutenin, the insoluble proteins that bond to form gluten than white cake or pastry flour. Bleaching1the source is now gated became legal in the US in the 20th century. According to the science cited by the milling and food processing companies, bleaching did not affect nutrition. There was instant reaction by some bakers, consumers and food scientists. European food scientists debated about the effects of industrial mixing methods on the quality of white bread. Consumers accepted the convenience and low price of sliced bread. Through much of the 20th century American bakers concentrated on making sandwich bread. Nutritionists criticized white flour in the 1930s. American regulatory decision makers required the enrichment of white flour with nutrients. Consumers became suspicious that mass-production white bread lacked culinary or nutritional quality. Some independent artisan bakers used baking technique to produce better white bread.
Whole wheat baking was a counterculture idea in the 1960s, rather than a restoration of traditional baking practices, remembered through cookbooks from that era such Edward Espé Brown’s Tassajara cookbook. The pioneer counterculture bakers were vegetarians, enviromentalists and spiritual thinkers, interested in authentic and natural products. Their methods were often trial and error; they were skeptical or unaware of food science and culinary tradition. They had to learn about leavening and other baking methods. Some followed traditional regional styles for flatbreads, which had efficiently used grain, fuel and time. Recipes from vegetarian, vegan and nutritional/health oriented recipes tend to produce brick-like loaves. Peter Reinhart has a chapter in Whole Grain Breads (2007) on how he learned to bake before he started Brother Juniper’s Café/Bakery in Santa Rosa, California in 1986. He describes the 1960s and 1970s as a preamble to an American culinary awakening. Independent artisans or craft bakers used methods including use long or cold fermentation to make very tasty loaves with whole wheat flour. Industrial bakers responded to demand and opportunity with their interpretation of whole grain baking producing brown bread, which is usually a white flour multigrain bread. Artisan baking did not scale to industrial baking.
Millers do not use high protein wheat to mill whole wheat flour. There is an abundance of steel roller milled whole wheat flour available. It is not as shelf stable as white flour, but more stable than traditional whole wheat flour. Stone ground whole wheat and “organic” whole wheat flour is less stable and more expensive. It is usually made with basic market wheat, and seldom made with identified varieties of wheat.
A home baker and an artisan baker can make whole wheat bread with starters, soakers, sponges, barms and sponges. This gives the loaf time for preliminary fermentation which adds flavour. It also allows for more gluten formation which starts when flour and water are mixed. Bakers hydrate whole wheat flour more intensely that bread flour. Sugar it is hygroscopic and weakens (relaxes) gluten. Small amounts relax gluten for flow and rise much. With time and hydration, loave with whole wheat flour, water and sugar will form gluten and shape up and bake into loaves that crown up. A commercial baker working in with pans will not have time or space to let loaves rise slowly and could enhance whole wheat dough with vital wheat gluten and enrich the dough with sugar. These recipes may use about 6 g. (less than a tablespoon) of gluten to 300 g. of whole wheat flour. In bread machine recipes, gluten may run at a tablespoon and sugar(s) to 1 ½ to 2 tbsp. per cup of flour.
“Farm to table” cooks (e.g. Dan Barber, The Third Plate) and plant breeders (e.g. The Bread Lab at Washington State University) try to find good wheat that can be grown sustainably. The Bread Lab is a resource for recipes and techniques to bake with “unsifted” whole wheat flour. It has recipes for an “Approachable” sourdough whole wheat loaf on its Unsifted page and Bread Lab Collective page.
The white chickpea is a staple dry legume in the cuisines of regions from the Meditarranean to India. The Romans named it cicero; the Italian word is ceci. It is also known in America as the garbanzo bean. In India it is known in as chole or chana. The Hindustani name is kabuli chana – the chickpea from Afganistan, to differentiate from the black and green chickpeas of South Asia. It is harvested whole. It can be ground into a flour used to make flatbreads and dumplings.
White chickpeas are cooked whole in the skin. They keep their shape and do not shed their skin – this provides texture and assorted nutritional benefits. Undercooked chickpeas are grainy or even crunchy. Some recipes start with dry legumes and cook them in a sauce; some cook the legumes first, and then cook them again with other ingredients. Cooked chickpeas absorb flavours. Some recipes suggest removing skins after the cooked legumes are cool, before mashing or other processing. Well known dishes:
South Asian dishes including chana masala, chana aloo (chana with potatoes) and other vegetable curries;
Chickpeas take a long time to cook, compared to other dry legumes. Soaking reduces cooking times for all cooking methods. The main methods of soaking:
naturally for hours in water at room temperature, or
a short period in boiling water, or a pressure cooker (quick-soak).
Variations include soaking in salt water and soaking in water with baking soda. These methods require the cook to drain and rinse the soaked beans and discard the soaking water.
