Did you know you can turn your pressure cooker into an air fryer? You better believe it! The Mealthy CrispLid is the new kid on the block and has earned a permanent spot in my kitchen. Read on for more details. Enter the giveaway below!
Recently I talked about the Mealthy CrispLid on Instagram, and I received several questions about it. Today I will address those questions and let you know my thoughts after having used it for several weeks.
WHO IS MEALTHY?
Mealthy is an honorable brand that carries high-quality products at impressive prices. The Mealthy HandBlender is only $30 and it does just as good of a job as my $100 immersion blender I decided to splurge on years ago. The Mealthy Multipot is the #2 best selling electric pressure cooker on Amazon and has a great reputation with many 5 star reviews.
Mealthy has amazing and prompt customer service and I've really enjoyed collaborating with them. For a good laugh, you absolutely must check out their promo video on the Mealthy home page. It hits so close to home that I was in tears laughing!
WHAT IS A CRISPLID?
The Mealthy CrispLid is basically a heating unit and fan attached to a glass lid that will fit perfectly on a 6 or 8 quart pressure cooker pot. With the press of a button, it will broil, crisp, or air fry your food to golden perfection. I'm a crispy food lovin' girl, so this speaks to my soul!
WHAT COMES WITH IT?
The CrispLid comes with all the needed accessories: raised trivet, air frying basket with a handle for easy transfer, stainless steel tongs, and a silicone trivet to place the hot CrispLid on after cooking.
DO I REALLY NEED ANOTHER APPLIANCE?
If you've been around here long, you know I love testing out new products so I was very eager to give the Mealthy CrispLid a go. It's important to me that I only recommend products to you that you will actually use and find valuable enough to take up space in your kitchen.
For me, I haven't pulled out my giant Air Fryer since I received the CrispLid. I still love my Air Fryer, but I've found that for the ways I use the air fryer the most, the CrispLid does a comparably excellent job and it's small enough to fit in my pan drawer.
For convenience, size, and performance of the CrispLid, I do indeed consider it a great addition to any kitchen.
HOW HAVE YOU USED THE CRISPLID? WHAT WERE YOUR RESULTS?
My favorite feature of an air fryer is how it makes food brown and crispy with very little to no added fat. The CrispLid works the same way for everything I've tested. Here are some examples with their results.
Turkey Steak: I took a large, frozen turkey steak straight from the freezer and it cooked up so juicy and crisp without any of the grease splatters I deal with in a saute pan.
Meatballs: I used the meatball recipe from this Instant Pot Ricotta Chicken Meatball Soup for this experiment. Oh my goodness! This was my favorite thing I cooked in it! I didn't add any extra fat to the meatballs and in less than 10 minutes they were brown and crisp like I had just pan fried them in oil. They were AMAZING!
Reheating Leftovers: I love crisping leftover shredded meat and the CrispLid did this so quickly that it didn't dry it out one bit. Mmm . . . Crispy shredded pork is my weakness.
Frozen Packaged Foods: The CrispLid did an excellent job at cooking and crisping chicken patties, chicken nuggets, sausage patties, and Veggie Fries. Super easy and quick!
Baked Potato: For this experiment, I actually pressure cooked the potatoes first and for my husband and I, I rubbed the skins with olive oil and sea salt and let them get crispy all over. DIVINE! My kids hate crispy skins, so typically I just go without.
Tamale Pie: This experiment sealed the deal! Without needing to turn on the oven, I browned and crisped the top of my Instant Pot Tamale Pie in 2 MINUTES. It was so convenient and did a superb job.
Other Instant Pot recipes I know I'll be using with the CrispLid are:
- Sweet Potato, Spinach, and Sausage Breakfast Casserole
- Tofu
- Salt Potatoes
- Italian Meatloaf
- Breakfast Cake (my kids like turbinado sugar broiled on top)
- Buffalo Wings
- And so many more!
WILL IT SAVE ME TIME?
With the different ways I've used it, no, not a ton of time. Maybe a few minutes here and there. For me it's the convenience of not having to transfer my food to another pan to broil it in the oven. However, in general, when it comes to air frying foods vs baking them in a regular oven, air frying is supposed to be quicker.
HOW DOES IT COMPARE TO AN AIR FRYER?
As a caveat, I've never used an air fryer to cook a steak, pork chop, whole chicken, etc. But for everything I mentioned above, it has worked every bit as well as my big air fryer.
The one difference I noted is that in my large air fryer, I will sometimes use a rack to create 2 layers so I can cook more food. This didn't work quite as well with the CrispLid and I ended up moving the bottom layer to the top to finish cooking.
Another thing worth mentioning, the CrispLid is much quieter than my regular air fryer, which I LOVE!
ARE THERE ANY DOWNSIDES TO IT?
To make enough chicken wings, french fries, etc for a large crowd would be very difficult using the CrispLid. This is a similar complaint for regular air fryers, so this wasn't a surprise to me.
Some people solve this problem by cooking them in batches. If I need a large batch of fries to feed my family, I go back to the good ol' oven.
CAN I USE IT WITH ANY BRAND OF ELECTRIC PRESSURE COOKER?
