How To Steam In Instant Pot Duo

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Recommended Equipment For Reheating Leftovers In The Instant Pot:

DUO EVO PLUS Instant Pot w/ TRUE STEAM FEATURE Steamed Broccoli & DEMO REVIEW

Reheating leftovers in the Instant Pot is such an easy way to warm food without using a microwave. Who knew there could be so many uses for an electric pressure cooker? I continue to find more and more reasons to love this versatile appliance!

How To Reheat Leftovers In The Instant Pot Pressure Cooker

Looking for ways to make smaller batches of food in your Instant Pot? Check out Instant Pot Cooking for Two!!

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For Simple Instant Pot Steamed Asparagus Stalks:

  • Trim off the woody bottom ends of the asparagus as these dont cook up nicely. Wash the veggies.
  • Place the asparagus into a steamer basket or trivet, then place the basket into the pot with one cup of water.
  • Drizzle asparagus with olive oil or add butter, season if youd like.
  • For tender, firm results: Cook on HIGH pressure for 0 minutes and perform a quick pressure release.
  • For softer results: Cook on HIGH pressure for 1-2 minutes and perform a quick release.
  • If you have thicker stalks: Add 1-2 minutes to each cooking time.
  • If you have thin, stringy stalks: Cook on LOW pressure for 1 minute.

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For Simple Instant Pot Steamed Pod Peas:

  • Wash and prepare your peas for cooking.
  • Add the trivet or steamer basket to the inner pot with around a cup of water to steam with.
  • For fresh: Add your peas to the basket and cook on high for 0 minutes.
  • For frozen: Add your peas to the basket and cook on high for 1-2 minutes.
  • Follow up with a quick release and enjoy.

Learn How To Boil Water

Instant Pot Duo Plus Mini 9

Whichever electric pressure cooker you end up with, your first time using it should involve literally learning to boil water. You do this by adding a cup or so of water to the inner pot , sealing the lid, and selecting a short cook time. Within five minutes, the water should heat up and build pressure, at which point the pressure is released via the natural method, or you can use the quick-release method. .

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How Long Do I Steam Veggies For

Less cooking time more natural texture.

It takes a bit of trial and error to get the time setting right. The vegetables still would be delicious and healthy, but you may get a mushy carrot if you are cooking it for too long or a hard carrot if you dont cook it enough.

As a general rule, If you like natural texture of vegetables , reduce the cooking time.

Please note that the time you set, is the actual time for steaming so you dont have to compensate for the preheating time.

Natural Vs Manual Pressure Release

When the cook time is up on your Instant Pot, there’s still one more step — releasing the pressure.

There are two ways the pressure can be released. With natural pressure release, the valve on the lid stays in Sealing position and the pressure dissipates naturally over time. This can take anywhere from 20 minutes to more than an hour, depending on what you were cooking. Low-liquid meals take much less time than high-liquid meals, like soup or chili.

The other option is manual pressure release . Here, you’ll carefully move the valve into Venting position and watch as steam shoots out of it, releasing the pressure. This method is much faster, but very high-liquid meals, like soup, can still take about 15 minutes to release pressure manually.

So which one should you use? Consider that with natural pressure release, the Instant Pot is still full of pressure, so the food will continue cooking while the Instant Pot is in Sealing mode. Manual pressure release is useful — and necessary — when you’ve built in enough cooking time and cooking needs to be stopped as fast as possible.

If the goal is to cook a meal quickly, set enough time on the Instant Pot to cook your food and release the pressure manually when the time is up.

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How Would I Use The Steam Function Does It Still Cook Under Pressure

With the Instant Pot, if you use the “Steam” button, it’s essentially going to be pressure steaming, not just regular steaming.

To use the Steam function, you’ll need to pour in at least one cup of water into the inner liner. Then place your trivet at the bottom, then place a steamer rack or basket on top of the trivet. Place your food into the rack or basket and then close the lid. Just push the Steam button, then put in your cooking time. After that, just wait a few moments until you hear the beeping sounds. Then the display should read “On.” This is when the Instant Pot is heating up, boiling the water, and creating pressure. Once the pressure is high enough, it begins to count down. When the food is done steaming, make sure to do a Quick Release, otherwise, the food will be overcooked.

As the water boils, it creates steam. Since you need to use the regular Instant Pot lid for all functions except sauté, the Instant Pot will be sealed while steaming, building up pressure inside. However, the Steam function won’t create as much pressure as the Manual/Pressure Cook function, so you aren’t exactly pressure cooking like you normally do.

The only problem with using the Steam function is the fact that you can’t check on the food as you steam since it’s under pressure and the lid isn’t see-thru.

Once the timer is up, always make sure to Quick Release , because the food is still cooking as it’s inside. Failure to Quick Release can result in overcooked and mushy food.

