Instant Pot – Tex Mex Chicken Thighs

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chicken, cooking, delicious, easy cooking, easy dinner, easy dinners, eat, eating, food, fresh, fresh cooking, instant pot, make ahead meals, pressure cooking, salsa, simple entertaining, tex mex, tomatoes, winter

This is a quick dinner that can be made on any weeknight or weekend.

All it takes is 30 mins in an Instant Pot.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 kilo chicken thighs (club pack)
• 1/2 medium onion diced
• 2 tsp oil
• 1 tsp cumin
• 2 tbls chili powder
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 cups fresh salsa
• 2 whole chipotles in adobo sauce diced up
• 3 cloves garlic
• Stems of cilantro finely diced *amazing flavour and even those who don’t like the cilantro flavour like this.
• 19 0z Can black beans
• 15 oz Can of corn kernels

Press sauté on your Instant pot until it registers HOT. Add 2 tsp oil and add your chicken thighs. Cook both sides of chicken for 5 mins add salt, chili powder, cumin, chipotles, cilantro stems, garlic and onions. Mix around for 2 minutes. Add canned corn with juice, add drained beans and stir. Top with salsa and DO NOT STIR. Tomatoes can tend to burn in the IP so just pour on top and spread out.

Put on IP Lid and seal the vent. Press Chili button – 30 mins. Viola

Do what ever you need to do and once the IP beeps release the steam vent to depressurize. Shred the chicken thighs, they will be soft and buttery. Mix everything together, add fresh cilantro leaves and check seasoning.

Serve on its own, on rice, spaghetti squash, top with chunks of avocado, cheese and a dollop of Greek yogurt.

Makes 10 cups and freezes perfectly well.

Enjoy!

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Instant Pot: Pulled Pork!

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BBQ, comfort food, cooking, delicious, easy cooking, easy dinners, eat, entertaining, fall dishes, food, instant pot, kid friendly, make ahead meals, pork, pressure cooking, pulled pork, quick cooking, simple entertaining, tacos, winter

I am officially obsessed with my Instant Pot. My pulled pork was a big test because I swear by using my slow cooker for 12 hours to make the “perfect” pulled pork. I saw pork shoulder bone in on sale at the store today so I picked one up for 18$ for 3 kilos. A steal!

Prep is the same, but instead of taking 12 hours in a slow cooker however I had pulled pork on the table in 75 minutes!

Here is what you need:

• 3 kilos of pork shoulder bone in (remove the skin and slice into fist full chunks)
• Dry rub – start with 2/3 cup but you may need more (I use my own rub but you can buy one from the store)
• 1 bottle beer or can of coke or root beer (not sugar free)
• 1 onion thinly sliced
• 1/4 cup bourbon
• 1 cup bbq sauce – I use homemade but you can use your favorite store bought BBQ sauce.
• 

1. Cut the pork shoulder into fist full chunks keeping the bones.
2. Rub each and every pork chunk with the dry rub.
3. Typically I would do this 24-48 hours in advance and keep it in the fridge but today I did it all in one step.
4. In your instant pot press the sauté button and add a splash of oil. Add sliced onion. Sauté for 2 or 3 minutes. Add pork chunks.
5. Layer meat and onions, meat and onions.
6. Pour beer over top. If you want it gluten free don’t have a beer use root beer/coke etc. in this case I used a radler. Try to make sure the meat is evenly in the pot and mostly covered by the beer.
7. Put on instant pot lid.
8. Press meat button, set for 75 minutes and put up your feet and relax.
9. Fast forward ~90 mins (once instant pot is finished and done venting open the lid.)
10. Remove bones and discard. Shred meat with fork or tongs. The meat is like butter and just falls apart.
11. You will have a lot of pork juices (these are delicious and if you want to scoop out 3 cups you can use it for baked beans) reserve a good 3 cups, you will most likely have 5-6 cups of juices.
12. In the instant pot add back in the pork, 2-3 cups of porky juices and the bourbon and BBQ sauce. Press sauté button and cook for 5 minutes or so. You want to taste the sweet pork, not just the BBQ sauce so start with a little, you can always add more.
13. This made 8 cups of meat and sauce. Enough for 4 dinners. It freezes superbly well. I use it for tacos, on nachos on my famous pull pork pizza! Think about it, 4 dinners for 18$ is a great deal.

Enjoy! I can’t wait to hear how you liked it!

