Do you Have an Instant Pot? (Did you Make the Right Choice?)

Were you one of the 215,000 people who bought an Instant Pot on Amazon’s Prime Day?

If you are, you might just be wondering if you made the right choice. Some of you may have opened up the Instant Pot, but some of you might have it sitting in the cabinet, unused because the concept is so daunting.

While we also bought an Instant Pot on Prime Day (making it our THIRD Instant Pot – we just love it that much we bought for both of our parents, too)… we initially bought ours back in December of 2015.

Over that time, we have made more over 20 pounds of brown rice, and bag upon bag of lentils – beans, soup and even hard boiled eggs. 

Those 215,000 sales were the Instant Pot IP-DUO60. Not only is it easy to operate, it has a stainless steel inner pot that is easy to clean and perfect if you love one-pot meals like we do.  We have (2) of the Duo60 Pots – each of our parents has one. We have the 7-in-1, that has the Yogurt feature.

It works as a slow cooker and pressure cooker in one – depending on your Instant Pot, you can make yogurt, saute vegetables, and whip up the tastiest rice in just a few minutes.   9 months later, I’m still just as in love with the appliance as I was the first day I opened it and pulled it out of the box. If you like to get dinner done in a hurry, then you may have thought about getting one too.

Unlike other Electric Pressure Cookers, the Instant Pot has an uncoated, stainless steel inner pot with a tri-ply disc on the underside. That disc is great for sauteing vegetables, searing beef & more.

The lid detaches – not only that, it sits in the holder on the top for hands free removal of the pot. You don’t’ have to lay the lid down just to get food out (soaking your counter)… just twist off, flip up, and stick in the handle. Voila – easy peasy!

The Instant Pot is safer than our stovetop pressure cooker. I don’t have to stand at the base of the stove to ensure that the pot doesn’t blow up ~ I don’t have to monitor the stove (which is gas) to ensure little hands don’t grab anything. The Instant Pot can be turned on – and you can walk away – when the food is done, the device will switch to a keep warm function so keep your food nice and toasty until you are ready to sit down.

Here are some of the things we have made in ours since we have picked it up:

Soft/Hard Boiled Eggs – hard boiled eggs can be done in just 5 minutes; soft boiled in just 3.

Chickpeas/Garbanzo Beans can be cooked in as little as 20 minutes (after soak) or, 35 minutes without ANY soaking at all.

Steel Cut Oats – just 10 minutes in the Instant Pot with a natural release of 10 minutes.

Fish – although fish does cook quickly in the oven, cook from frozen in the Instant Pot in just 8-9 minutes. Cook from thawed in as little as 4 minutes with LITTLE clean up.

Homemade Yogurt (requires the 7-in-1!) – this is so incredibly easy to make in the Instant Pot, as you can just walk away.

Molten Chocolate Mini Lava Cake in just minutes. Minutes – crazy, right?

Meatballs – in just 5 minutes from raw ground beef.  Like meatloaf? You can make that too.

Quinoa takes just 1 minute in the Instant Pot. There is no reason not to incorporate more in your diet.

Corn on the Cob in just 2 minutes… even better, cook up 6 or 7 at once. It’s SO terribly easy!

Homemade Enchilada Sauce – dump & go. Use the sauce on fish, or combine with shredded chicken.

Some things you might need to keep in mind in regards to the Instant Pot

• The Instant Pot cooks between 10.2 – 11.6 PSI – which is just a bit less than a Stovetop pressure cooker. Therefore, when looking at recipes for a stovetop pressure cooker, you may need to adjust the time ever so slightly when making in your Instant Pot.
• Cook times for the Instant Pot ARE fast in some cases – but remember that the pot needs time to come to pressure (which is less time if you are using less water), and come down from pressure. The Instant Pot does that for you though, so you really CAN walk away & let it do it’s “thing”.
• Rice cooks amazingly well in the Instant Pot – less than 10 minutes for white.  You can cook frozen chicken too – as well as beef – you should always use at least 1/2 C. water depending on what you are making to allow the pressure cooker the moisture it needs to cook your food.

See our full guide for the Instant Pot below:

6 Basic Instant Pot Recipes

8 Easy Instant Pot Dinner Recipes

Mouth Watering Instant Pot Dessert Recipes

15 Instant Pot Soup Recipes your Family will Love

15 Things you Need to Know About your Instant Pot

8 Must Have Items for your Instant Pot

You can also see recipes HERE that you can try if you scored the pot on Amazon Prime Day.