Our Instant-ly Ruined Pot...

I was cleaning up after dinner on Sunday when I noticed something strange.

That's strange, I thought. Did the lid on or Instant Pot always have that unusual shape?

The closer I looked at it, the more convinced this was not normal.

Crap.

We bought our Instant Pot just over a year ago and it's been fantastic. Like most things that I've found fantastic, I blogged about it back in January 2017. It was great back then and it's been a trooper for us ever since. We've used it at least once a week and many times more than that. So, when I was cleaning up dinner last weekend, I noticed a strange contour shape on the lid.

Yup--the lid melted.

I remember (vaguely...) hearing about pressure cookers having issues in the past. I didn't pay much notice. Why should I? Ours was working great. When I saw the misshapen lid on our Instant Pot lid, I thought back on those stories and I wondered if what happened to ours is the same thing that happened to theirs.

I checked the company website, got on an on-line chat, and explained the problem. They said "Check out our replacement lids." I did--all sold out. I don't know when they will be in stock. I asked about any type of warranty. They said "No." I then asked if they felt it would be safe to continue using our pressure cooker (I even included a picture of the lid malfunction...). They recommended we did not use the cooker. That makes sense--we don't want a defective lid keeping highly pressurized boiling water in its place.

Bummer.

Oh well--these things happen. I don't know how much it costs to replace the lid. We'll find out if we decide to do that. The strangest thing for me was trying to figure out how and when it happened. I don't remember it looking that way when we took it off to start dinner. And, based on the way it melted, the lid most likely was turned upside down. When it's upside down, it's also cooling down. Plus, I don't know of a place in our kitchen that could have caused it to get that hot, other than the stovetop. And that wasn't on.

Weird.

With the Instant Pot out of commission, we went back to the Crock Pot and it did a fine job. We just need to start the food preparation earlier, that's all. Still, I would like to know what happened so it doesn't happen again. We'll see if we ever find out.