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The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book: 500 Easy Recipes for Every Machine, Both Stovetop and Electric: A Cookbook
The ultimate in pressure cooker books--with 500 recipes for breakfasts, soups, mains, grains, vegetables, and desserts--each adapted for stovetop or electric models, such as Instapot.The old-fashioned pressure cooker has been rediscovered by modern home cooks, both for its quick-cooking powers (dried beans are perfectly soft in 35 minutes; risottos are tender in 20 minutes) and for its ability to infuse foods with intense flavor (carrots become sweeter, meat more savory). The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book has recipes for every device, stovetop and electric, no matter the manufacturer. Whether you're seeking an adventurous array of spices, found in dishes such as Cherry Chipotle Pulled Chicken or Smashed Sweet Potatoes with Pineapple and Ginger, or pure comfort food, like French Toast Bread Pudding or Classic Pot Roast and Potatoes, you'll find the perfect recipe--each labeled by level of ease--to feed your family. This is the only pressure cooker book you'll ever need.
529 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 17, 2015
399 people are currently reading
564 people want to read
About the author
Bruce Weinstein
65 books22 followersBruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough are QVC favorites with five sell-out appearances. They've appeared on everything from the Today show to corporate-sponsored events, making ice cream, gelati, sherberts, and sorbets. They're also experts on the desserts that pair with these frozen treats, having written bestselling brownie and cookie books and all-purpose cookbooks with desserts aplenty and countless features for Fine Cooking, Eating Well, and The Washington Post. Their cooking podcast, Cooking with Bruce and Mark, is available on iTunes. They've written numerous cookbooks, including A la Mode and The Turbo Blender Dessert Revolution (11/1/16). They live in Connecticut.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
November 2, 2020
This has some really great recipes in it, but I didn't find any that I really wanted to make.
August 18, 2015
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Purchased June, 2015
I think this is without a doubt my favorite cookbook for electric pressure cooker recipes (I have several books that have yielded less than stellar results). With the wider use of these machines, we are finally getting cookbooks for them that aren't just written by the stove top cooker people and we then have to figure out how to adapt. This book will work for either crowd.
The recipes are really good on times and I don't feel like they are just crock pot food made faster. Every recipe was tested by the author's and others. Notes for possible changes made by testers are alongside. Degrees of prep are also given. There is an extensive amount of recipes in each section.
My only downside would be that there aren't many pictures, which is why I only gave it 4 stars. For the price of the book, there should have been more, and I know there are other people out there that just enjoy reading cookbooks - and we like pictures in them. Some recipe ingredients aren't widely found outside of the northeast, but that's only in a few cases.
This is one of those cookbooks that is also a pleasure to read and I like that more than cooking anyway. I recently moved from a rural area to a house in the city, leaving my wonderful gas stove behind and I now have a kitchen with one of those glass top stoves. I hate it. I also have much less counter top area to slice and dice on even though the kitchens are roughly the same size (bad layout), so I cook much less here (too aggravating). That's revived my interest in the electric pressure cooker my late husband (the gadget guru) purchased and used a few times before he stowed it away under the cabinet. With the epc, I really don't have to use that horrible cook top. Book buyer that I am, I got a bunch of cookbooks for pressure cookers to read up on, and maybe finally make use of it.
So far I have made corned beef, chili, short ribs, beans, chicken wings, split pea and butternut squash soups. The cooking times were spot on, whereas using another (big name) cookbook for their corned beef recipe, the meat was underdone for our tastes and we had to cook for additional time. In the case of the chili and soups, I used my own recipes I've made for years with their time guidelines, and the results were great.
Highly recommended!
Purchased June, 2015
I think this is without a doubt my favorite cookbook for electric pressure cooker recipes (I have several books that have yielded less than stellar results). With the wider use of these machines, we are finally getting cookbooks for them that aren't just written by the stove top cooker people and we then have to figure out how to adapt. This book will work for either crowd.
The recipes are really good on times and I don't feel like they are just crock pot food made faster. Every recipe was tested by the author's and others. Notes for possible changes made by testers are alongside. Degrees of prep are also given. There is an extensive amount of recipes in each section.
My only downside would be that there aren't many pictures, which is why I only gave it 4 stars. For the price of the book, there should have been more, and I know there are other people out there that just enjoy reading cookbooks - and we like pictures in them. Some recipe ingredients aren't widely found outside of the northeast, but that's only in a few cases.
This is one of those cookbooks that is also a pleasure to read and I like that more than cooking anyway. I recently moved from a rural area to a house in the city, leaving my wonderful gas stove behind and I now have a kitchen with one of those glass top stoves. I hate it. I also have much less counter top area to slice and dice on even though the kitchens are roughly the same size (bad layout), so I cook much less here (too aggravating). That's revived my interest in the electric pressure cooker my late husband (the gadget guru) purchased and used a few times before he stowed it away under the cabinet. With the epc, I really don't have to use that horrible cook top. Book buyer that I am, I got a bunch of cookbooks for pressure cookers to read up on, and maybe finally make use of it.