Starchy Vegetables In Instant Pot

Instant Pot – Duo Evo Plus Steam Release

First, lets talk about starchy vegetables. These are the veggies that will be the most forgiving as they often need a longer time to cook: potatoes, carrots, pumpkin, squash, beets, sweet potatoes. But, not all starches are created equal. Whether you love your meat and potatoes or youre cooking your way through the hardy veg during the fall season, heres how to do it .

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How To Steam Broccoli In The Instant Pot

  • Wash and cut broccoli into uniform pieces. Make sure they arent too small, otherwise they may overcook . Its important to cut them into similar sizes so they cook evenly.
  • I use the 3lb bag of broccoli florets at Costco. Some of the pieces are really large, so I cut them down .
  • Transfer the broccoli to a steamer basket or net. Now you dont need one in order to make Instant Pot broccoli
  • Before I had my basket, I would layer the broccoli on top of the trivet and hope it didnt fall through.
  • Read 12 Ways to Use an Instant Pot Steamer Basket
    • Lock the lid, turn the knob to sealing.
    • Cook on manual high pressure for 0 minutes. Yup, you heard me right. Press the adjust button until you hit 0 minutes.
    • As soon as the pressure cooking has completed, an L0:00 will appear for LAPSED time.
    • Do a quick release right away by turning the knob to VENTING.
    • Open the lid, and test the broccoli with a fork to see if it is tender enough. If you fill up a big basket like mine, you may have some pieces that are undercooked in the center.
    • I dont mind this, because I use the parts that are cooked first. The rest gets reheated in the days following and they stay crisp and not overcooked.
    • For the best, most consistent results throughout, fill the basket halfway.

    How The Instant Pot Timer Works

    Like with most timers on kitchen appliances, the timer on an Instant Pot basically counts down from a certain time.

    When the timer reaches the end of the countdown, it shuts off. Alternatively, if you have the keep warm setting on, it simply lowers the heat and pressure to the right setting to keep your food warm.

    But as youll learn in this article, Instant Pot timers are slightly different than those on other appliances.

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    Which Instant Pot Buttons To Use

    As an Amazon affiliate, and affiliate with other businesses, I earn from qualifying purchases.

    SO MANY BUTTONS! How to use Instant Pot is a top Google search. If you own an Instant Pot electric pressure cooker and want to know what each button does and when to use it, my complete guide will tell you everything you need to know about using the Instant Pot buttons for every model and version!

    If youre just getting started with your Instant Pot, your first question might be How do I know which Instant Pot buttons to use? Heres a detailed explanation that will help.

    The most important thing to know is the buttons are just preset, suggested cook times for specific items. If you use the Poultry button, your Instant Pot will not know how much meat is in the pot or whether its frozen or fresh. Your Instant Pot CANNOT sense what you are actuallycooking and CANNOT tell you when the food in your pot is cooked through.

    So when youre cooking chicken soup, you can use the Soup button, the Poultry button, the Meat button, or the Manual button It really doesnt matter which button you use, just choose the button with the closest cook time to the time in the recipe youre using .

    Lets Put This Thing Together

    Instant Pot Duo Mini 7

    First, wash and dry the lid, gasket, and metal insert. Now youre ready.

    On the back of the cooker, youll see a spot where the drip catcher goes. Slide it right in. Its made to remove easily, so you can empty it. Without the catcher, youd wind up with small puddles on your counter.

    Pop the insert in the cooker. Now insert the power cord into the cookers socket. Plug it in. The digital display on the front should now read OFF. Your cooker is now in standby mode.

    Slide the rubbery gasket ring under the lid there’s a bracket where it will snap into place. The gasket helps seal the pot, allowing it to come to pressure.

    Alison Conklin

    On the underside of the lid is also a small metal cage. It will be round or rectangular, depending on your Instant Pot model, and it helps keep the valve from getting clogged with bits of food. Its removable so you can clean it out if necessary, but you probably won’t need to do this very often.

    Alison Conklin

    Look for arrows on the top of the lid and side of the cooker. Line these up to get the lid on and off. The first dozen or so times you use your IP, this whole getting-the-lid-on-and-off will feel unnatural, because your cooker is new and so are you. Itll eventually become second nature. If the cooker is plugged in, it bleeps cheerfully when you open and close it.

    Next to the steam release is the pressure indicator. This is a little metal cylinder that the steam pushes up its a manual indicator that the unit has attained pressure.

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    For Whole Sweet Potatoes:

    • Just like with whole potatoes, you want to begin by poking your sweets with a fork a few times. Then, you can choose to pile them in the pot, wrap them individually in foil with seasoning, or use a steamer basket .
    • Add one cup of water to the pot.
    • For small to medium sweet potatoes, set the pot to cook at high pressure for 10 minutes. For large sweet potatoes, set the pot to cook at high pressure for 12-15 minutes.
    • Allow the pot to naturally release pressure for around ten minutes before performing a quick release.

