I've been working on adapting family favorite recipes to the IP. My favorites so far:
My Cajun mother-in-law's real deal red beans and rice recipe: https://gist.github.com/chrissnell/2ee0a820b7ba7c25a12d1b253...
My grandmother's refried beans from her regionally famous 1960s-era Tex-Mex cookbook: https://gist.github.com/chrissnell/c87a98b7ee3239065737eaf14...
Just curious: The OP mentioned steel cut oats rather than traditional oatmeal. Did you mean the same as well?
The reason I ask is because, while I love steel cut oats, cooking a nice sized batch on the stove can be time consuming, and I don't like the 3-5 minute oats (precooked and/or steamed; lacks the same texture IMO, same reason I don't like standard oatmeal). I'm not sure I'd go so far as to use them in an Instant Pot, but it'd be interesting to read a second opinion of how they turn out.
I too am wondering if the parent was talking about precooked/steamed. The recipe that comes with the IP is definitely steel cut and has that great springy bite to it--almost al dente in a way (or QQ as my Chinese friends might say).
And my version is 3 minutes of cook time, but there's several minutes of getting up to pressure time, and then 10 minutes of natural release when it finishes. Still largely "set it and forget it" though.
Thanks a bunch!
I certainly getter results doing pot roast & pulled pork in a pressure cooker than a slow cooker.
If you do a 7-hour lamb in a pot in an oven, you have the opposite problem, as it's a bit warmer, and might have to glue together the lid with dough. I think the taste will be better though, as I think there is more caramelisation going on at higher temperatures.
I get amazing results with a crock pot and pork shoulder with honey and a nice rub. Start it in the morning and it's ready when I get back from work.
Interested in the pressure cooker though for some more versatility. What's the main difference btw your pulled pork in PC vs SC?
It pretty much works the same for all of them. I get all my aromatics roughly chopped, saute for a couple minutes just to brown them up, then I put them in the blender and transfer to the IP for an hour or so. I just submerge the meat and guess at a time that matches a stove top pressure cooker.
So I get what you mean about the hassle of multiple steps. I feel like I save time on the prep and stove managing. I only chop roughly and I'm not obsessing over doneness on the stove.
I mostly do it, because the results are just better. Stews really are better under pressure imo.
She ends up not having to do a lot of experiments because the other people in the group do it and report back. She's actually started doing some reporting back too.
* 4-5 chicken breast, frozen. Add a half can of green enchilada sauce, or a cup of BBQ sauce, or a half cup of taco seasoning, plus 1/4 cup water. Cook on the "poultry" setting for 24 minutes. Quick release, remove chicken, set pot to saute, shred chicken and return to broth, boil off some of the excess liquid. Can serve by itself, or on hamburger buns (for the BBQ variant) or in tortillas/taco shells (for the enchilada and taco variants), or over rice. This has become a go-to because it's so quick and easy and we don't have to defrost anything ahead of time.
* 4-5lb chuck roast. Sear all sides (I do this on the stove for convenience), then coat in a seasoning of brown gravy mix, powdered ranch dressing, and italian seasoning. Add a half cup of water, and pressure cook on high for 38 (4lb) to 45 (5lb) minutes. While it's cooking, dice some carrots, onions, celery, and garlic. Once it's done, quick release, add veggies, cook for another 11 minutes. Remove meat and veggies from pot, sautee, boil down the remaining liquid for a few minutes until it reaches a thick gravy-like consistency. Slice the roast, serve with veggies and gravy. Making a roast like this takes 8+ hours in the slow-cooker, and it's done in <90 minutes this way.
* Brown 1lb of beef or ground sausage on "sautee" with half an onion, diced. Throw in several tablespoons of italian seasoning. Once browned, add 2 cans of diced tomatoes, 1 can of tomato paste, 1 can of chicken broth, 1 can of water, some garlic powder, salt, pepper, and a box of smallish pasta (macaroni and garden rotini are our favorites), pressure cook on high for 8 minutes.
* Throw a cup of dried mixed beans, 1 beef boullion cube, and any other seasonings you'd like (garlic, pepper, the usual suspects) and enough water to cover the beans by a couple of inches to the instant pot on the "warm" setting to soak for ~45 minutes, then pressure cook for 45 minutes. Makes a fantastic mixed bean soup. Probably even better if you have a hambone to throw in there, though I haven't tried this yet.
Please?
1 cup steel cut oats
4 cups water
1/2 teaspoon salt
Cook in Instapot, 5 min at 'Manual' pressure
Let cool in Instapot for 20 minutes or until pressure relief button pops
(if you don't let it depressurize slowly it will foam up inside and mess the lid)
Add the following:
2 Tablespoons of chunky peanut butter (heaping)
2-3 heaping tablespoons of sugar (brown is better)
5 shakes of Pensy's Chinese 5-spice powder
4 shakes of Pensy's Star Anise powder 1 cup steel cut oats
4 cups water
Clearly you and many other people are getting some benefit from the device, I'm really doubtful that I would.