So far I have made corned beef, chili, short ribs, beans, chicken wings, split pea and butternut squash soups. The cooking times were spot on, whereas using another (big name) cookbook for their corned beef recipe, the meat was underdone for our tastes and we had to cook for additional time. In the case of the chili and soups, I used my own recipes I've made for years with their time guidelines, and the results were great.
Highly recommended!
January 14, 2016
Heather's review from Smut MattersI probably won't review too many cookbooks, but I got this one last week and I just had to. I got an Instant Pot for Christmas this year, and since I've never had a pressure cooker before, I had no idea what to do with it. The Instant Pot website is good, there are a lot of recipes and advice, and the Facebook group is one of the most active I've ever seen, but I was getting my recipes in dribs and drabs. Enter The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book.
This book was great. The first section is an easy to read breakdown of the history of the pressure cooker, the different types of modern pressure cookers, and some general tips on how to use them. There are 500 recipes in here, and every one of them uses easy to recognize, easy to find ingredients. Of the 500, I probably marked 300 I want to try out. I probably won't actually make all 300, but they were the ones that grabbed my attention on my first go through. Each recipe includes the usual parts (ingredients, time, and instructions), but also the expected level of effort, servings, what level pressure to use, and the type of pressure release to use.
The only two minor quibbles I'd have with this book are the lack of pictures and the format. I love pictures in cookbooks. This one had a ten-page section in the middle with pics of about 30 of the recipes, and that's it. I wouldn't expect pics of all 500 recipes, but more that 30 would have been great. I'd also prefer it to be spiral-bound, but I think all cookbooks should be spiral-bound. It's just so much easier to deal with in the kitchen.
So that's it - my quickie cookbook review. If you have a pressure cooker, do yourself a favor and grab this one up.
This book was great. The first section is an easy to read breakdown of the history of the pressure cooker, the different types of modern pressure cookers, and some general tips on how to use them. There are 500 recipes in here, and every one of them uses easy to recognize, easy to find ingredients. Of the 500, I probably marked 300 I want to try out. I probably won't actually make all 300, but they were the ones that grabbed my attention on my first go through. Each recipe includes the usual parts (ingredients, time, and instructions), but also the expected level of effort, servings, what level pressure to use, and the type of pressure release to use.
The only two minor quibbles I'd have with this book are the lack of pictures and the format. I love pictures in cookbooks. This one had a ten-page section in the middle with pics of about 30 of the recipes, and that's it. I wouldn't expect pics of all 500 recipes, but more that 30 would have been great. I'd also prefer it to be spiral-bound, but I think all cookbooks should be spiral-bound. It's just so much easier to deal with in the kitchen.
So that's it - my quickie cookbook review. If you have a pressure cooker, do yourself a favor and grab this one up.
November 23, 2019
Love this witty concise, well organized cookbook. Tips are fantastic. This is an excellent pressure cooking recipe book. I have tried countless recipes, my little "instant magic" secret to being an excellent cook. If you are well versed in pressure cooking you will enjoy a diverse encyclopedia of gourmand. Everything from meatballs to yes even oatmeal. For the home chef, like myself, I crave these fresh /even detailed recipes, enriching our day to day menu.
I get so bored in the kitchen and fall into the same old, same..o 'Taco Tuesdays'..etc. I'm a mom, almost always wondering "what's for dinner?" You will be inspired, promise. I've even tried a whole fish, believe it or not! Steel Cut Oats have never been quicker. ps: The author asked me why, why the fish, I wanted to try a thick cut of ahi tuna, that’s why
I get so bored in the kitchen and fall into the same old, same..o 'Taco Tuesdays'..etc. I'm a mom, almost always wondering "what's for dinner?" You will be inspired, promise. I've even tried a whole fish, believe it or not! Steel Cut Oats have never been quicker. ps: The author asked me why, why the fish, I wanted to try a thick cut of ahi tuna, that’s why
January 29, 2026
It’s a huge book. I found 2 potential recipes of interest; in the first, the authors didn’t know that “pork shoulder” and “pork butt” are exactly the same cut of meat. In the second, they did not give an alternative to soaking dry beans (which is definitely not needed when pressure cooking).
I’m really glad I didn’t buy this book. The format is a pain as well, as there are no attempts to keep recipes on one (or 2 facing) page so one must constantly flip back and forth.
I’m really glad I didn’t buy this book. The format is a pain as well, as there are no attempts to keep recipes on one (or 2 facing) page so one must constantly flip back and forth.
