Instant Pot Duo Plus 6-Quart Pressure Cooker Review

Instant Pot Duo Plus 6 quart pressure cooker is one of the most popular pressure cookers today but is it the one to buy?

Cooking with Instant Pot Duo Plus 6-Quart Pressure Cooker

Instant Pot Duo Plus 6 quart pressure cooker makes cooking simple and fast. Food tastes great and it doesn’t make it dry. If you want to eat healthy food then pressure cooker is probably the best kitchen appliance you can buy.

Instant Pot Duo Plus 6 quart pressure cooker is quite versatile allowing you too cook many different meals. It has a total of 15 cooking functions – 11 pressure cook functions (Soup/Broth, Meat/Stew, Beach/Chili, Cake, Egg, Rice, Multigrain, Porridge, Steam, Sterilize, Pressure cook (manual)) and 4 non-pressure functions (Sauté, Slow Cook, Yogurt and Keep Warm)

Each cooking mode has 3 additional modes: “Less”, “Normal” and “More”. They do a different thing with every cooking function (it’s written down in manual). For example with Meat/Stew function use “Less” if you want soft texture, “Normal” is you want very soft texture and “More” if you want fall-of-the-bone meat texture.

Instant Pot Duo Plus 6 quart pressure cooker can keep your food warm for up to 10 hours (if you don’t want to eat it right away) and you can delay cooking by up to 24 hours.

Overall it works really well and does a good job of making delicious food. Only thing you might dislike is that sealing rings do retain smell (and perhaps some flavor) of the food you cook so you might want to buy some extra ones for different types of food.

Inner cooking pot

Inner cooking pot has 6-quart capacity which will be enough to cook food for 4 people in most cases. It’s made of food grade stainless steel and does not have nonstick coating.

The lack of nonstick coating can be either a good or a bad thing depending how you look at it. On the downside not having it makes the inner cooking pot a bit harder to clean but on the upside you don’t have to worry about damaging the coating or it eventually starting to come off.

Pressure release

There are two methods of releasing pressure: Natural and Quick. With natural release you don’t have to do anything – just wait for the pressure cooker to cool down. Once it has released pressure so safe levels the float valve will drop down. The disadvantage of natural release is that it can be time consuming – anywhere from 10 to 40 minutes.

You can release pressure in less than 1 minute with quick release method. All you have to do is turn steam release handle to venting position and pressure will be released rapidly. Once again when the float valve dropping down indicates that the pressure has been fully released to safe levels. The disadvantage of this method is that it releases hot steam which can scald you if you place any of your body parts in the way of steam release valve (so don’t put your hand over it or get your face close). You shouldn’t use quick release method when cooking foods with large liquid volumes as it may splatter liquid.

Control panel

Instant Pot Duo Plus 6 quart pressure cooker has a large, easy-to-read LCD screen. Control panel is more or less the same as on most other pressure cookers with no significant differences (but it’s a bit more advanced than usual).

The unit does beep however you can mute it (which is something you cannot do on some of the other pressure cookers).

Verdict

Overall this is a really good pressure cooker so it’s very easy to see why this model has become so popular. It cooks well, is more versatile than most and is rather simple to use all while still remaining affordable. If you are looking for your first pressure cooker then this one is probably the best choice currently.

Instant Pot Duo Plus 6-Quart Pressure Cooker Specifications:

• Power supply: 120V~60Hz
• Rated power: 1000W
• Inner pot capacity: 6 Quarts
• Inner pot dimensions: 6.2” x 9.4” inches (15.7 x 23.9 centimeters)
• Pressure cooker dimensions: 13” x 12.2” x 12.6” inches (33 x 31 x 32 centimeters)
• Weight: 14.8 lb (6.75 kg)
• Cooking functions: 15
  • Pressure:
    • Soup/Broth
    • Meat/Stew
    • Beach/Chili
    • Cake
    • Egg
    • Rice
    • Multigrain
    • Porridge
    • Steam
    • Sterilize
    • Pressure cook (manual)
  • Non-pressure:
    • Sauté
    • Slow Cook
    • Yogurt
    • Keep Warm