[floridaorange]

Do you recommend?

[M_Six]

I'd give you ours if you lived nearby. We tried several recipes with it and never found one that was worth doing again. And the word "instant" should not be applied to this device at all. There's nothing instant about it. YMMV

[floridaorange]

[Ohio Enthusiast]

It's an electric pressure cooker. Pressure cooking does some things very well, but most things can be accomplished easier with regular cooking. We have a handful of recipes for it and we use it to cook dried beans for other dishes (which is something that I was never able to do with regular cooking methods). It excels at recipes that are "dump everything in and set pressure for X minutes". Also works great for making dulce-de-leche from condensed milk cans.

Bottom line, it's not an expensive appliance, but it does take quite a bit of room. If you have the space and budget for something you might use a few times a year, go for it. If ours broke I'm not sure we'd get a new one in a hurry.

[floridaorange]

It’s in the top 5 most purchased items on Amazon which sparked my curiosity especially if it makes healthy meal prepping easier.

We have a slow cooker but don’t use it very often at all.

[Ohio Enthusiast]

Originally Posted by floridaorange

We have a slow cooker but don’t use it very often at all.

A slow cooker and an electric pressure cooker overlap a little, but they're not the same and there could be use for both in a kitchen. I'll also throw in sous-vide precision cookers, which I like a lot and use for quite a variety of recipes.

[stbm5]

we have one and use it 4-5 times per year. probably use my slow cooker 2-3x more often. there are a couple recipes we have where its a true one pot solution. but basically its mostly just a pressure cooker. i dont think it has any special utility for food prep. if i were going to cook a lot of meat all at once i think id prefer to use the slow cooker. if you wanted to cook a bunch of potatoes all at once then its good for stuff like that.

[UncleWede]

My wife is Hispanic and uses ours for lots of beans. Lid smells like pethos

[TboneS54]

I love it. We used it every week. Cook 4 lbs or pork shoulder (cubed, to be "pulled") in 50 minutes as opposed to several hours. Even the tough short rib can get super tender in about 1.5 hours. If you can make it in the morning and leave it in a crockpot all day,m ore power to you, but the instapot is great when you want to get it all done in a couple of hours (or less) total.

Meals we make:

Carnitas (the frying is done later, in a different pan on stove top)
Cuban pork
chile verde (chicken or pork)
barbacoa (chuck roast)
short rib

Chicken tends to only need like 40mins, pork 50-60, beef the most at like an hour to 1.5hr.

[floridaorange]

Originally Posted by TboneS54

I love it. We used it every week. Cook 4 lbs or pork shoulder (cubed, to be "pulled") in 50 minutes as opposed to several hours. Even the tough short rib can get super tender in about 1.5 hours. If you can make it in the morning and leave it in a crockpot all day,m ore power to you, but the instapot is great when you want to get it all done in a couple of hours (or less) total.

Meals we make:

Carnitas (the frying is done later, in a different pan on stove top)
Cuban pork
chile verde (chicken or pork)
barbacoa (chuck roast)
short rib

Chicken tends to only need like 40mins, pork 50-60, beef the most at like an hour to 1.5hr.

To be honest I’m interested in how you prepare each of these 1-1.5 hrs is what I’m looking for

[TboneS54]

They're all mostly the same. A decent amount of water, cubed protein, bay leaf, salt and other common things like oregano, cumin garlic, onion, chili powders maybe lime juice and some chicken stock/broth.

The carnitas take an extra step when I drain the liquid and put the meat/fat into a ceramic non stick pan with bacon grease or lard (I cut off fat purely to render down in a pot to make oil. I need the extra oil for the refried beans and frying tortillas) to crisp them up. My fav meal by far. Side of guac ofc.

As another example, for Barbacoa, you add tomato paste which thickens it up to be more like a gravy.

Only complaint is that since moisture doesn't escape, the whole dish is very runny. So you can either try to strain some fluid or put the whole stainless pot on a burner and reduce it.

But if you reduce, that takes heat which could over cook the meat so if you know you'll reduce it, undercook it in the instapot imo.

