I think if I had to buy one I would lean towards the Kuhn Rikon . It does have some advantages . Maybe quick in ways . But I’m one these slow cooks who enjoys the dramatics of simmering 15 -20 lbs of bones in a stock pot for 30 hrs. Waking up to the smell . Braises on the stove top 3-4 hrs love it. Maybe one of these days I’ll join the pressure cooker club .
Love, love, love my Fagor. Have made the best poultry stock of my life in that thing. Just made some baby back ribs in mole pipian that were unbelievably tender and flavorful. I sometimes make large batches of steel cut oats for the week. My ragus are pretty much always better served by my Le Creuset dutch oven, but the Fagor will turn out a completely serviceable bolognese when I don’t have three hours to sit around the house tending to a pot. And it is ridiculously easy to clean.
They key for me is using appropriate times. I use this site quite a bit:
Collards and pork. Indian curries. Tagines with dried fruit. Picadillo. I have had a lot of fun with mine. Highly recommended.
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Saved and thanks.
I really like my Kuhn-Rikon. And I highly recommend to buy one as you can do many great things in a short period of time and most of the “issues” are not really true or can easily be addressed
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@ipsedixit Did Rube Goldberg design your pressure cooker? With a slow cooker, I can’t get any maillard reaction happening and I don’t have the time to babysit a stockpot.
If Rube did, it would actually be easier to use.
Maybe its a lifestyle thing or a just a difference in cooking style, but personally I see no advantage to using a pressure cooker.
I don’t need rice in 10 minutes. I can wait an extra 20 minutes for my Zojirushi to make perfectly fluffy rice.
For things like stews and braises, as I mentioned up above, I like to season as I go. And for me there is no one set number of hours, or amount of seasonings that go into, for example, a braise. The type of meat, the various accoutrements, etc. all will vary the time and seasonings that are needed. Using a pressure cooker makes adjustments simply impossible. It’s like one shot to hit the gravitational orbit of Jupiter, or you go flailing into space. I prefer to be able to pilot my ship, with thrusters and and what-not. Plus, when I make a stew or a braise a good part of the reason for doing it is to make my kitchen smell like the primal, aromatic promise of a hearty comforting meal.
And rarely, if ever, do I need stock in an hour. Stock just isn’t something I make when I need it. I make it when I have enough of the ingredients on-hand. If for some reason I actually find myself needing stock in an hour, I’ll just make something else. Or order out. Or just go out to eat.
I have two pressure cookers and I mainly use them in the winter. I love the time savings that they give. One dish I really enjoy is a bread pudding. It is not something you’d think of to do in a PC. It is made in a pyrex bowl o a rack in the PC. The pressure and steam give it a souffle like character. Check out missvickie.com and some of Lorna Sass’ pressure cooker books. They can be more useful for a lot of things you might not imagine.
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I’m Indian. I’m required to own a pressure cooker. Indian dishes are the only things I really make in mine – dals and rajma (kidney beans) mainly. I can shorten cook time from an hour to about 20 minutes, which is helpful on weekdays. I don’t cook mutton curry, but my mom does mutton and lamb curry in hers too. Never tried stock in mine or rice.
I use one of the Insta-Pot pressure cookers. I use it mainly as a rice cooker, but I’ve also cooked numerous other dishes with it.
The main advantage is saving time. I don’t have much time to cook for my family when I come home.
The main disadvantage is that you can’t season your dishes as you’re cooking. A final addition of seasonings at the end doesn’t always have the same effect as adding seasonings as you go.
You’re not the first one to mention seasoning as you go but I’ve never done that. I preseason and then season more if necessary at the end. What kind of seasoning are you talking about?
I think it depends on what you’re cooking. For chili I do what the cook-off/contest folks call dumps. Some chili powders & spices (cumin) burn easily, some mellow or lose strength over cooking time. Putting them in at intervals is more effective.
I mentioned it up above.
It’s critical to season as you go. In many ways it’s the essence of the difference between cooking and just making something to eat.
Take for example, a stew or chili. While whatever recipe or back-of-the-hand formula you use may call for X tablespoons of this, and Y teaspoons of that, your raw ingredients will invariably vary and differ each time you make the dish. Those tomatoes – are they as sweet or tart as when the recipe was written? What about those onions? More bitter? More sweet? Less liquid?
Seasoning once, cooking, and then eating is a bit like making instant ramen. Or more precisely treating cooking like you are making instant ramen.
You’re not only doing your food an injustice, but more importantly you’re doing the rapport that should be developed between you and your food a major disservice.
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I love this
I guess I don’t cook then. My apologies to all my dinner guests 
Oh Cat… You probably know most of your recipes so well there’s no need to season as you go.
Aren’t you kind? Actually I’m a recipe follower. I figure that’s why they pay them the big bucks 
When the “big boys” (and girls) give me instructions I rarely find the dish off in flavor.
Yep… For certain dishes I follow the recipe to a tee.
It depends. If you have a recipe that you are certain works every time, then you can put it all in and cook it. I do that with certain recipes that I’ve tested many times over. However, there are other recipes where it won’t work. Your mileage may vary.
Rather than a recipe I follow certain authors, i.e., Batali, Hazan, Nguyen, Beard, Child, etc. BTW I’m speaking generally as this thread seems to be discussing both PCs and seasoning in general.
Late to the party . . .
I personally do like pressure cookers, despite agreeing with many of the cons that @ipsedixit lists.
I use it mostly for stock and for beans.
I find the stock made in a PC to be far superior to stock made by simmering. In addition, there is no need to skimming. All of the impurities that would normally rise to the top and need to be skimmed coagulate around the bones, meat, and aromatics. I find clean up to be pretty much the same as that for the classic method. Other than the additional washing of the lid, I don’t get the clean up complaints. So superior results that are faster, in my experience.
I eat a lot of beans and the PC allows me to make a pot quickly. If I don’t pre-soak, I can still have a great pot of beans for dinner in less than an hour. Usually, 20 minutes at high pressure and then 20 minutes simmering without the lid. In terms of salt, its best to season late anyway, so seasoning can be done at the appropriate time with this method.
I find braising in a PC to be excellent. True, a traditional braise may beat out a PC. But I can serve a solid dish of say short ribs in a very reasonable amount of time that is maybe 90% as good as a traditional braise. On a weeknight that is an incredible gift. And again, seasoning as you go is best. But I tend to “finish” the dish with the lid off on the stove top for 15-20 minutes. I find that is enough time to adjust seasoning and to allow flavors to marry properly.
Less of a staple, but real polenta (not that quick cook stuff) can be made very quickly in the PC. The cleanup here is a real problem, but the flavor and texture are amazing. As good if not better than traditional method, but in a fraction of the time and with no stirring necessary.
I don’t like white rice in the PC, but whole grains do quite well. Farro, brown rice, freekeh, etc, come out quickly and cooked well.
If you have the time, traditional methods are really the tops. However, a stove top PC like the Kuhn-Rikon can, with the right technique, get you really very close that ideal dish in a fraction of the time. Haven’t so far been a fan of the electric cookers. Those seem fussy to me, but what do I know.
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