January 29, 2018
A cookbook for readers! Putting aside that their estimation of amount of effort often raised an eyebrow, recipes are extremely well articulated. If you're learning how to use a pressure cooker, this book is great, if you are problem solving something specific, this book is also great. Filled with post-it notes for review by the time I was done with the first read through.
February 26, 2017
This recipe book really tries to have every pressure cooker recipe you can think of. But like other such cookbooks to often the recipes are repetitive with one or two ingredients changed for something new.
May 6, 2017
Well presented, and has a lot of recipes. Shows difficulty and has great detail on how to make the recipes with stove top cookers and electric. What would make it great though would have been for more photos, there are hardly any photos in this book.
July 30, 2017
Great book for someone who's just purchased an electric pressure cooker (Instapot). Not a picture heavy cookbook...breaks down into sections of meats, vegetables, beans, & grains-more useful than the instructions that come with the machine and a great starter before moving on to "fancier" recipes.
May 29, 2017
Not exactly what I expected...some good recipes.
July 27, 2017
When you tag over half the book for recipes you want to try I would say that is a good cook book. However I have not tried any as of yet.
January 13, 2018
spoiled - need photos for each recipe.
August 3, 2021
Excellent! Huge number of recipes. I've made maybe 10 and they've all been winners.
April 15, 2015
NOTE: Blogging for Books provided a free copy of this book for review
Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough’s The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book: 500 Easy Recipes for Every Machine, Both Stovetop and Electric is a useful book. It assumes a 6 qt volume, because that’s the best-selling size and because electric pressure cookers mostly come in that size. Ours is slightly less (5+), but at most that means we cut the ingredient amounts by a very small amount.
I was hoping to find more information on electric vs. non-electric pressure cookers; some people seem to have very strong feelings about which to use, and this cookbook doesn’t go into it at all. It does, however, have directions for both stovetop and electric pressure cookers, which is really handy. Various helpful tips also made me feel much less nervous about pressure cooking (our only other try, the cooker turned out to be defective, so it was… exciting). This time we used my mother’s Kuhn Rikon–an excellent brand, as I understand it.
Recipes for the pressure cooker are largely simple. Add ingredients–make sure they don’t go over the max fill line–bring up to pressure, cook for the required time, then lower the pressure according to the specific method recommended by the recipe.
The recipes we tried from The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book were decent but not great. Mind you, this cookbook has an awful lot of recipes in it, and we only tested a handful for this review. One soup I liked combined winter squash with chipotle peppers. It seemed a little thin, and while the chipotle flavor was noticeable, it didn’t have a lot of flavor beyond that.
There was a chili that worked out well enough. No real difference between it and any other ‘not bad’ chili we’ve made other than the faster cooking time. We also tried out a quinoa and apples recipe, and that was actively not-so-good. It was really bitter, even though the quinoa was thoroughly washed. The bit of vinegar in the recipe seemed to affect the results disproportionately. I didn’t end up eating any of the leftovers.
It’s never a good sign to pick a handful of random recipes and have none of them impress. I do still plan to use the book because it has all the useful directions and pressure/time recommendations. But I’ll certainly work on altering some of the details to suit my taste buds.
For added information, here’s a list of the sections in this book:
Breakfast
Soups (main course and vegetable/grain soups)
Meat (beef, pork, and a chapter on lamb, veal, and rabbit
Poultry (chicken, but also turkey, game hens, and duck
Fish and Shellfish
Vegetables, Beans, and Grains
Desserts
While the recipes don’t come with pictures, there is a sheaf of photos in the middle of the book. The index is useful, and the recipes are organized well/easy to read. If you’ve never used a pressure cooker before this book is useful, but be prepared to alter your recipes to taste.
For a longer review that includes photos from our cooking, please visit my site: http://www.errantdreams.com/2015/04/r...
Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough’s The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book: 500 Easy Recipes for Every Machine, Both Stovetop and Electric is a useful book. It assumes a 6 qt volume, because that’s the best-selling size and because electric pressure cookers mostly come in that size. Ours is slightly less (5+), but at most that means we cut the ingredient amounts by a very small amount.
I was hoping to find more information on electric vs. non-electric pressure cookers; some people seem to have very strong feelings about which to use, and this cookbook doesn’t go into it at all. It does, however, have directions for both stovetop and electric pressure cookers, which is really handy. Various helpful tips also made me feel much less nervous about pressure cooking (our only other try, the cooker turned out to be defective, so it was… exciting). This time we used my mother’s Kuhn Rikon–an excellent brand, as I understand it.
Recipes for the pressure cooker are largely simple. Add ingredients–make sure they don’t go over the max fill line–bring up to pressure, cook for the required time, then lower the pressure according to the specific method recommended by the recipe.
