Jun 28, 2021
Margaret Malelu lives with her husband and four children in a ramshackle compound of cement block buildings, just steps from one of Nairobi’s lush green forests. The place is home to around 30 families, whose children chase chickens around the courtyard while neighbours chat across the clothesline. At mealtimes, families bring out their jikos — portable round charcoal stoves — and the air slowly fills with smoke.
“I enjoy cooking for my family”, says Margaret, a 39-year-old accounts clerk.“My children’s health is my responsibility, so I have to prepare good food.” Her favourite meal is githeri, a stew made of beans and maize. Until recently she too was using her jiko to cook it, a laborious process that took at least three hours and made her cough. “There is a lot of smoke, it chokes”, she says, especially if she tries to cook inside. Her kerosene stove isn’t much better. “The kerosene smells a lot when you are cooking with it.”
But since January, Margaret’s cooking experience has changed dramatically. She is participating in the Global LEAP Awards Electric Pressure Cooker (EPC) Competition Usability Testing Process, a component of the Competition that evaluates ‘real cooks’ experiences with nominated products. As one of the ‘users,’ she is cooking with different EPCs to determine how each works in real-world conditions.
Margaret confesses that before participating in usability testing, she had never heard of an electric pressure cooker. “At first I was so eager, I wanted to try it out. I really wanted to know, what is this thing? How can it cook in 45 minutes what we usually cook in three hours?” she recalls. “The first day I did my rice and beans, and I only took ten minutes. Then when I did my githeri, it took 45 minutes, I was so happy.”
For a busy working mother like Margaret, the EPC frees up the extra time she needs for other urgent priorities. “The advantage of having so much time is that I can wash clothes, I can go to the market, I can go do something else, and I come back to find my food well prepared,” she says.
The fact that the EPC is smoke-free allows her to cook inside, in the comfort of her sitting room. But living in a compound full of small children, one of her primary concerns is safety. “We’ve seen children get burned using the jikos, which is very dangerous”, she explains. “But when I’m using the EPC, everything is sealed safely inside. Until the pressure is off, you cannot open that pressure cooker. Even if the small boy goes to open that pressure cooker, he can’t.”
Margaret was surprised to discover how little EPCs cost to operate. While she used to spend around 2,000 shillings ($20) per month on a combination of charcoal, kerosene, and gas, she now spends only 500 shillings per month on the electricity needed to power the cooker. “You can actually see the amount of money I’m saving,” she grins. “I’m spending a quarter of the amount of what I was using before I got the EPC(s).”
Some EPCs work better for her than others. One of the main objectives of the usability testing process is to determine which components and features are most important to everyday cooks. For Margaret, the models that are portable and easy to clean are her favourites. But her most important criteria is size. “Because I’ve got a bigger family, I want a big pressure cooker. I prefer six to eight litres,” she says. “If you bring a smaller electric pressure cooker, it makes my work hard.” Having to cook multiple batches of food for her family eats into the time the EPC saves.
It wasn’t long before her neighbours began dropping by to see how it worked. “I showed some of them how to use it and they were so happy. They really wanted to know where to get one”, says Margaret. “They say it looks expensive, but I told them it’s not.”After the usability testing is over she intends to buy one for herself. “I have seen the advantages,” she declares. “When I’m using the electric pressure cooker the taste is good, the smell is good, and we love it.”
Check out this YouTube video to learn more about the usability testing participants.
Read on Agnes’s experience, an EPC SuperUser in the Electric Pressure Cooker Usability Testing Process.
The 2020 Global LEAP Awards EPC Competition was implemented through Efficiency for Access Coalition in partnership with the Modern Energy Cooking Services (MECS)programme and funded by UK aid. Detailed information about the products tested is now available in the newly published Electric Pressure Cooker Usability Testing Buyer’s Guide.
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About the Global LEAP Awards
The Global LEAP Awards is an international competition to identify and promote the world’s best off-grid appliances, accelerating market development and innovation. This unique program has evolved into a trusted global brand that serves as the de facto source of accurate, actionable information about the quality and energy performance of off-grid appliances. The Global LEAP Awards is implemented through the Efficiency for Access Coalition and managed by CLASP.