Most recipes call for cooked or canned chickpeas, or have a distinct step of cooking the beans. Often the canning fluid in not palatable, and salty. A few recipes will use the fluid of some canned beans. This is not useful if the fluid is not palatable, or salty. Recipes often recommend disposing of the canning fluid and rinsing the beans. Several recipes conserve and use the soaking and cooking fluid of cooked dry chickpeas. This is workable if the fluid has not been salted or treated with baking soda.
The modern kitchen provides several options for cooking dry chickpeas. On a stove, and working with soaked beans, sources favour bringing the water to a rolling boil and backing off to a steady boil or simmer. Cooks judge slow or gentle boil differently. Stove and pots perform differently. Beans may be old. Sources provide a range of cooking times. Time in minutes. Soaked or dry noted as S or D. For pressure cooker – use slow or natural release (which adds 15-20 minutes).
Sources
Simmer
Slow Cooker¹
Electric Pressure²
Italian Vegetarian Cookbook (1997), Jack Bishop
35-60
366 Delicious Ways to Cook Rice, Beans and Grains (1998), Andrea Chesman
2 hrs.
Indian for Everyone (2014), Anupy Singla; The Indian Slow Cooker (2nd ed. 2018), Anupy Singla
45-60
Soaked 4 hrs High3
The Complete Slow Cooker (2017), America’s Test Kitchen
Dry 8-9 hrs High
Hip Pressure Cooking (2014), Laura Pazzaglia
Soaked 18 High + Dry 38-40 High +
¹ Instant Pot, Slow Cooker Program. America’s Test Kitchen and other have raised questions about whether an Instant Pot can perform recipes for slow cookers. The Instant Pot can do dried chickpeas. I use smaller amounts (under 3 cups). I soak these legumes in the Instant Pot, and add more water to cover the beans if the soaked beans have swelled above the surface. I follow with a quick soak – cooking the legumes on Pressure Cooker High for one or two minutes, and let the pressure drop naturally. Then, and while the beans and cooking water are hot, I start the slow cooker program on High (More in some models), cooking with the pressure cooker lid with pressure release valve left open. 6 hours on High cooks thoroughly.
² Instant Pot Pressure Cooker Program. The electric pressure cooker method works in the Instant Pot.
I am describing the small dry legumes, including lentils, as opposed to small phaseolus beans (including black turtle beans). T
These legumes are commonly sold as dry grain; some canned lentils are available. Some were sold in bulk food stores and as bulk foods in grocery stores. The availability of bulk products was affected in 2020 by the Covid-19 epidemic.
Lentils
Lentils (Lens culinaris and related species) have several varieties which look different and cook differently. Brown lentils cook (get soft in boiling or simmering temperature water) faster. Green lentils take longer and taste different. Some of the differences in cooking time are shortened or can be ignored with pressure cookers and slow cookers. Recipes may suggest soaking some small legumes, but soaking is often left out.
The interior parts of brown lentils are reddish pink and can be hulled and processed into red lentils. Some exporters, wholesalers and retailers refer to brown lentils as red lentils. Some Green and brown/crimson lentils grown in the US (Pacific Northwest, Eastern Washington, Northern Idaho) and Western Canada are larger than other lentils. Canadian growers mainly grow green culinaris lentils of the Laird, Richlea and Eston varieties, and a large crimson lentil (Lens esculanta).
Whole green and brown lentils and red/pink/salmon lentils grown in the US or Canada were widely available in grocery stores before Covid-19. Whole brown lentils were popular in stores in the US but not as common in Canada. The availability and presentation began to vary during the pandemic. Black lentils, small lentils that cook brown, were and are a specialized product, remained available in some channels.
Other
Other small dry legumes could be available in stores specializing in selling supplies for South Asian, Middle Eastern, North Afican, or regional European cuisines or health themed stores including vegetarian/vegan.
Legume, English/Euro name(s)
South Asian
Condition
Appearance
Dry
Cooked
dark chickpea
chana dal (duhli)
split, hulled
yellow
pigeon pea
toor dal (duhli)
split, hulled
yellow
moong bean, mung bean
(sabut) moong dal
whole
green
moong bean
moong dal (duhli)
split, hulled
yellow
yellow
urad bean black bean
(sabut) urad dal
whole
black
black
urad bean
urad dal (duhli)
split, hulled
white
brown (spanish or german) lentil
(sabut) masoor dal
whole
brown
brown
red, pink, salmon lentil
masoor dal (duhli)
hulled and split
red
yellow
crimson lentil
hulled and/or split
red, large
yellow
green lentil
whole
pale green
French green lentil Lentil de Puys
whole
dark green, speckled
black or beluga lentil
whole
black
brown
Cooking
Lentils and other small legumes are almost inedible to humans without cooking. The hulls are hard and have to be removed mechnically, or softened by cooking; the seeds are dry and hard and have to be softened by cooking. Many recipes reduce split and hulled legumes to a gruel. Recipes for whole legumes may specify a legume with a hull that softens rapidly such as a French lentil. Other recipes for whole small legumes require long cooking – e.g. the urad bean. The seeds have to be flavoured, often by an infusion of other plants including peppers. Meat and vegetables can be cooked with legumes for nutrition or flavour. Some recipes cook small legumes in a sauce. South Asian dal recipes may require a tarka – a sauce of spices friend in oil or ghee (clarified butter) be added to cooked legumes and other ingredients. Some recipes pre-cook small legumes, and cook the legumes with other ingredients in soup, sauce or stew.
