Take it from an experienced pressure cooker guy, getting a pressure cooker/instant pot is no small investment into your kitchen routine. Since even the basic ones will set you back about $100, you need to know if this is the right cooking device for you. If you are looking for a device that will do a multitude of cooking techniques, then you should most likely pass on buying an instant pot as they will not air fry as good as an air fryer, sous vide as good as a sous vide cooker, slow cook as good as a crock pot (in fact, some models won’t even heat up enough to slow cook properly), or bake as good as an oven no matter what settings are available to you. So if you are looking for an item just so that it can brown and pressure cook, then read on.
The Video Review
My first introduction into a pressure cooker was the Mealthy Multipot as it was one of the cheaper ones that had great ratings on Amazon. And it revolutionized my kitchen cooking as long as I stuck to the basics of what it does well and that is brown the meat and pressure cook whatever you want.
We have made hard boiled eggs by steaming them, steamed rice, braised short ribs, tandoori chicken, pulled pork, one pot pasta dishes, all with great success. The great thing about the pressure cooker is that it can cook in less than two hours a very tender pulled pork or braised ribs that would take hours in the oven or smoker at a low temperature. We absolutely love it’s ability to tenderize tougher (and usually cheaper) cuts of meat.
How does it work you may ask. Well, if you’re going to brown the meat first, you set it to sauté and brown the meat which usually takes 5 to 10 minutes, then drain the fat and then add all the ingredients. If you’re pressure steaming your food, place the trivet inside add 1 cup of water and then all the ingredients. If you’re making something like a chili, just add all the ingredients into the pot.
Once you’ve got everything in that you want to cook, seal the lid and set the device to pressure cook for however many minutes you need. Usually not more than 50 minutes. Now a fair warning, depending upon how warm the ingredients are inside, it’s going to take 5 to 15 minutes to heat up and build pressure before starting the pressure cooking timer.
Then when the pressure timer has finished, you can let the pressure release naturally, which will take another 10 to 15 minutes, or quick release the pressure which will take about 1 to 2 minutes. Some recipes will have you add ingredients after pressure cooking like cheese or spinach or other items that the pressure cooker may turn into mush. But other than that, the dish is now ready to serve.
So how does it save time? Well when I usually cook chili in a crock pot, I brown the meat, add all the ingredients and then let it cook for at least 6 hours. But with the pressure cooker, after I brown the meat, I add the ingredients and then set the pressure cooker to 30 minutes, so the whole chili cooking process will be done in about 1 to 1.5 hours. I even have a video for my comparison of crock pot chili vs. pressure cooker chili:
So in our kitchen, I am using a pressure cooker more often than using the crock pot. It cooks faster and the flavors of the pressure cooker can be just as good if not even better than a crock pot.
Unfortunately for us, our preferred pressure cooker, the Mealthy Multipot can no longer be bought and then our pot decided to stop working, so we decided to go with the Cosori Pressure Cooker since (1) we have been using a Cosori air fryer and have like it a lot (2) the Cosori Pressure Cooker was rated well and relatively inexpensive and (3) it has a sous vide function which isn’t as good as a true sous vide machine, but it works well when I am cooking for just the 3 or 4 of us.
Now that you’ve read all about a pressure cooker and know in more details what they are like, you can now safely take the next step and buy one for yourself or decide it’s not for you and save your money.
Link to the Amazon Pages
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| Cosori Electric Pressure Cooker |
