to cook foods by exposing directly to steam. Cooking vegetables in this way retains all the natural goodness. It is a quicker way of cooking because steam is hotter than boiling water. Fish or chicken is very successful cooked in this way. Petal steamers can be bought very cheaply and folds out to fit any pan, bamboo steamers are also cheap and fit over any pan. Purpose built steaming pans can be stacked in several layers to separate the different foods.