The modern kitchen provides several options for cooking dry legumes. all involving cooking in water at a boil or simmer. There are recipes to simmer small legumes in ceramic tagines and other ceramic vessels. Few cooks have such tools. On a stove, in a metal vessel, sources favour bringing the water to a rolling boil and backing off to gentlly boiling, braising or steady simmering. Cooks judge simmer or gentle boil differently. Stove and pots perform differently. Beans may be old.
Traditional slow cooker recipes for usually start from dry (unsoaked) legumes. Traditional slow cooker recipes work in pressure multi-cookers such as Instant Pots in the slow cooker program, with adjustments. There are Instant Pot and pressure multi-cooker recipes for the slow cooker program. Electric pressure cooker and pressure multi-cooker pressure program recipes also usually start from dry (unsoaked legumes). The cooking times are at pressure, and do not estimate or count the time for the machine to preheat to pressure. The release of pressure has to be natural (i.e. about 15 – 20 minutes). Slow cookers, pressure cooker and pressure multi-cookers can pre-cook dry legumes, or cook a recipe using dry legumes in a sauce or stew.
Sources provide a range of cooking times (minutes unless other unit noted):
Legume/Dal
Source
Simmer
Slow cooker
Electric Pressure
Brown, Green, French Green or Black (beluga) lentil
How to Cook Everything and, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, Mark Bittman
20-30 test and cook longer depending on tenderness
brown lentil
Italian Vegetarian Cookbook (1997), Jack Bishop
25-35
brown lentil
Pakistani & North Indian Cooking (2015), S. Abbas Razza
45
brown or green lentil
366 Delicious Ways to Cook Rice, Beans and Grains (1998), Andrea Chesman
25-40
brown or green lentil
Easy Beans (1994), Tish Ross and Jacqueline Trafford
30-40; 1-2 hrs for soups
green lentil
At Home with Madhur Jaffrey (1973), Madhur Jaffrey
40
brown lentil
The Indian Slow Cooker (2nd ed. 2018), Anupy Singla
Low; 3 hrs
brown or green lentil
Hip Pressure Cooking (2014), Laura Pazzaglia
High 12-14
brown or green lentil
Vegan Under Pressure (2016), Jill Nusinow
High 6
red lentil
366 Delicious Ways to Cook Rice, Beans and Grains (1998), Andrea Chesman
15
red lentil
At Home with Madhur Jaffrey (1973), Madhur Jaffrey
40-45
red lentil
Indian for Everyone (2014), Anupy Singla; The Indian Slow Cooker (2nd ed. 2018), Anupy Singla
12 + final boil
Low; 3-6 hrs
red lentil
The Complete Slow Cooker (2017), America’s Test Kitchen
High; 2-3 hrs Low; 3-4 hrs
red lentil
Hip Pressure Cooking (2014), Laura Pazzaglia
High 1
red lentil
Vegan Under Pressure (2016), Jill Nusinow
High 6 +
toor dal (duhli)
At Home with Madhur Jaffrey (1973), Madhur Jaffrey
1 hr +
chana dal, toor dal (duhli),
Indian for Everyone (2014), Anupy Singla; The Indian Slow Cooker (2nd ed. 2018), Anupy Singla
*soaked 2-4 hrs, 25-60
High; 6 hrs
sabut moong dal
Indian for Everyone (2014), Anupy Singla; The Indian Slow Cooker (2nd ed. 2018), Anupy Singla
25-30
Low; 2 ⅟₂ hrs
moong bean
Hip Pressure Cooking (2014), Laura Pazzaglia
High 7-8
sabat urad dal
Indian for Everyone (2014), Anupy Singla; The Indian Slow Cooker (2nd ed. 2018), Anupy Singla
1 ⅟₂ hrs
High; 8 hrs
moong dal duhli
At Home with Madhur Jaffrey (1973), Madhur Jaffrey
An Instant Pot can be used in the pressure cooker program for simple cooked legumes, and some curries and prepared dal dishes. The pressure cooker program will be the better choice for some dishes. The pressure cooker program is also useful to cook or quick soak dry legumes for slow cooker dishes. Laura Pazzaglia has a chart of legumes and pressure cooking times, starting from dry, naturally soaked, and quick-soaked. It is comprehensive, with a few gaps and ambiguities:
Her “split chickpeas” means hulled split dark chickpeas (chana dal);
Split yellow and red lentils. The yellow split lentil may be a hulled split moong bean (moong dal duhli). The split red (or pink or salmon) lentil masoor dal duhli) is a hulled split brown lentil. Her moong dal and masoor dal recipes call for longer cooking times for these dry beans than her table.