[c1pher]

I tried one for a while but the types of foods I eat are not really suited for this type of cooking.

[M_Six]

Originally Posted by c1pher

I tried one for a while but the types of foods I eat are not really suited for this type of cooking.

That was our issue. We kept trying to find recipes that appealed to us and were practical for us, but had little luck. The recipes we usually make are easier to do on the stove.

[DocL]

I love my Instapot. Every Sunday I make a pot roast. I've also made steamed lobster tails, pork ribs, beef ribs, greek chicken, oxtail, and soup. There are a lot of easy recipies on line.

[unluky]

I use one every week for meal prepping chicken for my lunch salads. Toss in 1.5 cups of pineapple juice then 3-5 pounds of frozen chicken right out of the freezer, set it to 10 minutes and click start. 25-30 minutes later it's done and ready to be cubed up and toss in the fridge. I love mine, but I use it specifically for this. I've made like pot roast and things in it which worked fine, but this is what I use it for 99% of the time.

[floridaorange]

Guess I’m wondering if the IP is healthier - it’s less heat exposure that breaks down nutrients then slow cooker

[MPWRZME]

Originally Posted by TboneS54

I love it. We used it every week. Cook 4 lbs or pork shoulder (cubed, to be "pulled") in 50 minutes as opposed to several hours. Even the tough short rib can get super tender in about 1.5 hours. If you can make it in the morning and leave it in a crockpot all day,m ore power to you, but the instapot is great when you want to get it all done in a couple of hours (or less) total.

Meals we make:

Carnitas (the frying is done later, in a different pan on stove top)
Cuban pork
chile verde (chicken or pork)
barbacoa (chuck roast)
short rib

Chicken tends to only need like 40mins, pork 50-60, beef the most at like an hour to 1.5hr.

We have the exact same menu!

[Littlecoupe]

We have an Instant Pot, but it's not used weekly. Maybe for 1 or 2 meal preps per month.

One of my favorite recipes is french dip / beef dip, it turns out quite well.

I do find it can still render some meats tough even though the whole point is to speed up the cooking process while leaving meats tender. I don't think it's necessarily the pot's problem though, but just saying it's not magic.

[Dan B]

I had a crock pot that was getting old and having issues. Instead of buying a new one, I went with an Instant pot.

It does speed up some recipes and is convenient for others. I made mashed potatoes for Christmas. 25 minutes to cook the potatoes. When it is done, I manually release the pressure.

I slow cook chili a lot. What takes 3-4 hours in the crockpot takes 45 minutes in the instant pot.

It can be quirky though. If you don't have enough liquid it will not cook. It should give you a "food burn" type of error message. It means that it is heating up but unable to build pressure. So that can be annoying the 1st couple of times it happens.

Overall for me it was an excellent purchase.

[Needsdecaf]

We use ours sparingly, as we don't have a lot of pressure cooker or slow cooker recipes. Most of the times we prefer to use our dutch oven and just braise.

But it definitely is useful.

[spazzyfry123]

We use ours probably twice a week depending on what we are doing. Last night we had chicken in homemade broth with mushrooms on a slow cook throughout the day in a crock pot, but we did the rice in the Instant Pot when it was getting close to dinner time. I'll say that was some of the better rice we've had, but its competition is minute rice, boil in a bag, microwave, etc.

My wife has made her own yogurt in the IP, used it in lieu of a microwave to reheat meals... List goes on.

Overall, I'll say that I'm a fan. I think it's quirky. Getting things out of it has often required me to go to my tool box to find picks to get the thing out of the pot. There's a lot of build up (figuratively and literally). Unless my wife announces, it scares the crap out of me when she releases the pressure. It takes a bit longer than "instant", but we like not having to use the microwave as much. Quality of food as an outcome appears better vs microwave.

I'd say my only complaints are getting used to it/learning how to use it correctly (that's a "me" thing, not against the appliance itself) and that it's just another bulky appliance that takes up considerable room like a crock pot. It has its uses and also doubles down when other things are in use offering you the ability to cook simultaneously, but it's a beast of an item. A little bomb on your counter.