The recipes we tried from The Great Big Pressure Cooker Book were decent but not great. Mind you, this cookbook has an awful lot of recipes in it, and we only tested a handful for this review. One soup I liked combined winter squash with chipotle peppers. It seemed a little thin, and while the chipotle flavor was noticeable, it didn’t have a lot of flavor beyond that.
There was a chili that worked out well enough. No real difference between it and any other ‘not bad’ chili we’ve made other than the faster cooking time. We also tried out a quinoa and apples recipe, and that was actively not-so-good. It was really bitter, even though the quinoa was thoroughly washed. The bit of vinegar in the recipe seemed to affect the results disproportionately. I didn’t end up eating any of the leftovers.
It’s never a good sign to pick a handful of random recipes and have none of them impress. I do still plan to use the book because it has all the useful directions and pressure/time recommendations. But I’ll certainly work on altering some of the details to suit my taste buds.
For added information, here’s a list of the sections in this book:
Breakfast
Soups (main course and vegetable/grain soups)
Meat (beef, pork, and a chapter on lamb, veal, and rabbit
Poultry (chicken, but also turkey, game hens, and duck
Fish and Shellfish
Vegetables, Beans, and Grains
Desserts
While the recipes don’t come with pictures, there is a sheaf of photos in the middle of the book. The index is useful, and the recipes are organized well/easy to read. If you’ve never used a pressure cooker before this book is useful, but be prepared to alter your recipes to taste.
For a longer review that includes photos from our cooking, please visit my site: http://www.errantdreams.com/2015/04/r...
February 27, 2017
Didn't really read this. I started giving up on the Instant Pot thing! But everyone on the facebook page says that the online sites are betters, and I won a cookbook from Eat my books - so I didn't get to this one!
March 30, 2015
I won this book in a giveaway on Goodreads. It is really well written and it is thought out. Some of the recipes do have substitutes for the alcohol and some don't. And if you have a pressure cooker that has keep warm, low and high this book is not for that type of pressure cooker. This book is for the stove top or the more modern electric type pressure cookers. The book was easy to understand and had some different and interesting recipes. The recipes also had the level of difficulty to tell you how hard or easy. And some of the items require other ways of cooking and then they go into the pressure cooker. And it did have some pictures of the recipe but they were put into the middle of the book and not spread out. Overall it's a good recipe book.
January 5, 2016
For each recipe, the author provides specific instruction on how to use the pressure cooker and provides tips for both stove top and electric models. There are tester notes for each recipe as well so it appears that all the recipes have been tested by the author. This is important because learning to cook with a pressure cooker can take a lot of trial and error attempts. I like that you can learn from the authors trial and error attempts. They also provide instruction on how to modify recipes. This is also important because pressure cookers need moisture to work therefore some ingredients are "required."
July 18, 2015
Love the writing style, the introduction is a hoot! The recipes are good and there are lots of hints and tips. Some of the recipes are pointless though. Why would you make oatmeal in the pressure cooker when you can do it in the microwave much quicker? But it is totally honest about how difficult each recipe is, so if you don't feel like making BBQ sauce from scratch, and then broiling the ribs you can skip that one.
If I didn't already have several pressure cooker books, I'd pick this one up.
If I didn't already have several pressure cooker books, I'd pick this one up.
May 1, 2015
Whether you're an old pro and you love your pressure cooker, or you're just starting out with one, either way this is a great book to have in your kitchen. It's packed full of recipes, and they are all easy to follow. Even I can follow these recipes, and that's saying a lot, as my husband has officially banned me from the kitchen.
*FTC Disclosure: I received this book free from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.
*FTC Disclosure: I received this book free from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.
February 21, 2016
Great Cookbook
This book has recipes from the uber easy for novice cooks to much more complicated for experienced cooks. Love the tester tips at the end of each recipe as they often give substitutions for some ingredients that may not be used as often. That can save money by not having to buy an expensive item that may go stale before being used again.
This book has recipes from the uber easy for novice cooks to much more complicated for experienced cooks. Love the tester tips at the end of each recipe as they often give substitutions for some ingredients that may not be used as often. That can save money by not having to buy an expensive item that may go stale before being used again.
February 26, 2015
I think this book is very well done (no pun intended). There is a wide variety of recipes and clear instructions on how to prepare them. The ingredients all appear to be easy to find. I recommend this book to anyone who has a pressure cooker or is looking to start using one.
December 5, 2016
THIS is *the* book of pressure cooking to have as a reference. It includes basic recipes and more complicated ones. I love how it's organized by "how much prep time" it requires :)
January 7, 2017
Many recipes, but felt no need to try one or renew this at the library.
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March 26, 2018very inclusive and comprehensive. great basic instant pot book
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews