Instant Pot Advice


 
I get the same aroma thing with my pressure cookers and I have to say I have never had migration of flavors from the seal into my food. If you think about it there would be a hard time to have that happen. Since pressure and steam flow is out of the lid not into it. At first I was real anal about trying to get rid of it now I just don't worry. As for flavors being "muted" with a pressure cooker I cannot answer to counter top models. Only my honest to goodness cooking with gas by golly stove top models :) and I do not notice this. Actually I have noticed flavors are heightened thanks to the quicker cooking though I have noticed flavors don't "mingle" as much. I attribute this to the fact a counter top 110V unit has pretty limited power whereas I can put mine on an 18000 BTU burner and it comes up on the steam in a heartbeat and therefore can cut cooking time quite a bit over a counter model since actual cooking time is measured once the pressure is up.
As for slow cooking I am a firm believer in cast iron and have a couple of heavy CI dutch ovens. They go from the stove top (for searing and browning) into a low oven for however many hours I want. I use the oven timer so if I want a 5 hour slow cook I set the oven to just turn off at 5 hours. So if I want dinner to be say 7 or 8 hours from my start time. I can set the oven for say 5.5 hours, it turns off, prep work is done for sides and table setting, wife and kid(s) get home or are ready to sit and even though the oven has been off for say 2 hours I pull out a perfectly cooked piping hot stew or pot roast or whatever. Plus on any time I want to deep fry I simply use that same CI dutch oven (either the smaller one or the big one) fill with grape seed oil and use either on stove top or on side burner from my grill depending on weather.
 
LMichaels said:
If you think about it there would be a hard time to have that happen. Since pressure and steam flow is out of the lid not into it. .
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Actually very very little steam and pressure escape out of the IP. Steam only when it first pressures up then it's a completely enclosed system (unless there's an issue, it doesn't de-pressureize/de-steam till times up). I do get a very slight aroma once it's about half way through the cycle but it's minimal.
 
I think you misunderstood or I mishandled the response. What I meant is that since the seal is under positive (not negative) pressure any aromas on it will not infiltrate the food. For the record I have never had steam escape from my lid seals only from the relief valve which because they're externally heated is how they regulate pressure if you don't turn down the heat. I think the IP uses temp control more than an actual mechanical pressure regulator to do it. One of my Fagors is a single pressure the other is dual (IIRC 7 psi and 15 psi) while the single is 15psi only. I have found the dual pressure one I always use the high setting anyway. I guess for some delicate things like say seafood low pressure may be called for but other than octopus seafood cooks so fast pressure cooking it is a waste of good seafood. I do use it for octopus though. Then once out I can do a quick marinade and grill finish on it. Yum!
 
Don't try reducing liquid on saute (high). Food may not burn because of a lot of liquid but it sure will stick like it's been crazy-glued down. Did Jamaican Goat Curry this pm and needed to reduce the liquid. Read to do saute on high. Not good. I could barely break the goat free from the bottom. It's cooling now to skim the fat but it's not a job I'm looking forward to (overnight cool down).
 
Len Dennis said:
Sealing Ring: do not bother trying to get the stink of old "cooks" out of it. Gone through turkey soup, ribs and beef stew. Pheww, it smells.

Tried washing HA! Tried outside for a day HA! Tried water and lemon peels and steam it HA! Not going to waste any more time on it.
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After just three cooks my sealing ring stinks to high heaven. And not a good smell either. I was doing some reading last night about how to get the smell out. One claimed success was with a product called Zero Odor.

There was one other success claim I found interesting because there was some scientific basis to it. The poster claimed to have consulted a friend who was a chemist. The chemist said the smell is from outgassing of molecules that got forced into the silicone while under pressure. The smell will continue until the outgassing has completed. So the suggested approach was to speed up the outgassing. If you have a second sealing ring, use that on the lid and put the smelly ring in the Instant Pot along with sufficient water to completely cover the smelly ring. It was suggested to use something to keep the ring submerged. Perhaps the steamer rack with something heavy on top. Then run the IP at high pressure for six hours. I'd imagine the point here is to literally dislodge the smelly stuff with fresh water by forcing it in under pressure. The poster claimed 100% success with this approach. Given the time involved, not to mention the electricity, I would think this would be maybe a once every dozen cooks cleaning regimen.

I don't have a second sealing ring so I can do the pressure cleaning, but thinking along the same lines I vacuum sealed my ring and am leaving it to sit like that for a while. This obviously won't flush out the smelly molecules like a good pressure bath, but it should encourage them to exit the ring for the lower pressure region surrounding the ring. Hopefully they won't all get sucked back in when I break the vacuum. I just did this about an hour ago. I'll post further if it seemed to have any effect at all.
 
You can figure out your cost for the 6 hours by taking your hourly kw/hr rate. My ultra is 1000 watts so 6000 watts for the 6 hours is 6 KWH x 6.0c/KWH or 36c. Probably less because the heating element is not on 100% of the time (unlike a crock pot where it is).