Instant Pot! Chipotle Chicken

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chicken, cooking, easy cooking, easy dinner, easy dinners, eat, food, instant pot, pressure cooking, tacos, winter

Holy moly was this one ever quick and delicious! I was craving wraps for dinner and didn’t want to pan fry the chicken so I whipped this up in minutes. Dinner on the table in less than 15 minutes.

Here is what you need:

• 4 small chicken breasts (roughly a pound give or take)
• 1/4 cup of diced chipotles in adobo sauce (I LOVE this stuff!) – Tip ! once you open the can throw the rest in a zip lock bag and toss it in the freezer to use in other dishes.   I’m obsessed with it.
• 1 medium onion finely diced
• 3 garlic cloves minced finely or use a rasp
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• 2 tsp Brown sugar
• salt and pepper
• 1 tsp oil

1. With the cooker’s lid off, add a tsp of oil spray and heat to “Saute” until the cooker has heated up. Add the onion and garlic and cook until the onion is translucent and the garlic is fragrant. Add in the chipotle and adobo sauce.
2. Season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper and place in the Instant Pot and saute until browned. Add the chicken stock & brown sugar. Securely lock the pressure cooker’s lid and set to “Manual”. Cook at HIGH pressure for 8 minutes. YES 8 MINUTES!!! 😳 crazy eh?
3. Perform a quick release to release the pressure. Open the lid and remove the chicken breasts. Shred the chicken and set it back in the cooker.

This is delicious in wraps, on nachos, served on rice and topped with avocado and salsa and cheese.

Stay tuned.. I will have 8 more Instant pot recipes to go for January!

Www.monicaskitchen.com

Instant Pot! Curried Butternut Squash soup

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butternutsquash, cooking, curry, delicious, eating, instant pot, pressure cooking, soup, soup recipes, squash, winter, winter soups

Need soup in a hurry? Keep reading.

My Goal in 2018 is to use my Instant pot 10 times a month. Sometimes following a recipe and other times just winging it.

This soup was the latter and it turned out amazingly well.

Ingredients I like to say are a guideline… don’t bail on a recipe if you are missing an ingredient just improvise. Only have 3 cups of squash? then use a sweet potato too!

• 6 cups of butternut squash. A small squash should give you 6 cups. Large pieces is fine.
• 1 small onion diced
• 1 large apple chopped or 2 small (leave skin on)
• 1 smoked Serrano chili (you can use 1 tsp chipotle powder or a whole chipotle pepper in adobo sauce (found in a can in your Mexican or ethic aisle at the grocery store))
• 3 cloves of garlic whole
• 2 tsp tumeric
• 1 tbs curry powder
• 4 cups chicken stock (i used water because I was out)
• 2 cups water
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1/4 cup of whipping cream 35% or full fat coconut milk
• 1 tsp oil (any oil you have)

Plug in your Instant pot and press Saute, add a little splash of oil and then the onions and garlic, saute and minute or two… then add your spices and keep your face away from the pot… the spices will begin to saute and you will start to cough if you are too close. Let it go a minute and toss in the apples and squash. Then add your liquids.

Press cancel. Put on the lid and move the vent to seal. Press the soup button, set time for 15 minutes and voila. Once Instant pot beeps, open the vent. Once you can safely remove the lid take it off and grab a immersion blender and blend the soup until nice and creamy, then add the cream and stir. Check for seasonings and adjust to your own tastes.

If you don’t have an immersion blender you can cool the soup and use a blender. This recipe makes 10 cups.

It will keep in your fridge for 5 days or freeze. I made this 3 days ago and have eaten 5 cups already.. it is spicy and creamy and delicious.

To jazz it up you can toss with a dollop of greek yogurt or sour cream, chives and pumpkin seeds or crispy bacon bits.

Enjoy!

The Best Bolognese sauce, hands down. Instant Pot Recipe.

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basil, comfort food, cooking, easy cooking, easy dinner, easy dinners, easy pasta, eat, entertaining, fall dishes, food, fresh, fresh cooking, fresh pasta, gluten free, instant pot, italian, Italy, kid friendly, make ahead meals, Parmesan, pasta, penne, pork, quick cooking, sauce, sausage, simple entertaining, spaghetti, sugar, veal

I can’t say enough good things about my Instant Pot. I bought the 8 quart one this winter and I can’t get enough of it. 

I typically make my bolognese sauce on the stove and it takes roughly 6 hours on a slow simmer to come out perfectly. 
Using my instant pot it took 35 minutes on high pressure and viola my sauce is ready!

The sauté feature is a huge time and prep saver as you can sauté in the actual pot. 

