How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following

Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by imglorp on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @08:45AM (#13810221)

I find some basic knife skills to be a huge labor saver. I've had the same decent (ie, not serrated) $25 chef's knife for decades and can plow through basic veg prep in a few minutes. I don't like all the extra gadgets except a peeler. When I factor in setting up and washing some chopping or slicing machine, I'm way faster with just a knife and board. Two things to wash. And the board is also used to hold stuff on its way to the pot, so that cuts down on temp bowls too.

Watch one good video on how to dice an onion an you're 90pct there.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by weaksauce on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @11:19AM (#13811585)

There's a great, free, video series online that teaches you how to cut[1]. Also, misen knives are excellent for the money.[2]

1. http://www.thekitchn.com/brendan-mcdermotts-knife-skills-cla...

2. Misen.co and http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/09/best-cheap-chefs-knives-m...

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by ska on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @10:06AM (#13810818)

Food processors (proper ones, not hand "choppers" and the like - those are nearly pointless) are a terrible replacement for basic knife skills.

What they are mostly great at is a few things that are so labor intensive (ever made hummus by hand?) you otherwise might not bother. Also a good time saver for things like pasta dough.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by nikdaheratik on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @09:01PM (#13817182)

Good for making mayo and the like by hand and for thin slicing potatoes and carrots. The biggest issue for me is setup + cleanup >> use time for most cases.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by haikuginger on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @02:43PM (#13813964)

Great for hummus; great for purees; great for pastry doughs.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by HelloMcFly on Wednesday March 08, 2017 @08:21AM (#13820023)

Good for homemade bread.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by ghaff on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @08:49AM (#13810257)

I mostly agree. I do have a food processor but, unless I'm doing a lot of chopping and don't care if it's pretty uneven, I find that just using a good knife is less total work and gives better results.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by bostonvaulter2 on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @06:39PM (#13816364)

New York Times has a really good set of cooking videos: https://cooking.nytimes.com/guides/23-basic-knife-skills

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by tonyarkles on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @09:09AM (#13810380)

While I did mention the food processor in the sibling post, I have to agree with you here too. A great sharp knife with a modicum of skill goes a long way. And the cleanup is definitely simple!

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by turnip123942 on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @09:58AM (#13810750)

Agreed! One thing to add:

Learn to keep your knives sharp. A sharp knife is a safe knife and makes the whole prep process go faster.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by pjc50 on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @10:25AM (#13810996)

Any tips on this?

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by Afton on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @11:38AM (#13811763)

Keeping the angle consistent is the problem with use a simple sharpening stone.

I recommend a jig that keeps the angle for you. I use a spyderco sharpmaker (https://www.amazon.com/Spyderco-Tri-Angle-Sharpmaker/dp/B004...), but there are others. I enjoy eating steak with a super sharp knife, so I have it out frequently for sharpening our set of steak-knives, and less frequently for our chef's knives.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by mywittyname on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @11:31AM (#13811701)

A basic electric knife sharpener will produce very sharp knives, certainly sharp enough for most people.

Purist will call them crap, but I use both a traditional whetstone and an electric sharpener and the electric gets 90% of my usage. It takes a few minutes to take a knife from "very dull" to "pretty sharp". The whetstone definitely gets them sharper, but it takes a lot longer and you only notice your knives are dull when you're right in the middle of making dinner.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by udfalkso on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @03:54PM (#13814765)

Which electric sharpener do you use? Thanks!

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by yojo on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @10:37AM (#13811119)

I've had great results with a Japanese water stone.

https://youtu.be/kSKpz1UqIl4?t=4m13s has overkill levels of detail (and some marketing upsell) but communicates the idea well.

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Re:How the Instant Pot cooker developed a cult following by exDM69 on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @11:48AM (#13811909)

I sharpen woodworking tools so my point of view is slightly different, but I'd recommend diamond plates over water stones.

I've had great results with both but water stones need to be soaked in water before use (instructions say 10 minutes, but my experience is more like 30 minutes), they release a messy slurry when they wear and they don't stay flat for very long (flatness isn't that much of an issue with knifes I suppose, but essential for woodworking tools) and wear down as you use and re-flatten them.

Diamond plates stay dead flat, need very little maintenance, ready to use (just wet them, no soaking) and last 10 years or more in my infrequent use.

I have big 8" plates for my woodworking tools, but I intend to buy a small 1200 grit sharpener for kitchen for about $6 from here: https://www.fine-tools.com/ezelap-diasharpener.html

1200 grit isn't super fine (compared to water stones) but is enough for basic kitchen sharpening (you don't need coarser ones unless you sharpen damaged blades and you don't need a finer one to get decent sharpness). I'd add a leather strop and some honing compound (chromium oxide) if I needed to get them sharp enough to shave (like I do with my tools).

That's about $20 for diamond plate + strop + compound, you can't get a decent water stone for that price.

But the real difference between sharp and kinda-sharp is practicing the skill of honing the blade. Sharpen a little at a time, test frequently and do it often.

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