5 Favorite Ways I Use My Instant Pot

I’m just going to throw this out there… if you haven’t heard of an Instant Pot yet I think you are probably not on social media or many food blogs. Instant Pots are EVERYWHERE now. It’s really incredible how this electric pressure cooker has taken off.

Guess what? I sure love mine. And if you don’t have one, I’d definitely recommend getting one. They are pretty amazing and I bet we use ours at least 5x per week. I used it twice yesterday to make hard boiled eggs and dinner.

First and foremost, what is an Instant Pot? It’s an electric pressure cooker that makes food really fast. And it’s so versatile too. It’s 7 kitchen appliances in 1, Pressure Cooker, Slow Cooker, Rice Cooker, Steamer, Sauté, Yogurt Maker and Warmer.

They say it can make food up to 70% faster. I’m all for getting dinner on the table faster. I’m guessing you are too??

Before we get into my favorite ways to use the instant pot, I want to give you 3 tips starting to use it.

1. I was really scared to start to use my Instant pot. I mean, it’s pressurized. I thought it may explode and ruin my kitchen or something. It takes a little bit of time to get comfortable with it, but just experiment. You can’t really do anything wrong.
2. To bring the pot to pressure, you need to have 1 cup of liquid in the pot. If not, it won’t go to pressure and cook. Add water or broth if you need more liquid.
3. If you are cooking vegetables (especially frozen veggies) and you don’t want them to get overcooked, use low pressure. I often put in cooked meat with veggies and sauce and I use low pressure so I don’t get mushed veggies.

You can get an Instant Pot in a 6 Quart or 8 Quart Capacity.

Here are my 10 favorite ways I LOVE to use my Instant Pot

Hard Boiled Eggs

I don’t know if it’s just me, but making hard boiled eggs on the stovetop proves to be more difficult than it should be. The water boils over, I forget to set the timer, they are overcooked, or they are hard to peel. The hard to peel thing seems to happen the most often, like, all the time!

Guess what? The instant pot makes perfect peeling hard boiled eggs. Every time! I have had one hardboiled egg that hasn’t peeled that great in the year I’ve been making them in the Instant Pot. I really thing this tip makes the whole cost of the Instant Pot worth it. But realize there are other great uses too that makes this appliance (or kitchen miracle) worth your dollars.

I make hardboiled eggs by putting the eggs on the grate and adding 1 cup of water to the bottom of the pot. I cook the eggs for 3 minutes on high pressure. I let out the pressure and put them in a cold water bath to stop cooking and help the shell peel better.

Frozen Meat

Have you ever reached dinner time and realized you haven’t taken the meat out of the freezer for dinner? I’m going to assume that it’s not just my issue. Guess what? The Instant pot cooks any meat from frozen in a pretty quick amount of time without drying out the meat. All you have to do is get it thawed enough to get out of the package. And that takes about 5 minutes.

My favorite thing to cook from frozen is chicken breasts. Often times I don’t use it for a specific meal, but to have wonderfully cooked chicken to eat for lunches throughout the week.

Obviously you can cook thawed meat, but we all know we can do that. It’s the rush to get meat thawed that brings a lot of frustration right at dinner time.

PS. The instant pot makes the best roasts too. I cook them for longer but they get so wonderfully tender and delicious! Just don’t add the veggies with the raw meat. You’ll create veggie broth and it won’t be good. Cook your meat and then add in the veggies and cook for 3-7 minutes (depending on your veggies) on low pressure to get a perfect roast and veggies.

Baby Food

I wished I would have thought of this when Ottava was first eating food. I had my instant pot but for some reason I never actually thought of it. It wasn’t until she was closer to a year old did I take out the Instant Pot.

Using the instant pot for baby food makes it really easy to cook veggies to a soft consistency. You can take an immersion blender on low to make a puree too. I really wished I would have done this. Especially with carrots, beets, and sweet potatoes.

Another thing you can cook in the instant pot is meat. And you could puree it with broth with the immersion blender too. I did this, but I didn’t have an immersion blender at first. I was using my Vitamix. It worked great, but it took more time to transfer into the Vitamix, clean it up, and then the Vitamix is plastic. And although “healthy” plastic, I still wondered if hot meat would leach any chemicals from it.

Sweet Potato and Spaghetti Squash

Do you want a quick way to cook sweet potatoes and spaghetti squash? The take so long in the oven but only 10-15 minutes in the Instant Pot.

I will say, sweet potatoes and squash are better roasted/ baked in the oven. But I often times want them quicker and that’s where I love the Instant Pot.

I cook my sweet potatoes on the steamer grate for about 7-12 minutes (depending on the size of the sweet potato size)

I cook my spaghetti squash for 15-18 minutes the sam way I cook the sweet potatoes.

Quick One Pot Meals

I really love making quick one pot meals. It’s a staple in our home for healthy and flavorful meals. You can pretty much throw any veggie, meat, sauce, and spices and get a great one pot dinner.

I don’t think there’s a meal that simpler than this. Easy clean up too because you can throw the stainless steel Instant Pot insert in the dishwasher.

Need Some Healthy Instant Pot Recipes?

There are a lot of good Instant Pot recipes on Pinterest. But if you are a cookbook person, my favorite one is by Jennifer Robins. She created a Paleo Cooking with Your Instant Pot. And it’s truly amazing!

Need an Instant Pot??