The key to this sauce is the meat ratio and I blitz all the vegetable in the food processor before I add it into the meat. This bolognese sauce is more of a ragu than your typical spaghetti sauce. Also another tip I don’t use beef, I only use veal and pork and prom sausage. This makes the sauce much more mild. 

What you need:

• 1 1/2 pounds ground pork
• 1 1/2 pounds ground veal
• 1 pound Italian sausage meat (casing removed)
• 1 large white onion
• 2 carrots
• 3 celery heart stalks
• 4 garlic cloves 
• 3/4 cups of sundried tomatoes
• 1 huge handful of fresh basil
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 28 oz can tomato purée (try to find San Marizano tomatoes)
• 1 16 oz can of diced tomatoes
• Parmesan rind
• Dried Bay leaves (4) 
• 1/3 red wine
• Splash of heavy cream 

In a food processor add all the vegetables and basil and sun dried tomatoes. Blitz until their are no chunks and you have a very finely diced mixture. Set aside.

Plug in your Instant pot and press the sauté button – it will take a few minutes and it will beep and say hot.

Start sautéing the sausage meat so some of the fat renders down, once crumbly add the  ground pork and cook down and then add the veal. This whole process will take about 10 minutes to brown the meat. 

Once no longer pink, add in the onion, carrot, celery, garlic, basil and sundried tomatoe purée. Cook for an additional 5 minutes. Then add in the 2 cans of tomatoes, salt and sugar and bay leaves. Throw in the Parmesan rind and 1/3 cup of good red wine. 

Put on the top of the Instant pot, press the meat/stew button (35 mins on high pressure) and sit back and relax! It will take about 5 minutes to come up to high pressure and then the timer will start counting down. Once it is finished, the Instant pot will shut off automatically. 

This sauce usually simmers on my stove for 4-6 hours. With this instant pot it now only takes 45 minutes! 

Typically a Bolognese sauce is served with a wider pasta noodle but you can serve it on whenever noodle you desire. Before serving add a splash of cream to the sauce. I can’t explain what it does to the sauce but it makes it amazing and rounds out all the meat and tomato flavour. 

This sauce freezes amazingly well (do not add the cream before you freeze it) and this recipe will give you roughly 10~12 cups. 

Mangia! 

Chicken Chili in 35 minutes in my Instant Pot – Includes Recipe!

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avocado, beans, chicken, chili, chipotle, delish, dinner, dinners, fiber, freezer dinners, instant pot, kid friendly, lunch, make ahead meals, pressure cooking, simpledinner, sour cream, southwestern, spices, tomatoes

I LOVE this shredded chicken taco chili. At times I serve it over rice, but many times just in a bowl and top it with avocado, cheese, and chipotle sour cream.

It is perfectly made in a slow cooker because you just dump all the ingredients in, turn it on and come back to the best tasting meal! But, it is amazing in an Instant Pot and takes 35 minutes! So you don’t need to plan ahead you just dump it in, turn it on and eat 35 minutes later.
This makes a lot, ~ 22 cups and it is even better the next day. It is a great freezer-friendly meal.

I have an 8 quart instant pot, so if you have a smaller one you may need to reduce by a can of tomatoes.

A serving is 1 cup and contains about 220 calories, 3 grams of fat, 8 grams of fiber, 21 grams of fiber and 28 grams of carbs.

1 medium onion, finely diced
2 (19 oz) can black beans, drained
2 (14 oz) cans of corn kernels
3 (19 oz) cans of diced tomatoes w/chilies or garlic
1 1/2 packages of reduced sodium taco seasoning (you can make your own but this is super easy)
2 tbsps cumin
2 tbsp chili powder
1 tbsp each of garlic and onion powder
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro for garnish
Serve with diced avocado, shredded cheese, sour cream or chipotle sour cream

Combine beans, onion, corn, diced tomatoes, cumin, chili powder, spices and taco seasoning in a your instant pot.
Nestle the chicken in to completely cover, press meat/stew botton (which sets it for 35 minutes) and voila!
Once our instant pot has done its magic, open your vent and then open your lid after a few minutes. Remove the chicken and shred in a seperate dish and then return to your pot and stir it in.

Top with fresh cilantro and your favorite toppings!

In a slow cooker, prep the same way and turn on high for 5 hours or on low for 9. Shred chicken the same way.

For the Chipotle sour cream topping… take one can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (6.5 oz can) and blitz in a food processor and add in 1/4 cup of plain greek yogurt or sour cream. It makes a delicious condiment which is creamy, smokey and spicy! It’s great for chili, tacos and even on wraps.

For the love of tasty food,

Monica

http://www.monicaskitchen.com