Mealthy states that the CrispLid is for use on any 6 and 8 quart STAINLESS STEEL pot, so while it hasn't been specifically approved by any other brand, Mealthy does not see a reason why it would cause any harm. Personally I have used it without any problems on both the Mealthy and Instant Pot brand pressure cooker.
A FEW EXTRA NOTES
- The handle has to be down in order for the CrispLid to work. I made this mistake within the first minute of pulling it out of the box. If you actually read manuals, that won't be an issue for you.
- It is possible to see how brown your food is getting through the glass lid. If you want to remove the lid to check it more closely, just lift the handle to pause the cooking, then return it to the pot and press play to resume the cooking cycle. If the handle is raised for an extended amount of time, the cycle will reset.
- You can mute the button sounds by pressing and holding the square button.
- Never put the lid directly onto your counter after cooking. It is HOT! The circular silicone mat is the perfect solution for this.
- When air frying, you don't want extra liquid in the pot, so if you pressure cook your food first, be sure and drain the pot before crisping your food. The exception here is if you made the food in the base of the pot (like with mac and cheese or scalloped potatoes) you can just add your cheese or breadcrumbs and broil it until browned.
- If you have any issues with your CrispLid, the dream team over at Mealthy is extremely helpful. Shoot them an email and they will take care of you.
Hopefully that covers all of your questions!
After a much-anticipated wait, the Mealthy CrispLid is now available to order!
I'm also giving one away! Enter below to enter to win a free CrispLid and all the goodies that come with it!
Maggie says
Thanks so much for letting us know about this great gadget. As soon as I read your email & your review about it , I ordered mine. What a great air-fryer. It is smaller than my huge ones & it is lighter, too. I love the size as I live alone & it’s perfect for browning my sous vide steak. It is also easier to store, on top of my extra insert for my Instant Pot. Their website also has a lot of recipes as well as their phone app.
Thanks again, I hope that it was beneficial for you, too.
Marci says
Maggie, it is such a smart appliance, I’ve loved having it! I’m glad it’s worked so well for you!
Shelise says
Hang on, I had no idea they even made this product!! Thank you for your wonderful review. I’ll definitely be checking it out!!
Marci says
Shelsie, it’s so great, I love it!
Karen says
I really really really need and want this! I cook all the time and have a super tiny kitchen–this would be the perfect small addition!
Marci says
Karen, yep, my air fryer is getting moved to the basement 🙂
Sandy says
I didn’t know about thid till today.
I think no, i know I would love the crisper. It sounds perfect for the IP. And my fryer is huge so I would love to give mine away and win the crisper.
Marci says
Sandy, it’s such a smart product, I wish I’d thought of it 🙂
Claire says
I love this idea! And would love to have one! But seriously…Mealthy? That name makes me cringe 😬 😂 could they not come up with something better 😂
Marci says
Claire, haha, it grows on you!
Elizabeth A Whittaker-Williams says
Thank you for the review of the MEALTHY CRISPLID, I am going to purchase one for my Daughter-in-law (she lives out of state ) as she loves her InstaPot and it would be handy for her. I would like one also, but PGE has really increased my ele cost during preparation of dinner and evening. I could not find what it would cost to use the Crisplid.
Thank you for all your recipes, I love your books and have purchased them for my Daughter-in-law also.
Marci says
Elizabeth, Mother in law of the year right there!
Sheila says
I want to thank you for introducing this new product to those of us, your subscribers, who haven’t heard of this new product. Thanks also for the links to their sit. I’ve been checking out there videos for the last 1/2 hr and realised I needed to get back to your vlog.
Anyway, I live in Canada and they do not ship to Canada, yet. I contacted them to find that out. They said they are” hoping to ship to Canada and Internationally in the near future”.
I couldn’t find the eligibility for your Giveaway but entered anyway in the hope that Canadians are eligible. Thanks again and good Luck to all entrants.
Marci says
Sheila, we’ll work it out if you win 🙂
Sheila says
Marci, thanks for letting me know. I appreciate it. Have a great day.
Beatrix Knoll says
Love my Crisp Lid. I made popcorn chicken this weekend, but it was a bit dry. Granted, I used almond meal and coconut flour instead of white flour.
But the most amazing fries!!!!
Marci says
Beatrix, I agree, I’m loving it. Now I want to try popcorn chicken.
Cecilia says
Wow! Now that’s the one way I’d do an air fryer. With a smaller kitchen, I can’t add space hogging appliances. This would be ok though. It sounds fantastic!
Megan says
Ok I absolutely need this in my life!! I’m so glad to hear you love it because it sounded like the coolest thing!
Jillian says
You’re right, this IS genius! I’ll be getting one for our 6 quart Instant Pot.
Have you by chance tried it on the 8 quart Instant Pot? I don’t think it would fit on Instant Pot’s 8 quart because is wider than the 6 quart, not just taller. I have both the 6 and 8 quart, so it’s not an issue, I’m just wondering…
Marci says
Jillian, yep it works on 6 or 8 quart just great. They thought of everything apparently 🙂
Michelle says
Hello!! This is so exciting! I have been wanting an air fryer, but space is very limited in my kitchen. I do have to ask, does it use oil to help crisp food?
Marci says
Michelle, Sometimes I’ll spritz it on, but it only needs very little. Sometimes I don’t use any and it still works.