Monday, December 8, 2014

Cuisinart Multi Cooker Review

I'm so excited to share this latest addition to my kitchen! Meet my new best friend, the Cuisinart Multi Cooker.
What's a multi cooker? Well, basically it's a little miraculous device that can sautee food, and then slow cook it. This means that you can brown food, and then simmer at a low temp with just a touch of a button!
I love that you don't have to change pots or move from the stove to the slow cooker. My favorite dish to make with this slow cooker is lentils. We have them about once a week here, and I used to use a pressure cooker to cook the lentils, and then transfer them to another pot to season and simmer them. This always left a mess of pots and pans to deal with-- and it took forever.
With the multi cooker I can condense all those steps into one. The first time I used the cooker I was a bit worried that the heating element wouldn't get hot enough to temper spices, but I shouldn't have been. The multi cooker performs exactly like a pot on an electric burner-- with the added benefit of being able to walk away.  After adding the lentils and water, I can just turn the cooker on simmer and walk away. By dinner time, the cooker has magically turned my 5 minutes of prep into dinner.
My favorite part of using the cooker is that it means that I can cook on the counter with the kids. The outside (the stainless steel portion) of the cooker does get hot, but not hot enough to burn. This means that the kids can 'help' prep the veggies and actually see them being cooked through the clear lid at the top, instead of me shooing them away from the stove.
I can't wait to use the multi cooker during the holidays. It will be so nice to move any soup and daal making onto the counter and free up a burner for other items. Plus, the keep warm setting means that I can just serve right out of the multi cooker on the keep warm setting!

The cooker I have is 4 quarts; but if you have a large family, or plan on using the multi cooker for entertaining, I really suggest getting the 6 quart version. You won't regret it!

Cuisinart provided these products for me to review, but all opinions are my own. Purchase using the affiliate links above to support Make It Handmade at no cost to you.