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Some of the vintage pressure cookers come with an indented bottom, while some are flat.

Revere Ware originally came out with these pressure cookers in 1946 (see the Revere Ware history site).  The original design had a pressure gauge and there was a small rubber gasket underneath.  This proved problematic and in 1948 they came out with a revised design that used a dial gauge.

The manual for the original pressure gauge model shows a flat bottom.  I have two specimens that also have a flat bottom.  We can presume that the indented bottom variety came out after 1948.   Looking at all available vintage pressure cookers on Ebay (that have pictures of the bottom), plus my own specimens, they clearly come with the indented and non-indented bottoms:

Indented bottom: 7
Flat bottom: 3

The vintage gauge-style pressure cooker manuals do not discuss an indented bottom or show pictures of the bottom, so there is no help there.  From the relative quantities of indented vs flat bottom pressure cookers in the wild, I would presume that at some point earlier in the full production life of these pressure cookers, they switched to the indented bottom because it was preferable for some reason.

Does anyone know when they might have made the switch and what might be better about the indented style bottom?

Those of us who have been using our Vintage or other Revere Ware pressure cookers for years know how useful they are.  I find them much better at cooking artichokes than simple steaming.  My mother still makes (what she calls) Spanish rice in her pressure cooker (54 years old) that is fantastic.

It looks like the culinary set is taking notice of the lowly pressure cooker (once again) as evidenced by an article in the Weekend Edition of the Wall Street Journal (The Pressure Cooker is On).

CHEFS ARE EMBRACING a green technology that makes cooking faster, flavors more intense, braised meats more tender, stocks richer, whole grains easier to handle and root vegetables more flavorful. The good news for home cooks: This transformational piece of equipment is not a pricey Pacojet nor a complex sous-vide setup. It’s a common, relatively inexpensive and easy-to-use pressure cooker.

Chef John Currence of City Grocery in Oxford, Miss., said he once disdained pressure cookers as emblematic of “the great culinary shame” of the 1960s and ’70s, the era of canned food and quick casseroles. But now he uses a pressure cooker to braise pork roasts, short ribs and beef blade roasts, and considers it essential for maintaining the shape and texture of legumes. “The greatest upside of the pressure cooker is the intensity of flavor,” said Mr. Currence.

Jason Fox of San Francisco’s Commonwealth uses a pressure cooker to infuse lemon verbena into plums and to make a roasted chicken broth in just 30 minutes. “Under pressure, everything stays in there, it’s not evaporating,” Mr. Fox said.

“Modernist Cuisine,” a five-volume work on innovative cooking published by former Microsoft executive Nathan Myhrvold in 2011, boldly states that pressure cookers are the best equipment for making stocks—a cornerstone of classical cuisine—because they can cook at high temperature without boiling, which causes fats to emulsify and makes stocks cloudy. Phillip Lopez of Root in New Orleans said he read “Modernist Cuisine” voraciously and was surprised by its endorsement of a piece of equipment he considered fit only for canning. Soon after, at an International Culinary Center conference in New York, Mr. Lopez found he wasn’t alone. “Everyone was talking about them,” he said.

Mr. Lopez soon developed a method for infusing Japanese dashi broth with the aroma of burned hickory wood by cooking it under high pressure for an hour. He also tosses in a small amount of expensive or exotic ingredients, such as star anise and black cardamom, and uses them to turn veal shanks and other tough cuts of meat into luxurious, potently spiced dishes.

Kuhn Rikon, a Swiss maker of high-quality pressure cookers, reports that sales have increased by about 25% since 2000. In the past five years, a multitude of pressure cooker cookbooks have hit the market, including a 2009 reprint of Lorna Sass’s definitive “Cooking Under Pressure.” Several websites, including the encyclopedic missvickie.com, offer recipes and tips.

Often confused with slow cookers, which cook at low temperatures over lengthy periods to allow for unattended cooking, pressure cookers actually function in the opposite way. They work by creating an environment in which water boils at a higher temperature than in a conventional pot. Steam inside the cooker forces its way through the food, cooking quickly and at high heat. Because there is no heat loss during cooking, and because food cooks so much faster, pressure cookers require far less energy than conventional cooking. Stews and braises that might require three hours in an oven take as little as 15 to 30 minutes; risotto takes about five.

Sang Yoon, chef of Father’s Office and Lukshon in Los Angeles, says he is puzzled that even more cooks haven’t come around. “The pressure cooker is an awesome thing because you can literally beat the laws of physics,” he said. “It is a simple device that modifies atmosphere, which means you can do all sorts of playful things.”

From the list of pressure cookers they’ve reviewed in their test kitchen, you’ll pay anywhere from $50 to almost $300 for a pressure cooker, or, you could just get a used vintage Revere Ware pressure cooker from Ebay for a little as 20 bucks.

Incidentally, the electric model by Cuisinart they’ve reviewed is strikingly similar to one Revere sold in the last decade, and obviously something they simply branded from another company, probably Cuisinart.  I’ve got one but have yet to try it.  The combination of electric and pressure cooker is very appealing as perhaps a better Crock Pot (yes, I’ve got a vintage one of those too).

Customer Kathy inherited a pressure cooker with some interesting inserts.  Does anyone have an idea if they belong to the vintage pressure cooker (they don’t appear in the manual) and what they might be for?

A call to our customer service line highlights the quality difference between vintage Revere Ware and the new stuff nicely.

Vintage:  You are using the cookware that your grandmother used, was used by your mother, and is now yours.  Other than a new handle, it still works great.

New: You lift a pot off the stove.  Part of the bottom of the pot sticks to the stove (melted).  Part of it falls off onto your linoleum floor and catches the floor on fire.

A customer recently send us these photos of a skillet with extra handle and domed lid, wondering what the official name for this piece of cookware is.  If you know what this is called, please let us know in the comments or email us here.

An article in the latest Consumer Reports brings to light the sad state of another vintage brand, Pyrex, which is also owned by World Kitchen, which owns the Revere Ware brand.  While the cheapening of Revere Ware began long before World Kitchen owned the brand (the good stuff was made before 1968 and World Kitchen purchased the Revere assets in 1998) this article goes to show that World Kitchen definitely isn’t about honoring the spirit of the brands it owns.

In the case of Revere Ware, today’s cookware is made with a much thinner layer of stainless steel and copper than the vintage cookware was.  The thinner copper layer is not nearly as good at spreading the heat as the thicker layer in the older cookware, resulting in more hot spots and burned food.  Here is an example of the difference:

(Image courtesy of Classic Kitchens and More and The Shine Shop)

In the case of Pyrex, today’s glassware is made of tempered soda lime, while the vintage glassware (and current European glassware) is made of borosilicate.  Borosilicate glassware handles temperature changes much better than soda lime glass does.

Exactly when the changeover occurred is still up for debate, but there is some evidence that it happened about when World Kitchen took over the Pyrex business.

On a slow news day, I guess this story makes sense.  World Kitchen, the owners of the Revere Ware brand (among others, including Pyrex, CorningWare, and EKCO) just signed a new 10 year lease on their building in Chicago.  The building was recently sold to a group of REIT investors.