I think I can handle that :D

If it works that is. BUT won't the off-gassing of the submerged ring get transferred to the new (substitute) ring????????? Probably but at a much lower concentration.
 
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I have a Kill-A-Watt meter and intend to use it on my next IP cook, but I'm quite certain the IP is not using remotely close to the maximum power when simply maintaining the pressure. Very little steam escapes once it pressurizes. If it kept heating at full power the whole time steam would be escaping like crazy (or the thing would eventually explode). So it's probably more like 1000 Watts for 10-15 minutes as it comes up to pressure and then periodic bursts that average to about 100W (if that) for the rest of the time. That should bring the effective cost way down.

I think most of the stuff forced out of the ring will stay in the water. Any that goes into the second ring should be at greatly reduced concentration.

I wonder too if it would be possible to essentially pre-load the ring with something that won't stink. One assumes the smelly food molecules are forcing their way into microscopic crevices in the silicone. Maybe pressure cooking the ring prior to first use would saturate it with water and keep the smelly stuff from getting in there.

Do you really pay $0.06/kWH? I'm not sure what the rate is here in Illinois but I know where I lived in California it was $0.25-$0.31/kWH depending on how much you used. And they're supposed to be changing to a time-of-use rate plan where net cost is likely to skyrocket.
 
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It varies (per our damned time-of-use meter). I looked at an old bill for the 6c rate (it changes-always up-- quite often). Our off peak time is currently 7.7c, mid peak is 11.3 and peak (naturally when everyone is either getting ready for work or is home making supper) is 15.7c.

http://www.ontario-hydro.com/current-rates

AND, it's different again in the summer (to take advantage of DST).
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You can soak the ring in baking soda. It's what I do with mine and it GREATLY reduces the smell on them.
 
I don't measure anything lol. I just throw some in and soak it a bit than wash it. Another trick you can try (I haven't) is to stick it in the dishwasher. I know it won't go over the temps the gasket is designed for
 
A couple things addressed here. Power usage... Yesterday I made carnitas in the IP. I've had some issues with pressurizing the pot when I just throw everything in and turn it on so I first heated the liquid to boiling then added onion and citrus chunks, then added meat. The lid didn't seal properly the first time so the pre-pressurized time was considerably longer. I'd guess close to an hour total before it came to pressure, 35 minutes at pressure, then 30 minutes natural pressure release, during which time I assume the heating element was off. When I finally opened the lid and removed the pork and Kill-A-Watt said 0.75kWH used. I then tried, mostly unsuccessfully, to reduce the cooking liquid on saute-high. That burned up another 0.50kWH. Next time I'll put the liquid in a wide saute pan and reduce it on the stove, but that's a different topic.

Second item, sealing ring stinkage... I had theorized that vacuum sealing the ring would pull the odor from the ring. I had it under vacuum for a bit over 24 hours. It clearly still had an odor, but my impression was that it was significantly reduced from what it had been. I'll have to experiment with this some more. One big plus, however, was that the vacuum bag kept the odor fully contained. So even if it doesn't totally remove the odor, at the very least it's a viable storage method that will keep the ring from stinking up the kitchen. Perhaps a simple Zip-Loc would do the same as far as containing the odor.
 
odours still seep out of zip loc freezer bags. Depending on how bad the smell is, it may not matter to the "public nose" ;) .

I've come to the conclusion that it's only getting used for spicy flavourful stuff so it doesn't really matter. Beef stew, spare ribs and now Jamaican Goat Curry. It's all good!

If a successful method comes along, fine. Not worrying about this anymore.
 
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I got some spare sealing rings for the IP so I decided to try pressure cooking the stinky ring. I just shoved the ring down into the pot as far as it would go and added water to cover. I set it for 3 hours of high pressure and let it naturally depressurize afterwards. This did not meet with complete success. The ring still had a noticeable odor, though it was not as strong as at the start. I should add the kitchen smelled very much like the pasta sauce I cooked in the IP last night so I have to think something came out of the ring. Speaking of which, there was a fair bit of white residue of some kind in the bottom of the pot when I opened it. No idea what it was but it had to have come from the sealing ring. Since I didn't let it go the full 6 hours recommended in the tip I read, perhaps the additional time is actually needed.

The IP used 0.55kWH, about 0.30kWH of which was used bringing the water to a boil at the start. It would seem to be quite efficient maintaining pressure once it's achieved. Extrapolating, the full six hour pressure cook for the ring would have used 0.80kWH. About $0.20 where I live.
 
It may just be salts, minerals, whatever leaching out of the water as it boils (scale, just like in a kettle).

Got my cheap(er) replacement clear ring from China. It's a smidge smaller than the OE one (won't rotate when installed) but it passed the 2min pressure test so that's done.
 
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I used the IP last night for the first time since pressure cooking the stinky ring. To my surprise the old stinky ring didn't stink at all. No sign of odor at all. Whatever was left of the stuff that caused the stink obviously finished outgassing. I'm going to have to declare success with the pressure cooking of the ring eliminating the odors, even if it took a few days for the smell to completely disappear.
 
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