She doesn’t include pigeon peas or split pigeon peas (toor dal); but her recipe for toor dal suggests soaking for a short time and about 10 minute high pressure – like borlotti, cannellini, and pinto beans;
The black bean in her chart is the (small-medium) Central American black turtle bean, a Phaseolus.
She doesn’t include whole urad beans (black gram), small hard black beans (technically Vigna, a pea). Her recipe for urad beans suggests cooking whole urad beans like black beans – 7 minutes on high, followed by natural release. Madhur Jaffrey would soak them overnight, cook 30 minutes on high, and natural release.
An Instant Pot is not a traditional slow cooker. It is an electric pressure cooker. Recipes for traditional slow cookers assume:
heat is delivered by the element around the lower vertical sides of a ceramic crock to food totally or partly immersed in a cooking fluid;
fluid near the element may reach boiling temperature and bubble. The hot fluid circulates between and around the food at the micro and macro levels and transfers heat to ingredients further away from the hot sides. Food near the element may cook faster or even reach a sauté/fry/burn temperature;
the average temperature of the food in the pot will increase over time but circulation of fluid and heat depends on what’s cooking;
the device will not get hot enough to bake or steam the ingredients within normal cooking time;
two cooking settings: low and high
low gets the food to same temperature as high, more slowly.
The first couple of hours on either setting raise temperature to the lower end of the range when the food starts to cook;t
6 hours on low is equivalent to 4 hours on high.
Many traditional slow cooker recipes for 5 to 6 quart croclks or cooking vesssels involve 2-3 quarts of food and fluid. Many traditional slow cooker recipes call for 4-6 hours on low or 2-4 hours on high. An Instant Pot can simmer food in fluid for long slow cooking, but recipes that work in traditional slow cookers will not necessarily work in an Instant Pot. Laura Pazzaglia says:
Readers have reported under-cooked food and less evaporation when slow cooking with all Instant Pot models, … The under-cooking is … a side-effect of all new generation thermostat-regulated slow cookers versus the traditional wattage-regulated cookers and the uneven heat distribution between a stainless steel insert compared to ceramic inserts.
A traditional slow cooker “warm” setting and Instant Pot slow cooker program Less (Low) are not cooking settings! The Instant Pot slow cooker program cooking settings involve a preheat period to get to the set temperature, as read by the sensor, and a timed period, in half hour increments. The preheat is short and relatively cool. Instant Pot identifies three temperature settings for the slow cooker program in its pressure multi-cooker product lines in the 6 and 8 quart models. The Instant Pot manuals for the Duo and Ultra models (5, 6, and 8 quart) indicate the slow cooker program cooks in a range of 180-210 F. The ranges for each setting:
Traditional Slow Cooker≃
Duo
Ultra
Range
Set
Less
Low
180-190 ℉ (82-87.8)℃
185 (85)
low
Normal
Medium
190-200 (87.8 – 93)
194 (90)
high
More
High
200 – 210 (93 – 99)
208 (97.7)
Custom
≥ 104 – ≤ 208 (40-97.7)
The heat source in a pressure cooler is an element at the bottom of a tall narrow pot. There is a temperature variance between temperature read by a sensor at the bottom and temperature read 2 cm from the top surface. The Instant Pot slow cooker program on High/More gets 1 – 3 quarts of ingredients in fluid to a good simmering temperature and keeps the temperature at the set temperature – near the element – for the entire cooking period. 4 hours on Instant Pot slow cooker program at the High/More setting means 4 hours at the set cooking temperature. at 4 hours on high in a traditional slow cooker involves a lower average temperature for the first hour (subject to hot spots) and a higher average temperature during the last 2 or 3 hours.
Instant Pot and other appliance manufacturers exaggerate the convenience of electric pressure cookers and multicookers as devices that can cook an entire main course in one pot at the same time. Slow cooker program recipes of Instant Pots and other pressure multicookers are rare. The Instant Pot genre is largely devoted to pressure cooking. Madhur Jaffrey has recipes for lamb (and goat) including a lamb pilaf using the slow cooker program of an Instant Pot (her Instantly Indian Cookbook refers to a 6 quart Duo v. 3)
A sub-genre of multicooker cookbooks and recipes provides recipes that have a common first stage, with alternative fast (pressure cooker) and slow (slow cooker) methods for finishing. The first stage includes prepping ingredients and may include using the sauté function to fry some ingredients. This approach fosters the impession that the should be a convenient 9 (i.e. less that 4-6 hour) slow cooker alternative for every fast recipe. The cookbooks in this genre:
Melissa Clark’s Dinner in an Instant (2017);
Cooks Illustrated/America’s Test Kitchen Multicooker Perfection (2018);
Milk Street Fast and Slow (2020).