    Can You Steam Frozen Shrimp In The Instant Pot

    Instant Pot Shrimp is one of those recipes in the even better category. Ive long advised my readers on my original blog, The Wicked Noodle, to purchase their seafood frozen and not from the seafood counter . Otherwise you have no idea how long its been sitting there, thawed and desperately needing to be prepared as soon as possible. Buying it frozen means YOU control how long its thawed and, therefore, how quickly it gets cooked.

    Which is why Instant Pot Shrimp is so perfect! If youre buying it frozen anyway, and can skip the process of thawing it completely, its so much easier and faster. Plus no more planning ahead to thaw something!

    Its also not just possible to steam frozen shrimp in the Instant Pot, its advisable to do so. Shrimp can easily overcook, so starting from frozen is preferable as it allows the shrimp to cook to the perfect doneness.

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    How To Keep Food Warm In The Instant Pot

    Maybe youve already reheated the food, or just cooked it, and you want it to stay warm until its time to serve it.

    The fabulous thing about the Instant Pot is that there is a button exactly for that! The Cancel/Keep Warm button is your best friend in this case.

    If you press the Keep Warm button, it will default to a 2 hour time frame where it will keep the contents of the pot warm. I use this button all the time! For instance, if I make an Instant Pot soup recipe, I can use this function to keep it warm until dinnertime.

    The Keep Warm button can also be used to reheat food slowly. Just add the leftovers to the insert pot and press the Keep Warm button, and it will gradually warm the food. You may need to stir every so often, just to distribute the heat more evenly, but it works like a charm if you dont need to reheat quickly!

    What Is The Difference Between Steam And Pressure Cook On Instant Pot

    How to steam broccoli in the Instant Pot

    Since both cooking methods use steam, its easy to confuse the two. In fact, I remember asking myself the same question .

    The difference stands in the fact that when youre steaming the pot doesnt use said steam build pressure. As a result, the veggies wont come out mushy and unrecognizable but whole and snappy.

    In short, steaming preserves the natural structure of the food while pressure breaks it down to make it more tender and easy to eat.

    If you feel you need more in-depth explanations on this topic, check out this post I just made about this subject.

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    Why Should I Make Idli Dosa Batter In An Instant Pot

    Why should you use an Instant Pot to make this batter? Because it makes the fermentation process so easy! The instant pot makes fermenting this batter foolproof even during colder months. With the IP, you no longer have to rely on an oven light to ferment the batter. With my recipe and proportions, you wont have to worry about the batter overflowing either. Ill also share how I make idlis in the instant pot SO EASY.

    Can You Use Frozen Vegetables In An Instant Pot

    This recipe for making Instant Pot steamed vegetables is based on using fresh veggies. You can use frozen vegetables, but they will need a little extra cook time.

    Rather than setting the cook time to zero minutes, you will just set it to one minute. An alternate method is to allow the pressure to release naturally rather than doing an instant pressure release.

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    Instant Pot Acorn Squash

    Acorn squash is similar to butternut squash, but its got an entirely different flavour. Its a bit nutty and a little less sweet, but it is delicious nonetheless. Its large cavity makes it fantastic for stuffing with sausage, meat, grains, and fall flavour infusions with dried fruits, fresh herbs, and more. Its also a healthy side dish. Personally, I love mine with a healthy spoonful of grass-fed butter and cinnamon.

    Storing Leftover Steamed Buns :

    Instant Pot Duo 7 in 1 Electric Pressure Cooker ⢠Homekits ...

    To prevent them from sticking to one another, place the steamed buns on an oven tray, and partially freeze them in the freezer.

    Then place the partially frozen bao in Ziploc bags. Remove the excess air in the ziploc bags and seal tight.

    For best quality, you can store the bao in the freezer for up to 3 months .

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    For Instant Pot Cooked Mushrooms:

    • Wash and prepare mushrooms. You can halve them or prepare them in slices, or leave them whole.
    • Turn the Instant Pot on saute mode and add 1-2 tbsp. of coconut oil or olive oil. Then, add in the mushrooms. Here, you can also use any additional spices you like, fresh garlic, etc. Salt to taste.
    • Saute for 4-5 minutes or until browned and beginning to caramelise.
    • If you are using sliced mushrooms: Your mushrooms will be done after this and you wont need to steam them.
    • If you are using whole mushrooms or 1 lb.+ mushrooms: Place the lid on and steam for 12-15 minutes with a minimal amount of liquid, oil and/or butter, and spices.
    • For smaller amounts of mushrooms, halved mushrooms or a more tender mushroom: Steam for 8-10 minutes on high pressure.
    • End with a quick release of pressure.

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