Anyway. To take the comment seriously -- if only it were that easy! Perhaps one of the biggest selling points of the Instant Pot, at least around my house, is its ability to cook steel cut oats quickly, efficiently, and without needing to be watched.
On a further note -- what I've written here is what I received from my dad, but I've always just thrown everything in the pot at the start.
Add the following to the IP:
- 1 cup almond milk (they warn regular milk with curdle but not sure about that)
- 2 cups water
- 1 cup steel cut oats
- 1 cinnamon stick
- pinch of salt
- 1/4 cup of raisins
- They call for vanilla extract but I use vanilla flavored almond milk
Then I portion out what I want for myself, add a Tbsp give or take of light brown sugar, and any other toppings. My favorites now are chopped walnuts, chopped dates, banana, berries, diced granny smith apple, etc.
That recipe makes several servings and is great for brunch with an oatmeal bar. You can also refrigerate leftovers for several days and if you let it chill a bit, you can then wrap it in plastic wrap and shape it into bricks which freeze nicely.
Ingredients
1 tablespoon butter
1 cup steel cut oats
3 1/2 cups water
1/4 cup sliced raw almonds
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large apple, peeled, cored and diced
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/3 cup dried cranberries
1/8 cup dried cherries
2 tablespoons light brown sugar
Add butter to pressure cooker and set to sauté. When butter is melted add the oats and toast, stirring constantly, until they start to darken and smell nutty, about 3 minutes.
Add water and rest of ingredients.
Cook at high pressure for 7 minutes (stovetop) or 10 minutes (electric).
Turn off pressure cooker and use a natural pressure release for 10 minutes, then release any remaining pressure.
Stir, cover and let thicken for 5 to 10 minutes.
Top with milk, nuts and additional brown sugar, if desired.
Adapted from: http://www.pressurecookingtoday.com/pressure-cooker-cinnamon...
You are right that the timing involved on many sites is misleading, yet I find that without fail the "active time" when using the pressure cooker is WAY lower while the total time is roughly the same or slightly shorter than a normal recipe (much shorter if making something with beans). That's the big win for me.
You can experiment all you want, but I don't. I just take recipes from others and use them, with some adaptation. There's a lot of resources, and most people have already workshopped anything I'm interesting in making.
My policy is that I won't try anything new if I'm cooking for others. I only make recipes that I've tried before and iterated on. When I have a winner, I print it out and stick it on the back of the cupboard door where I normally store the pressure cooker.
Freezes and reheats very well.
A box of these:
https://www.wegmans.com/products/international-foods/asian-f...
Add about 6lbs of de-boned / de-skinned thighs, a few pounds of cubed potatoes, and and some onions chopped coarsely. You might want to add some salt.
Brown the chicken first, or don't - it'll be good.
Saute the onions first, or don't - it'll be good.
~20 minutes of pressure (40 minutes total) later and you'll have an excellent meal of quick and easy curry.
Most of the family-sized instant-pot meals we make are like this - one pre-made sauce or spice pack, chicken thighs, some simple vegetables and 20-30 minutes under pressure then served over rice. Pretty much any bottle of "Asian" sauce or small jar/can of curry paste (Thai, Indian, Japanese) works great.
The main variations are in the sauce, and the preparation of the thighs - the texture / experience difference between adding the chicken in pre-cubed / whole / whole then shredded is pretty significant.
Same for stews: Just add all the ingredients (meat, veg, stock, herbs) then press the 'Stew' button.
The slow cooking function is also great for this: Pork shoulder/butt, sauerkraut, pepper, maybe peas/carrots - 8 hrs on med.
I'd love to know how this fares vs. a normal pressure cooker, as far a learning curves go.
I'm sure once I get more experience with it that eyeballing things will become easier.
I feel generally competent in the kitchen to the point where assembling a nice meal (dare I say gourmet?) from scratch without a recipe is relatively easy for me.
That said, I've found the Instant Pot to have a steep learning curve.
For starters, you can't easily check on the food while it cooks, so if you are experimenting with large batch sizes and timing you are kind of gambling and have to wait till it is done (sometimes an hour) to see if you ruined something.
It is hard to find consistent info on how long to cook certain things, and it is easy to overcook things into mush.
And for anyone citing cooking time of a couple minutes... That's just misleading. Most recipes quote how many minutes to set it for. They do not tell you it takes upwards of 15 minutes to come up to pressure in some cases, and depending on the release instructions, some things can take another 20-30 minutes to release pressure if it is a large volume of liquid.
That said, it makes amazing steel cut oatmeal and we've had a couple other successes.
I'd love more recipes that were purely easy quick prep, toss it all in, no extra cooking steps (like finishing in the oven), and good for making easily freezable and quick to reheat one pot meals. Many recipes I've found are overly involved to the point where the IP seems unnecessary.
I desperately want to use it more, but so many recipes fail to meet the above criteria. Hopefully that improves. Maybe my expectations are just too high?