Cooks Illustrated/ATK’s Multicooker Perfection (2018) reported that the Instant Pot slow cooker high setting will heat 4 quarts of water in an 8 quart model to to 206 ℉. – a simmer. The Multicooker Perfection Team warned that High/More did not reliably do what traditional slow cooker high was supposed to do. Cooks Illustrated/ATK asserted that the Instant Pot did not deliver enough heat, the right way, in its slow cooker program, to emulate a traditional slow cooker. Heating 4 quarts of water to a near boil temperature tests the capability of the device to heat that much water. Some cooks may want to make 4 quarts of soup or stock by a slow cooker recipe. The lesson in the CI/ATK test is that the Instant Pot slow cooker program will not get that amount of fluid hot enough.
CI/ATK suggests using Instant Pot slow cooker high setting where a Multicooker Perfection recipe says slow cooker low. This is useful advice. Christopher Kimball and his team at Milk Street Cooking provided what they found to be realistic slow cooking times for the slow option for recipes in Milk Street Fast and Slow (2020), and practical tips on using the Instant Pot to prepare ingredients for a slow cooker recipe.
An Instant Pot user can heat the fluid to boiling in another program (or boil it in another device and add it it to the Instant Pot) before using the slow cooker program to simmer. The slow cook high setting will maintain the contents of the pot at the simmer temperature. The Instant Pot slow cooker program works, with limitations. A few suggestions when experimenting with the slow cooker program:
Precook or parcook or prepare dry legumes, or other suitable ingredients in fluid on the pressure cooker or sauté setting. The pressure cook program can be used for a short pressure quick-soak of dry legume or to cook the dry legumes;
Consider other tools and methods to sauté or brown other ingredients;
Keep the quantity to 2 – 3 quarts of food and fluid in a 6 quart pot;
The optional tempered glass lid is not helpful in using the slow cooker program; it may be counterproductive. It is better to use the sealing lid with the pressure release valve open. (The glass lid can let some heat out while simmering on a higher heat settings);
Leave time to finish cooking by some faster method if a dish is not finished on time and consider using other tools and methods to finish.
A dish that does not cook in a reasonable time can be started or finished in a stovetop vessel. This will involve watching and stirring to distribute heat. Or the the Instant Pot can be reset and started in another program ( the Ultra models’ slow cook custom settings and Ultra program are not useful for the extra heat parts of these tasks):
boiled for a while and then simmered on a slow cooker program setting,or
simmered on a slow cooker setting, and then boiled for a short time – as long as it takes to make sure everything is cooked. Boiling at the end works when the pot contains ample watery fluid that is free to circulate but can set off the Hot warning with a some foods.
Higher heat settings may allow for simmering or boiling in the Instant Pot. This works with fluid in the pot and will not work if the food is thick – the burn warning will shut down the pot):
Sauté;
Steam setting – the no pressure steam setting can bring liquid to a rolling boil;
A short time on a pressure setting can speed up a dish that fails to cook on a slow cooker setting. The pressure settings require the sealing lid, locked in place. The release valve can be closed for pressure, or left open. If the valve is left open, it will vent; and some cooking fluid will evaporate.
The Instant Pot slow cooker program can do dried legumes. I use smaller amounts (under 3 cups of dry beans) in a 6 quart Instant Pot.
Lentils and small split and skinned legumes can be cooked dry. I use the slow cooker High setting for 2-4 hours. Larger dry legumes can be soaked and cooked on slow cooker High. I long-soak these legumes (i.e. dry beans in water at room temperature) in a bowl or in the Instant Pot, and add more water to cover the beans if the soaked beans have swelled above the surface. I follow with a quick soak – cooking the legumes on Pressure Cooker High for one or two minutes, and let the pressure drop naturally. Then, and while the legumes and cooking water are hot, I start the slow cooker program on High (More in some models), cooking with the pressure cooker lid with pressure release valve left open.
The delay function allows me to leave beans soaking, and start cooking and finish by the time I want to use cooked beans and the cooking fluid. It is necessary to adapt cooking times and settings from traditional slow cooker recipes.
For 10-15 years, 2006-2020 multi-cookers were electric pressure cookers with:
a heating element in a round plate below the cooking vessel,
stainless or non-stick metal pots,
sensors,
a control panel and
a programmed control responding to feedback from the sensors.
