re: Finally bought a Instant Pot

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If I get this can I ditch the crock pot?

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Yes. It has a slow cooker setting. I've found it runs at a higher temp than a traditional Crock Pot though.

I rarely use mine as well, but I use the hell out of the stainless steel pot that came with it.

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I’ve had one for over a year and literally have yet to use it. If I’m in that big of a hurry, I’m just going to go out.

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You're missing out. I use the hell out of mine.

Chicken salsa verde, pork salsa verde, cuban black beans, red beans, white beans, quick stocks, regular white rice and risotto, thai sticky rice, etc.

Well??

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To understand why the Instant Pot fails as a slow cooker, you need to understand how heat is generated in both these appliances.

A slow cooker heats from the bottom. That heat spreads up the sides so the heavy ceramic bowl of the slow cooker will soak it all up and heat all over.

An Instant Pot also derives its heat from the bottom, but the thin metal pot that it uses does not have the same heating effect as that of a slow cooker. The heat that is used to cook in an Instant Pot comes from steam that is pressurized and trapped in the pot. This works well at high temperatures to cook complex meals within an hour. But for slow cooking it is incredibly problematic

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Meant to reply this to the other dude who asked. Sorry.

I’ve only ever used it for pressure cooking. If I have time to slow cook, I tend to bypass both and use a Dutch oven. Even though I rarely use my instant pot, it is far from a gimmick. Most people don’t have the time to slow cook in their oven all day. Nothing gimmicky about being able to have those types of foods on a weeknight after work.

Yep. Its great if you want to use the meat for a casserole or quesadillas or something...but if you want to eat it like a roast chicken, its not the same. The meat just falls off. At least the 5 or so times I have done one.

I dropped a Costco chub of mostly still frozen boneless skinless chicken thighs into my IP on Sunday afternoon, along with 1/2 cup salsa, 1/2 of water, a couple teaspoons of chipotle paste and a couple tablespoons of Penzey's bold taco seasoning. Cooked at high pressure for 25 minutes, with the intention of having lightly seasoned cooked chicken for tacos, etc. Well, the chicken turned out exactly as intended, but the nice bonus: the leftover liquid was delicious. It will become the base for some future tortilla soup, as I popped it into the freezer. So I accidentally made soup and cooked chicken at the same time.

I’ve never tried it I just know the IP groups I follow seem to hate it as a slow cooker so I never bothered trying.

Like someone else mentioned, my crock pot is much wider, oval. So I would opt for that strictly because of shape if I was doing one or the other.

Congrats, you’ll use it 3 times a year.

Anyone know how to keep the new instant pots from burning on certain dishes. I tried a rice dish with heavy cream and it burned, i had to open and stir, it would burn again, until finally it worked.