One afternoon in May, Jer came home from work with a large Amazon package in his arms.
This was not too long after we had a conversation in which I lamented to him that I was tired of using my play money on household gadgets that I wanted, or asking for kitchen supplies for my birthday, or using Christmas as an excuse to upgrade our apartment furniture. I wanted to be gifted things that had a bit more frivolity, but I was torn because I still wanted these household items that we were getting along fine without. Where do these pseudo-necessities fit in a budget that is based around paying off tens of thousands of dollars of student loans? It was a conundrum and I was annoyed about it.
Leave it to Jeremy to hear my conundrum complaining and take selfless action. He came home with an Instant Pot that day, purchased with his meager play money budget.
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So, our crockpot, which I had taken from my parent's house years before where it had been well used and well loved, finally died last January. And for six months, I debated how I wanted to replace it. Which means for six months we didn't have a crockpot, and we were fine without it, and so little by little I stopped trying to figure out how to replace it. But not before I learned about the Instant Pot and became intrigued. I had never used a pressure cooker before, but I liked the idea that by getting an Instant Pot I could use it on the slow cooker setting to replace the broken crockpot, AND I had a whole new set of cooking possibilities at the same time. But the idea of spending the money on it brought forth the conundrum outlined above. So of course I was ecstatic when Jer brought me home this new kitchen toy, not for my birthday or Christmas, and not because I specifically asked for it, but "just because." I didn't realize at the time, but bringing that Instant Pot home opened up a brand new realm of seemingly endless possibilities of meals to cook and delicious food to eat, all with simple ease.
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Having never used a pressure cooker before, and having never even seen one used, there was a small learning curve to get through initially, along with getting over my uncertainty about "Am I doing this right?" I started with cooking chickpeas, and accidentally blocked up the venting valve by manually releasing the pressure. And I only know I did that thanks to hindsight. After two months of cooking only chickpeas and whole chickens, and starting to become confident in at least those two foods, I started to branch out to new foods and full recipes. When I mealplanned, I tried to include one new Instant Pot recipe each week. Using it more frequently and for new recipes allowed me to gain more confidence, and I have recently surpassed the learning curve enough that I have started to cook food in the IP without following exact recipes.
I love that with the Instant Pot I can sauté vegetables in it before dumping in everything else. I love that I can cook dried beans without having them on the stovetop for three hours, and I can avoid simmering bone broth for 24 hours. My favorite lentil soup takes less than an hour start to finish, and it tastes like it's been on the stove half the day. Los Angeles summers are long and we don't have air conditioning, so leaving the oven off is quite the benefit. I can buy a whole frozen chicken and have it on the table in about one and a half hours, so tender and juicy. I can make hardboiled eggs that come out exactly how I want them to every single time, and they are ridiculously easy to peel. Active cooking time for me has been drastically cut down; once I've chopped veggies or seasoned chicken or rinsed beans and pressed a few buttons on the IP, I'm free to leave it alone until it tells me the food is done, just in time for dinner after a few dance parties with Jeremy and Harrison. I'm still in the early stages of using the Instant Pot to its full potential, but its helpfulness already cannot be understated.
Of course, of course, of course I still love to cook on the stovetop, tasting as I go, adjusting this or that, letting the smell waft through our apartment, or roast vegetables in the oven, watching them get slightly charred with the perfect tenderness on the inside, and I will never let my new kitchen toy take the place of some of that. But having the Instant Pot in my arsenal of kitchen tools has only added to my joyful cooking experience.
Black Friday is coming up, and you only need one thing on your list. Do yourself a favor and use that day to buy the Instant Pot at the lowest mark-down price it reaches all year. Do it!
(We have the 6 quart 7-in-1 IP and it has served our purposes well. It is not the newest model available, but I have found that we don't need any more than what this one does.)