Midea of Guangdong Province, China patented a multi-cooker in 2006. Fagor America and its European parent company brought the Fagor Lux multi-cooker to market in 2015, and the Fagor Lux LCD in 2017. Fagor America ceased operations including honoring warranties and providing support for customers and dealers in 2018. The devices reemerged from the reorganization of the Fagor companies under the Zavor brand. The Instant Pot multi-cooker came to the market 2015-6. It was handicapped by poor manuals, a lack of information about how to use it and a lack of recipes. Users found technique and recipes in publications about stove-top pressure cookers, and began to experiment and circulate information on web sites and social media. Jarden Consumer Appliances, owner of the Crock-Pot name and brand, introduced a pressure multi-cooker with a non-stick metal insert called the “Express Crock Multi-Cooker”.
Blenders with heating elements that can make smoothies and cook soup or even chili. Moulinex has sold Thermomix blenders since 1961. There have been newer and less expensive variations on this idea. Philips makes a Soup Maker – an electric kettle mated with an immersion blender. In 2019, Instant Pot put is brand name on an appliance line including rice cookers, air fryers and the new Ace blender/soup maker. Multi-cookers without pressure cooking capabilities came into the market 2018-19: new iterations of rice cookers or slow cookers programmed for saute, steaming and other functions including “slow cooking”. Examples: Zojirushi Multicooker EL-CAC60; Philips HD3095/87; T-fal RK705851; Aroma Housewares ARC-6106 MultiCooker; Midea Mb-fs5017 10 Cup Smart Multi-cooker. Cuisinart introduced a 3-in-1 Cook Central slow cooker with a nonstick insert with a saute setting.
Appliance manufacturers exaggerate the convenience of electric pressure cookers and multicookers as devices that can cook an entire main course in one pot at the same time, and claim that their multi-cookers “replace” a rice cooker, a steamer, and a slow cooker. Cooking appliances presented challenges and opportunities for writers and publishers. Back in 2000, slow cookers were supported by a few books – many of them not particularly good. Cooks Illustrated/America’s Test Kitchen put out the Slow Cooker Revolution books for the ceramic crock slow cookers. Those books were good and apparently successful at the time.
Some multicooker cookbooks and recipes provides recipes that have a common first stage, with alternative fast (pressure cooker) and slow (slow cooker) methods for finishing. The first stage includes prepping ingredients and may include using the sauté function to fry some ingredients. This approach fosters the impession that there should be a convenient (i.e. less that 4-6 hour) slow cooker alternative for every fast recipe. The cookbooks in this genre:
Melissa Clark’s Dinner in an Instant (2017);
Cooks Illustrated/America’s Test Kitchen Multicooker Perfection(2018);
Milk Street Fast and Slow</em> (2020).
Cooks Illustrated/ATK’s Multicooker Perfection (2018) tried to rate the best pressure-multicooker. It favoured the Fagor Lux LCD and Lux devices in 2018, and then nearly identical Zavor device. Zavor models are more expensive than Instant Pots, and not widely available. Zavor does not honor Fagor warranties or provide support for Fagor models. Parts and accessories are rare.
Cooks Illustrated/ATK supported its recommendations with its test results. CI/ATK tested the low and high slow cooker settings by heating 5 lbs (i.e. 2.7 liters or 2.8 quarts) of water for 5 hours. It reported that the Instant Pot slow cooker high setting will heat 4 quarts of water in an 8 quart model, to 206 ℉. (a simmer). The test seems to clear and simple. Heating 4 quarts of water to a near boil temperature tests the capability of the device to heat that much water. Some cooks may want to make 4 quarts of soup or stock by a slow cooker recipe. The lesson in the CI/ATK test is that the Instant Pot slow cooker program will not get that amount of fluid hot enough, fast enough to make that a useful way to spend time and resources.
CI/ATK say that its slow cooker recipes in Multicooker Perfection work well if a device gets the food to 195-210 F and maintains that temperature. Cooks Illustrated/ATK :
warned that the slow cooker settings on some devices are too cold, and on others too hot;
warned that High/More slow cooker settings in some pressure multi-cookers did not reliably do what traditional slow cooker high was supposed to do; and
asserted that the Instant Pot did not deliver enough heat, the right way, in its slow cooker program.
No electric pressure cooker or pressure multi-cooker will be capable or cooking all recipes taken from a slow cooker recipe source. A slow cooker heats the food into the range where the food simmers slowly. The slow cookers sold in America in the 20th century used constant low heat. While in principle the food was not boiled, most of these device eventually cooked the dish at a temperature above the boiling point of water. Electric pressure cookers or pressure multi-cookers switch the power off when the device decides the pot is hot enough, and then turns the power on to bring the temperature up. It isn’t the same as controlling the flow of power to an element on a stove, and it is not the constant low heat of the traditional low cooker. Slow cooker settings in electric pressure cookers and pressure multi-cooker put out enough heat to warm the base of the pot to a set temperature, monitored by a sensor.
