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Comment by reverend_gonzo | Hacker News Reader

I can’t speak for everything but:

the vitamin blender, for cleaning, fill it water, some dish soap, and blend for 45 seconds at full power, then rinse out.

For the instant pot. It’s just a regular pot. Take it out and stick it in the dishwasher. I agree with your point in general but those are dead simple to manage.

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Granted, I'm a germophobe. Doubly so after my transplant.

VitaMix

There are two hard to reach cavities.

The outer ring of the top plug fills with debris. https://www.webstaurantstore.com/vitamix-062984-lid-plug/HP7... This one really pisses me off. It'd be so easy to redesign the plug to eliminate the cavity.

The second is the underside of the pitcher, between the side wall and the center spindle. This one is only annoying. Can't find a pic, but this is the pitcher. https://thingsaroundthehouse.com/vitamix-7500-vs-5200/

I use looped pipe cleaners to scrub these cavities clean.

I could fully disassemble my former KitchenAide's pitcher to clean every component. Alas, the Vitamix does better with all the big leafy greens I now consume.

InstaPot

I like the cord unplugs from the appliance. This should be the norm.

Where do I put the cord? Inside the pot? Great, now I have to clean the cord too. Or rinse the pot before using it again. Sometimes I kinda fold the cord and stuff it thru the top handle.

Do all Vitamix machines have the rubber seal arranged so that the threads are on the food-side of the seal? Look at any other non-conical thread, like for garden hoses or fire hoses. The thread doesn't even get wet. All of the vitamix machines I've seen let pulverized food collect in the threads and quickly begin to smell terrible, because the rubber seal is at the base of the male side rather than the base of the female side.

> All of the vitamix machines I've seen let pulverized food collect in the threads and quickly begin to smell terrible, because the rubber seal is at the base of the male side rather than the base of the female side.

I've had a single Vitamix for...huh, well over a decade, at any rate, and I've never had this problem with pretty consistent heavy use the whole time we've owned it. Pretty consistently cleaned according to directions, which are as described upthread.

I kinda had that problem with my former KitchenAide. You need tools to disassemble my VitaMix's pitcher, so i've never done so.

Instapots have a bunch of ridges where the lid clicks into place.

Not easy to clean. :( Not impossible, but if anything gets caked on there, rather annoying.

Also the lid gets scummy, not hard to wipe off, but there are enough snooks and crannies that it is a bit irritating.

There is always rice in that stupid trough around the edge. Always. I clean it, and then I come back the next day and there's rice there again.

IKR.

I loved my Magefesa pressure cooker. So easy to clean. Its design is very nearly the pinnacle of human achievement. I damaged the valve and that tiny plastic insert cost almost as much as a whole new unit, so I decided to try the InstaPot that everyone was crazy about.

I cannot fathom how someone ends up designing the InstaPot. They must have started with a CrockPot.

I do like the timer. Next time I'll upgrade my stove and stick with the dumb pot.

Don't get me wrong, I love how simple instapots are, and not using up one of my 2 high btu burners is a giant feature.

On the bright side, infinite rice!

One grain at a time. I need to get signed up for that whole chessboard-exponential-doubling-rice program

The cleanability problem for the instant pot is more the ring that the lid attaches to, which becomes an instant crumb/liquid trough. Not that big a deal but still easy to let lazily accrue into an unsettling (and potentially malodorous) food science experiment.

> For the instant pot. It’s just a regular pot. Take it out and stick it in the dishwasher.

The problem with cleaning an instant pot is not the metal pot itself, but the body and lid.

The lid is easy, you can just wash in a sink.

The body is a little annoying, but I've had good luck just running a damp folded cloth/paper towel around it towards the wider part, takes a few seconds.

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