Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I own other Breville products (juicer, toast) and appreciate their quality. The Fast Slow Pro is built in the same high quality manner. It was a little bit of a gamble to spend over 2x more than the other popular pressure cooker, Instant Pot, but I figured the combined benefits of improved controls (simplified), and build quality would make it worth it. Also, the other thing that allowed me to justify the price is that the Breville will replace our slow cooker and rice cooker in our limited cabinet space. Yes, I could have saved money of the cheaper Instant Pot but my thinking is if the Breville is doing the job of other appliances then it worth spending money on a better quality product that's easier to use. With all that said, after cooking a few different things I couldn't be happier. The Breville is a smart device that serves multiple purposes. So far I've made; brown rice, braised short ribs with vegetables, pulled pork with green chile sauce, and baked beans. Below is a breakdown of likes and dislikes. Likes: • Has multiple modes. In addition to pressure cooking you can steam, slow cook, simmer, saute, keep warm, and a few more things. Of course, if you read the in depth review of pressure cookers on the Serious Eats site, you'll learn that pressure cooking has bennefits (higher temp) over slow cooking, making slow cooking (in my mind) an unnecessary method moving forward. • Since you can saute in the Breville, you don't need to use a different pan for this. I've sauted vegetables and meats. Just keep in mind you won't have the contact area trying to saute something larger like a chicken. In this case a seperate pan may be better. • I love that the cord is detachable and you can put it in the Breville (along with the steamer basket) for storage. Means you don't have a chord getting caught up with other things in your cabinet (even though I wrap up my chords with velcro). • The controls and interface are very intuitive. For my first recipe (brown rice with onion, garlic and ginger) it took me a few seconds to figure out how to saute the veggies, and switch over to pressure cooking. There's a number of default settings (Soup, Beans, Meat, Chile, Rice, Risotto, etc...) that make the settings for you. From there you can tweak the pre-defined settings (time, pressure, steam release method). • The decrease in time it takes when pressure cooking means there's things you can make during a weekday you may not have had time for before. Of course, you need to factor preheat and steam release time (see Dislikes). • If your concerned with the scary-factor of pressure cooking, no need to be. It appears that the lid has triple redundancy (three spring loaded air locks). • The non-stick pot. This has been easy to clean so far. Some people wish it was stainless steel, which I understand. While non-stick usually doesn't last as long as ss, the only way to know for sure is time. If I get 10 years of use, and get get a replacement pot, then not an issue. Hopefully Breville will sell these. Dislikes: • The lid has retained a little food odor. I took the silicone ring off to clean it, but the minor odor is still there. • Speaking of the ring, its a little bit of a pain to remove. However, you don't have to clean it everytime since the ring is a little loose and its easy to get soapy water behind it. • I hesitate in getting the Breville when I read you need to remove a nut to take the lid off for cleaning. While this sounds a little odd, in reality its no big deal and takes a few seconds. • You need to factor preheating and steam release time into the complete cycle. So, when a recipe says it will take 45 minutes for a roast, you should factor time to saute, preheat, and steam release. Just something to keep in mind. This isn't a Breville issue, just the reality of pressure cooking (it takes time to cook the liquids to steaming, so pressure is created). Tip; if you saute and pre-heat your liquids (stovetop for example) the preheating cycle will shorten. • Price. While it is more than other products, considering the technical nature and build quality of the Breville I'm glad I spent the money. I do think if Breville priced these in the $199 range it would be an easier buy for people than the mid $200 range. I've included a few pictures that show; what comes in the box including the user guide and a very nicely done recipe book, the nut for the lid, some photos of the recipe book, how everything fits in the Breville for storage, and what the non-stick pot looks like. While there's a few dislikes above, I'm fine with them and understand that every form of cooking and appliance for that matter has trade-offs. At the end of the day the benefits of the Breville far outweigh the trade-offs.