Instant Pots have three settings in the slow cooker program Low, Normal or Medium, and High. Slow cookers often have a warm setting and low and high slow cooking settings. Instant Pot slow cooker program Low setting provides the function of a slow cooker Warm setting in a slow cooker; it is not equivalent to a slow cooker Low cooking setting. A rule of thumb for following a slow cooker recipe with a pressure multi-cooker: cook at medium (“normal”) where the slow cooker recipe says low.
Pressure cookers can cook the same soups, stews etc. that can be cooked in a slow cooker or in a pot on a stove or in an oven. Pressure multi-cookers, including Instant Pots, can perform many slow cooker recipes in slow cooker programs. Madhur Jaffrey has recipes for lamb (and goat) including a lamb pilaf using Instant Pot slow cooker progam setting in her Instantly Indian Cookbook. Melissa Clark has Instant Pot slow cooker versions of every recipe Dinner in an Instant. Cooks Illustrated/ATK’s Multicooker Perfection did too.
A limitations on pressure multi-cookers: size and working space. An 8 quart model is as bulky as a 6 quart ceramic slow cook. Pressure cookers are bigger than other cooking vessels because the user has to leave them partly unfilled for dishes that expand as they absorb water. Another limitation is that the engineers have not allowed users to use these devices manually. There are preset temperatures and times, and programmed cooking programs. A pressure multi-cooker as a simple cookpot when a cook wants to cook a thin broth or sauce down, or cook for a few more minute when the dish is not cooked enough. The multi-cooker has to be set again to a setting that will boil or simmer. The sauté setting will bring the pot to a boil but may burn the food and fire the heat warning, which will turn off the device. Can the cooking pot can removed and put on the stove; is there an element available? This is not hard, if you know what to do when the time comes!
My Cannondale Topstone 105 Alloy is a gravel bike by Cannondale, a subsidiary or brand of the Canadian conglomerate Dorel Industries, manufactured in Taiwan. The frame is an aluminium alloy. This is what it looks like
This Cannondale model is named for the Shimano 105 groupset which is marketed by Shimano as a road groupset. It has several Shimano 105 branded components: brakes, shifters, 11 cog cassette, and derailleurs. The crankset was FSA, with 172.5 mm crank arms, and 46/30 rings – a “compact” road bike crankset. The largest cog on the rear cassette was 34 teeth; lowest possible gearing was 30 to 34. The lack of more climbing gears is a flaw of this and other production gravel bikes.
The 2019 Cannondate Topstone 105 Alloy has a profile at Bike Insights. It is neutral on the upright/aggressive scale. It is a neutral mid trail bike. Cannondale builds it in 5 sizes that it calls XS, SM (small), MD, LG, XL. I bought the medium size, which means, according to the datasets used by Bike Insights:
The seat tube is 505 mm long;
The “effective” (horizontal) top tube length is 561 mm;
Stack 579 mm; Reach 385 mm – Average for category;
Trail: 63.7 mm;
Chainstay (horizontal) 423.4 mm.
The Cannondale Topstone 105 shipped with tubeless ready WTB ST i23 TCS wheels and 700c x 40 (ISO 40-622) WTB Nano TCS tubeless ready tires. The tires are knobby, like many mountain bike tires and cyclo-cross tires. 700c x 40 may the largest/widest tires that run on this bike.
There are eyelets at the drop outs for the rear wheel and on the seat stays to mount a rear rack, but the chain stays are short which limits the use of panniers for touring storage. The stays are widely separated for wide tires and disc brakes. There are eyelets behind the bottom bracket, on the seat stay bridge and at the rear dropouts for a rear fender. Some racks and fenders can be fitted.
The carbon fiber fork lacks the front facing mounting point at the fork crown found in bikes with rim brakes. There is a rear facing eyelet at the fork crown for a fender with an L-bracket. There are no eyelets on the outside of the fork blades. There are eyelet on the inside of each fork blade 150 mm above the axle drop-out. The limits the options for front racks, and bags:
A demi-porteur randonneur rack requires a front-facing eyelet at the fork crown and eyelets above midfork to mount the cantilevers;
A low rider front rack requires eyelets at the drop-outs;
The cable routing along the drop bars limits the options for proprietary mounting braces (eg. Arkel, Salsa); the space between the drops and brake levers.
The frame has several eyelets for bikepacking bags and accessories.
