While the Instant Pot community awaits the eventual release of the Instant Pot Max, Instant Pot released something out of left field: a super blender. The Instant Pot Ace, which is available to pre-order for $100 through Walmart, is scheduled to ship September 23.
Now, if you’re thinking $100 is a lot for a blender, you probably aren’t privy to the world of high-performance blending, one that’s remained utterly dominated by Vitamix’s pricey blenders for as long as its existed.
The gist: high-performance blending, traditionally, is all about the speed at which the blender can whip blades around a blending chamber. The primary difference between your run-of-the-mill blender and a Vitamix is raw power and far superior materials (namely, a lack of plastic), which leads to functionality regular blenders can’t claim — it can spin and work quickly enough to cook soups, puree in seconds, knead dough, make nut butters in a flash and more.
Instant Pot’s Ace claims to do a lot of this, but by different means, and at a price point that’s a fraction of the competition. Instead of an all-powerful motor and aircraft-grade steel components, it has a built-in heating component, making for a gentler, slower cooking process for hot dishes. Because it is an Instant Pot product, preset cooking programs are its way — four hot and cold blending programs for various blending tasks (low, medium and high manual speeds are also available).
We’ve yet to test one out for ourselves, but it shows promise. And if Instant Pot’s legion of followers has anything to say about it, it’ll likely be a hit either way.
