<\/a><\/p>\n

Fear, spine tingling, leg shaking fear is what we experienced when we heard that \u00a0sound. \u00a0The hissing, rattling, unmistakable sound that my mother was using the pressure cooker. Not just any pressure cooker but the biggest, baddest, pressure cooker, handed down to her from her mother.\u00a0The regulator on this pressure cooker was like a solid steel hockey puck that danced on top of that pot leaving us all wondering if and when it would explode.<\/p>\n

My mother always cooked her stuffed artichokes in the pressure cooker, they were always delicious and we couldn’t wait to eat them but the cooking process struck fear in all of us, even my mother. \u00a0She had a love\/hate relationship with the pressure cooker. \u00a0She loved the way it cooked but she almost seemed deathly afraid and that fear was transferred to all of us kids who my mother would shoo out of the kitchen when it came time to open that pressure cooker. \u00a0My mother had us all convinced that the pressure cooker was unpredictable and the very act of transfering it from the stove to the sink took a few Hail Marys. \u00a0When it was safely in the sink and I think after my mother blessed herself with the sign of the cross, she then doused that pressure cooker with cold water for what seemed like hours. \u00a0When she finally deemed it questionably safe she would again call to us to stay out of the kitchen because she was about to open the pressure cooker.<\/p>\n

This was when we all gulped and wondered if this was going to be the time that unpredictable beast was going to explode and sail right up through the roof of our house leaving a gaping hole which the tremendous steam would rise out of, as the neighbors would stand and shake their heads and call the fire department. \u00a0My mother would be clear across the kitchen, lucky to be alive and breathing heavily, having the wind knocked out of her as the blast shot her clear over to the refrigerator where she landed with a thud. \u00a0 When we saw her pry those locking handles loose and the seal was broken, we finally could breath, knowing that we made it. \u00a0My mother would tell us all was alright and we could come back in the kitchen. \u00a0We made it, the pressure cooker had not destroyed our house, and we were soon enjoying the artichokes and could breathe easy until the next time.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Needless to say I have always found pressure cookers intimidating. \u00a0Even when my mother bought a more modern version it may have had a \u00a0less intimidating regulator but it still danced and hissed on top of that pot and scared all of us. \u00a0I never felt the need to put myself or my kids through that so I never thought about getting a pressure cooker. \u00a0When Nesco asked me if I would like to review their new 6 liter 4-in-1 Electric Pressure Cooker<\/a>, that old fear came right back. \u00a0My husband though, was stoked, \u00a0so we agreed to the review. \u00a0The pressure cooker arrived and it did not bear any resemblance to the terror inducing pressure cookers of my past. \u00a0It looked quite serene, with a digital touch pad and nothing on the top to dance or hiss.<\/p>\n

My husband made a pot roast the first time we used it and he could not believe how quickly it cooked the meat and that it was still tender and falling apart the way it would if it had been cooking for hours. \u00a0He made another type of roast a few days later and we had the same impressive results. \u00a0It’s a new day, a new dawn, the pressure cooker is not something to be feared but it is an appliance to be embraced. \u00a0If you have always wanted a pressure cooker but were living in fear of unstable, hissing pots with gauges that could not be trusted, you can rejoice. \u00a0Go out and try a Nesco Electric Pressure Cooker and start changing the way the world thinks of pressure cookers one meal at a time, one household at a time, until the world knows that we can pressure cook without fear and have our artichokes too.<\/p>\n