Rack
I tried to use the Tubus Logo Evo touring rack that I had used on my Trek. It fit on the wider chainstays (longer rear axle) of a disc brake bike with modification of fit kit parts. I was able to install a Tubus Vega, which can carry a trunk bag. The point is to carry some tools, an inner tube, some clothing and little food. The rack legs and the bolt heads for fender stays interfered with the rotation of the thru-axle handle. The thru-axle may have to removed to remove the wheel for maintenance and repair. The handle may be removed with a 4 mm Allen wrench, but when that is done, a larger (e.g. 12 mm) fixed wrench (combination or open end) will be needed to release the axle. An after-market rear axle (Robert Axle Project) that can be removed using a 6 mm Allen key was part of the installation of the rack.
I shopped for a new bike last summer (2019). The literature of bicycle manufacturing is vast. The Guardian published a survey and list of printed works in 2016. Some books and resources address innovation and engineering:
Many books are about competitive events – or the special bikes used in competition. Racing on tracks and roads became the most visibible use of bicycles at the end of the 19th century. The single speed utility bike with coaster brakes was the common bike for much of the 20th century.
Much of the innovation for riding on trails and rough roads came in the mountain bike and BMX sectors in the last 4 decades of the 20th century: frame design, wheels, wide tires, cleated tires or knobby tires for traction in mud and on climbs and descent on bare ground, wider gear ranges, more efficient brakes. Mountain bikes have been discussed in books, but seem to have been discussed in on the internet – for instance in inteviews and discussions like The genesis of the mountain bike, according to Tom Ritchey, published at Handbuilt Bicycle News in September 2016. [Update – August 2021. The Cyclist Magazine’s Podcast Episode 34 interviewed Tom Ritchey in two parts on July 8, 2021 and July 16, 2021. Tom Ritchey raced track as a teen and began to repair his own frames. He was a mountain bike pioneer. His company also makes highly regarded road bikes.] Special gear was developed – e.g. frame bags for mixed terrain cycle touring (i.e. bike-camping or bikepacking). Mountain bike races on unpaved roads and trails, touring on back roads, bike-camping and adventure rides became popular. Mountain bikes permitted new kinds of competition. Cross-country mountain bike (XC) races became organized, and competition became specialized into XC, downhill, endurance and other events. Endurance blossomed into multi day ultra distance events along difficult and challenging routes such as Tour Divide and Trans-America.
Cyclo-cross (CX) racing is a competitive event in cycling, for riders on drop bar bikes. Cyclo-cross bikes are similar to road bikes with wider, knobby tires for traction and other features for races off of paved roads. As road bikes tended to use narrow tires at high pressure, road bike frames often did not have clearance for the right tires. Some mountain bike innovations were adopted to design and manufacture CX bikes, including tire clearance. CXbikes retained nearly horizontal top tubes, for reasons related to conditions of those races. For some applications, users and shops began to adapt and develop monster-cross bikes.
The Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI), the international sporting body has rules or standards for track and road racing, CX, mountain bikes and BMX. The rules are seen as restricting technological innovation in cycling. UCI has recognized gravel in September 2021 – UCI announced sanctioned gravel events in 2022.
Gravel
Road bike riders began to use unpaved roads more extensively for training and recreation, and to participate in Ultra cross and endurance events on rough roads. Randonneur rides became more common. Gravel grinders – races or endurance events on gravel roads. Some custom bikes and adaptations provided some advantages in such events. Gravel riders started blogs or published on sites like Gravel Cyclist. Salsa (a subsidiary of the conglomerate QBP released the Fargo, a fat tired bike with drop bars, a “mountain touring bike” in 2009 (it has since become favoured as a touring bike), the Vaya gravel/touring bike in 2010, and the gravel racing Warbird in 2012. Other manufacturers moved into gravel bikes. Production gravel bikes incorporate technical innovations from road, mountain and all-road: disc brakes, threadless headsets, internal frame routing for cables, indexed shifting integrated in the brake levers, tubeless ready wheels and tires. Gravel bikes with disc brakes will usually have thru-axles (as opposed to quick release skewers). Thru-axles fit to closed drop outs with threaded fittings for the axle at ends of the fork blades and the rear stays. Some have suspension forks in the front; some manufacturers have some types of rear suspension.
The features of gravel bikes:
wider tires than road and cyclo-cross bikes. Most new gravel bikes are shipped with cleated/knobby tires – an imitation of the way mountain bikes a shipped;
most gravel bikes have drop bars; the drop bars are often wider, flared, and shaped differently than the drop bars on road bikes (article at Bikepacking.com);
the geometry is different;
gear combinations for moderately fast riding and moderate climbing:
a single chainring or a two ring set (similiar to a road bike compact -a large ring with 46 teeth instead of 50 or 52 and an inner ring with 30 teeth);
10 or 11 cog rear cassettes. a range from 11-34 teeth would be normal. Riders can customize for small increments or larger gears for climbing.
eyelets for frame bags, and for racks to carry panniers