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Some of my favorite tried and true ways to use the Instant Pot
-Soak one pound of dried beans overnight, rinse, cover with fresh water. Cook on high pressure and let the pressure release naturally before opening. 8 minute cooking time for black beans, 12 minutes for garbanzo beans. Additionally, I will often add chopped onion and garlic, with tomato paste and chili powder and cumin to the black beans, covering them with only just enough water before cooking. After cooking I take off the lid and use the sauté function to cook off a bit more water and use the seasoned beans for tacos and the like.
-Wash a spaghetti squash, cut it in half crosswise, scoop out the seeds. Put one cup of water in the IP, put the steamer insert in, and put the spaghetti squash halves on top. Cook on high pressure for 7 minutes, then manually release the pressure and open. Once the squash is cool enough you can scoop out the flesh and use however you'd like.
-Rinse one cup of white rice and put it in the pot with 1 1/4 cups of water, a swirl of oil, and some salt. Cook on high pressure for three minutes. Let the pressure release naturally for 7 minutes, then manually release the rest of the pressure before opening. Brown rice takes a bit longer.
-Put one cup of water and the steamer insert in the pot. Place seven or eight eggs on the insert, cook on high pressure for 4 minutes. Immediately release the pressure manually, open the pot and carefully put the eggs in ice cold water and into the fridge. Drain the water when the eggs have cooled off. Eat whenever! The yolks are still slightly soft, adjust the cooking time for your preference.
-Put oil, chopped onion, and chopped celery in the pot. Sauté until translucent, adding salt, cumin, chili powder, and smoked paprika to taste, add chopped garlic towards the end. Add chopped carrots, 28oz of diced tomatoes, 1 cup of dried lentils (rinsed), and chopped sweet potato. Fill with stock or water up to the 7 or 8 cup line. Cook on high pressure for 20 minutes and let the pressure release naturally for a little while before you manually release the rest of it. Adding chopped greens or cooked rice after it's done is also delicious. I'm sure you could add uncooked rice before closing the pot, I just don't know how much. Eat this soup with goat cheese, it's the best!
-Take some onion, celery, and carrot scraps and put them in the bottom of the pot, parsley too if you have any. Add one cup of water and the steamer insert. Put a whole chicken on the insert and rub on some salt, black pepper, and whatever other seasonings you'd like. Add a few whole garlic cloves on top of or inside the chicken. Cook on high pressure- about 25 minutes for a fresh chicken and 50 minutes for frozen. Let the pressure release naturally to seal in the moisture. Use a meat thermometer and properly check the internal temperature of the chicken, cooking times obvioulsy vary with the size of the chicken. Leave the liquid and veggies and drippings in the pot for making broth, as outlined below.
-Carve the above chicken, and put whatever you would have thrown into the trash back into the pot with the cooking liquid and vegetables. (Take out the steamer insert.) All the bones, cartilage, whatever you consider inedible can all go back in. You can add chicken necks, gizzards, feet, racks if you have them on hand (things I never expected I'd be storing in my freezer, but here I am today.) Add a swirl or two of raw apple cider vinegar. Throw in more salt, parsley, and/or garlic cloves to preference. Fill with water to between 8-10 cups. Cook on high pressure for 3-4 hours, then allow the pressure to release naturally. Strain the broth out and store in the fridge or freezer. This usually yields me about 3 quarts of broth, I store in mason jars and initially freeze 2 quarts, taking them out as needed.
-This butter chicken is delicious. I halve the butter (not because I'm afraid of butter, it just feels excessive) and use all the sauce with my meal rather than saving half as suggested.
-I LOVE this Dal so much. I use green lentils and have never soaked them as the recipe suggests, and it always turns out delicious (with a bit more salt to my taste.) I think the ghee is of utmost importance in this recipe.
-This recipe for quinoa burrito bowls has always turned out great, especially when topping it with cheese, salsa, and the like and eating with my favorite tortilla chips.
-I love this Moroccan sweet potato lentil stew. I use green lentils.
-And when I'm feeling indulgent and spontaneous and want to use refined sugar for something more than brewing kombucha, this recipe is totally on my radar and someday I will try it.
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Happy Instant Potting!
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