The Instant Zest rice cooker

I’m back to share my thoughts on another one of my newest kitchen appliances, the Instant Zest rice & grain cooker. If you missed my post on the Instant ACE blender, please check it out.

I wanted to replace my old rice cooker that we bought 10 years ago. I wanted a newer and up to date one with more functions than cook and warm. After some searching, I decided to give the Instant Zest a try. It happened to be much cheaper than the one I had put on my Amazon wish list two years ago. It only cost us $30 at the time we bought it.

This rice and grain cooker is the same size as a regular 8 cup rice cooker. It’s nonstick ceramic and comes with a steamer basket, measuring cup, spoon, Getting Started Guide, and user manual. You can steam veggies, make white rice, brown rice, Quinoa, Oatmeal, and more with it.

I have had my Instant Zest for almost three weeks now and I LOVE it. It gets used at least once each week (sometimes more) at our house. I was a little confused at first on how to operate it. I was glad to find some Youtube videos with owners using theirs. Take a look at some of the things I have made so far....

I have been buying only Brown Rice for the past 8 months. I learned all about soaking grains prior to cooking from Nourishing Traditions. Brown rice never tasted so good. We don't even miss white rice around here. Cooking rice in the Instant Zest is so easy (once I learned how to operate it of course). The measurements for the rice to water ratio is in the Getting Started Guide. Once you put the rice and water in, you close the lid, plug into an outlet, and the screen lights up. You select what you want to cook and the screen reads On. From there you just wait and let the cooker do its thing. Once it's about finished the screen starts counting down until it reaches End. It goes to Warm setting, but it's best to hit Cancel when it's done.

I also tried cooking Quinoa and it's the same process as with the brown rice. I love how well the food comes out so fluffy.

I buy old fashioned oats instead of instant. I give my oats an overnight soak like I do for the brown rice. The next morning you just rinse them well and proceed to cook them. The function for cooking oatmeal was not the same as the rice and Quinoa. When you hit the oatmeal button, you can select the amount of time you want to cook it. From there you can see the time counting down the enter time it cooks (unlike the rice or Quinoa).

Cleanup is a breeze because of the nonstick ceramic inner pot. The pic above shows nothing left behind after removing cooked food. Nothing sticks or browns and I love that. My old rice cooker seemed to brown food on the bottom no matter what I cooked. I think we made a great choice with this one, and I know it will get lots of use for years to come. I hope you have enjoyed hearing my thoughts on our newest Instant Pot brand products.

© My Life 0utside The Box 2020. All Rights Reserved. All photos, text, personal videos, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the blog author.