Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Inside the Home of Instant Pot

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 206 posts

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#111

Post by daveguy »

baldfat wrote: post #97
TheRealPomax wrote: post #56

If you actually read this article, there's barely any information in it that warrants that many words. It's basically just an advertisement that goes "lots of people have bought this thing!" with the automatic effect that readers will then go "wow sounds popular I should think about getting one".

When anything doubles in sales for 6 straight years I think this kind of article is warranted. When it is a top 5 item across stores on Black Friday. The story is how a small Canadian company has such religiously loyal customers and evangelist. I think it is a far article. I bought myself one in September. I love to cook and cook 70% of meals. Almost everything is from scratch and takes over an hour. I now use this I…

> anything doubles in sales for 6 straight years I think this kind of article is warranted.

If they started at 1 sale the first year they would be at 64 sales. No matter where they started they doubling every year for 6 years is 64x (2^6) sales.

64x sales over 6 years is great if you're an investor, but it isn't news.

Inability to buy one means they are having trouble with production.

You can bet it is doing more than 2x this year with great sales copy in the NYT.

Makes me want to cancel my NYT subscription.

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#112

Post by bunderbunder »

mattmaroon wrote: post #106

This article glosses over the real story which is how did Instant Pot win when their product is functional similar to ones that have existed for a long time? (And no, it's isn't sensors, they all regulate heat and have a valve that prevents explosion.) This is the same as when people write articles about AirBnB and act as if they invented the space when VRBO was there for years. I have no problem with stories about a…

I only skimmed, but I don't think it does.

As an owner of an Instant Pot that gets regular use, and another pressure cooker that lives in storage now, I think I can take a stab at it:

Compared to stove top pressure cookers, it's just easier. Stove top ones require constant attention and fiddling to manage the heat an pressure properly. With the Instant Pot, put food in, close lid, set time, go watch One Life to Live reruns until you hear beeping.

Compared to other electric models, it's either cheaper, or easier to use, or both. Many comparable models are prohibitively expensive, while the Instant Pot is $100. And the interface is dead simple. Push button, adjust time, walk away. I haven't used another electric model, but a couple friends have them, and, to hear them talk, theirs aren't quite as simple to operate.

(That first step might be more confusing before, probably by the 3rd usage, you realize that all the buttons labeled 'bean', 'soup', 'veggies', etc. all do basically the same thing and are really just there for show.)

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#113

Post by FroshKiller »

krrrh wrote: post #61
tdburn wrote: post #12

Does anyone else think the instant pot puts out weird smelling food sometimes? Like almost sour

I found that the ring picks up odors from some dishes that travel to the next. Definitely have had yogurt that was inadvertently flavoured with bone broth. I was pretty good!

The manual that came with my Instant Pot recommended buying separate rings for specific strong-smelling recipes.

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#114

Post by dogruck »

nichtich wrote: post #68
kitcar wrote: post #11

I was under the impression that instant pot was not the inventor of the electric slow cooker / rice maker / pressure cooker hybrid, they were just the ones to import the concept from China and market it to North American audiences. Can anyone who lived in China in the late 90s confirm - was the instant pot style of pressure cooker popular back then, or is the instant pot brand truly the original I nventor of the hybr…

It's pretty weird when you consider how food trends go. In China, back in the 90s, my parents use a pressure cooker and a wok for everything. And it's the norm as for most families I know both parent work and they have to come home at 5:30 and put food on the table at 6:30, with no easy option like frozen pizza. Now with supermarkets and food delivery you don't need to cook if you don't want to, and if you do choose…

I really liked this comparison. You might be right!

Can you say more? For example:

1. Back in the day, in the US, easy pre-made home meals were the rage. Frozen meals. Microwave dinners. Meals from a can. I don’t mean, “yeah, sure, we still have those today.” I mean, “This is the new society, this is the future, and this food is delicious and amazing!!!”

Was that ever a trend in China?

2. Is there a “Blue Apron China?” I don’t use Blue Apron, and personally think it’s silly — just wondering if there is something similar in China.

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#116

Post by berberous »

bigtex wrote: post #105

If you get the bluetooth enabled version, you can have delicious steel cut oats ready for breakfast. You just set the time you want it finished and wallah! https://instantpot.com/portfolio-item/smart-bluetooth/

Pet peeve: it’s voilà (a French word), not wallah.

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#117

Post by syntaxing »

I think the best part of the instant pot is how affordable it is. My mom had a pressure cooker for about 10 years now. It finally broke and we saw these huge sales during black Friday so we couldn't resist. It's crazy how useful these things are. We use it for soup, congee, and yogurt on top of the standard pressure cooking functions! Making your own yogurt is great because you can change the consistency and taste to your liking! You save a couple bucks too. We prefer the stainless pot rather than the non-stick pots that most pressure cooker have.

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#118

Post by tootie »

gambiting wrote: post #60
mrarjen wrote: post #59

Been using a rice cooker for some years now, it's already a huge step up from cooking it in a pot. And it seems almost nobody uses rice cookers here (NL). Fun fact, people from Asian countries are rather unlikely to know how to cook rice in a pan. I'll very likely get one of the IP's, as cooking ribs and other slow cooked meats do take a lot of time now, and pressure cookers are like playing with a bomb.

I just don't understand the point of a rice cooker, I really really don't. Cooking rice is the simplest thing in the world - throw rice in a pan with water and some salt, turn the gas on, wait 10-15 minutes. Done. Why would I buy a separate device taking precious space in my kitchen for what has to be the easiest cooking task imaginable? When you say "people [..] are rather unlikely to know how to cook rice in a pan"…

If you live in a household that cooks rice once or twice a day every day, it's easier to have a dedicated device. If it saves you 2-3 minutes each time because you don't have to measure the water or watch the timing, then it's worth it after your 300th pot or so. If you eat rice only occasionally, then it's probably not worth it.

I did, at one point, have a multi-purpose rice cooker that had all kinds of setting similar to an instapot. I could put rice, mean, veg and cook the whole thing without attending it. It was nice, but when it broke down I didn't replace it.

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#119

Post by peatmoss »

icebraining wrote: post #55
wglass wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking as one who is American born married to a woman from the subcontinent ... We’ve had accidents involving traditional pressure cookers 2 or 3 times. It’s not really an explosion though we’ve called it that. There’s a rubber emergency valve that pops out and a jet of high pressure steam rockets up. Usually our ceiling gets coated with gravy or orange colored lentils. Once this happened 5 minutes before dinner gu…

Interesting. My family cooks lentils on a pressure cooker quite frequently, and that never happened to us. Maybe you were filling it too much?

Or maybe not including some sort of fat to prevent foaming...

Re: Inside the Home of Instant Pot

#120

Post by chrisgd »

billfruit wrote: post #109

Does it deal with power failures, as in it remembers it's state and then properly adjusts for delayed start and stop considering the duration of power failure and adjusting process considering the cooking due to already generated heat when power was gone?

How often do you experience power outages? I don't think it does, but I don't think it needs to either
Post reply on HN