Instant Pot Week Day 1 — Buttery Toasted Oatmeal

Welcome to Instant Pot week here on A Solitary Feast.  This week is dedicated to everyone who got an Instant Pot for Christmas and aren’t sure what to do with it or, maybe, even a little afraid to use it. My mom was convinced I was going to blow up my apartment when I got mine 5 years ago.  The good news is I have made 100’s of meals in my pot and I have never blown up anything.

This week is going to be all about recipes and resources I love and use when I cook with my instant Pot.  First up, is the hands down, best pressure cooking resource for beginners or experienced people using the pressure cooker. The  blog is called Hip Pressure Cooking. It has reviews for different brands of pressure cookers, lessons on how to cook with pressure cookers,  community forums and tons of recipes.  But the best, most useful thing on the site full of useful things is the detailed cooking time charts for just about every food imaginable.  If you ever wonder how long to cook something, if you should cook on low or high pressure, or what kind of pressure release you should use these charts will give you the answer to those questions and more.  I printed  these charts out and keep them in a binder on my cookbook shelves because they are so useful. 

One of the most common complaints I hear about pressure cooking is that by the time you bring the pot to pressure, actually cook the food  and release the pressure you haven’t really saved anytime and might as well cook it on the stove.  In some cases that is true, the recipe would get done faster on the stove.  In these instances, the way the pressure cooker shines is in its ability to be totally hands off once the food is in the  pot.  I don’t have to watch it at all.  I can go get ready for work, watch tv, do laundry or whatever.  When the food is done cooking it will flip to the keep warm setting and be hot and ready to eat when I am ready to eat. I love tossing my oat meal in the pressure cooker, getting ready of my day and then sitting down to my hot breakfast with no effort on my part.

• Difficulty: Easy
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1 1/2 TBS butter

1/2 cup steel cut oats

1 cup plus 2 TBS water

1/8 tsp salt

Preheat heat the pot on the saute function.  When hot, melt the butter.  Add the oats and stir until toasted, about 3 minutes.  Add the water and salt.  Lock the lid and set the timer for 4 minutes.  When the oats are done cooking, turn off the instant pot and let the pressure release naturally for 10 minutes.  Quick release any remaining pressure.  Serve with whatever toppings you like.  I personally like milk, brown sugar and 1/2 tsp apple spice.

Instant Pot Gingerbread Oatmeal

Just because I got an air fryer doesn’t mean I am going to give up my pressure cooker. Especially when its cold outside and I need a warm breakfast fast.

I always thought I needed steel cut oats to make oatmeal in the pressure cooker. I assumed regular old fashioned oats would turn out mushy and inedible. Turns out, I was wrong. It is possible to cook any kind of oat meal in the pressure cooker.

If you like gingerbread you are going to love this oatmeal. Its like Christmas in a bowl. Beware, however, this oatmeal isn’t for the faint of heart. The oatmeal is very strongly gingerbread flavored. Don’t be surprised like I was.

Gingerbread Oatmeal

• Difficulty: Easy
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From Kitchen Simplicity

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup water

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1 – 1 1/2 tsp molasses

Pinch cloves

Pinch salt

1/2 cup old fashioned rolled oats

1/4 tsp vanilla

2 TBS dried cranberries

Combine all the ingredients in a small heat proof bowl; mix well. Add 1 cup water into the liner of the pressure cooker. Place the trivet in the bottom of the liner and the bowl on the trivet. Lock lid and cook for 10 minutes. Natural release for 10 minutes and release the remaining pressure naturally.

Blueberry Baked Oatmeal

Today is a big day. I graduate from training for my new job. We get a ceremony, pizza party and everything. Its nice to work at someplace that celebrates its employees success. But none of that is why today is a big deal for me.

I am so excited about graduating today because three weeks ago I was seriously thinking about quitting and going to ask for my old job back. If you knew how much I hated my old job at the end you would know how low I was feeling. I cried at my desk several times. I was so overwhelmed. On some level, I think I didn’t believe I could do the job.

I am fortunate that I was surrounded by people who believed otherwise and worked with me until I it believed too.

• Difficulty: Easy
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Adapted From Cookie and Kate

1/3 cup chopped pecans

1 cup old fashioned rolled oats

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt1/8 tsp nutmeg

3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk

2 1/2 TBS honey

1 egg, lightly beaten

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 TBS melted butter

1 1/4 cups blueberries

Preheat the oven to 375. In 1 1/2 quart baking dish, spread 1 cup of the blueberries on the bottom of the dish.

In a small bowl, combine the pecans, oats, cinnamon, nutmeg, and baking powder. Spread the oat mixture over the blueberries in the baking dish.

In the small bowl, combine the milk, honey, egg, vanilla and butter. Pour the milk mixture over the oat mixture. Spread the remaining 1/4 cup blueberries over the top.

Bake 40 – 45 minutes. Serve with milk or yogurt.

Baked Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal

Celebrity Chef Tyler Florence isn’t going to write any more cookbooks because …. “Recipes are dead.”  His reasoning behind this statement is …. “I’ll publish a cookbook and I’ll have a 125 recipes.  People only use five and they won’t even follow them:  They’ll use those like a guide that they’ll kind of interchange different ingredients with ….”   (The Smart Kitchen Summit via The Washington Post).

I can’t even begin to tell you how much this statement irked me.  First of all, every recipe since the first caveman threw a piece of meat on the fire has come into existence because someone used someone elses’ recipe as a guide and changed out the ingredients.  This includes every recipe that Chef Florence has ever created.  Second, I wonder if it ever occurred to Chef Florence that more people would use his recipes as written if they were more accessible to the average home cook.

Maybe, I am sensitive to what Chef Florence said because I have spent the last 5 1/2 years adapting other people’s recipes.  Over the years I have asked dozens of professional and hobby bloggers for permission to post my adaptions for their recipes.  None of them have said no because they don’t want their recipes changed in any way.  Most of them are happy I like their recipes enough to include them on A Solitary Feast.  In fact, only one blogger has ever said no when I asked permission to post one of my adaptions. It was more of wanting the views for her recipe on her blog rather than mine not because she was upset I changed her recipe.

Personally, I want you to take the recipes I have posted here and make them your own in whatever way you wish.  To me finding new ways to make a recipe is what cooking is all about.  It’s where we get new flavor combinations, new recipes and new cooking techniques.  So go grab a recipe, get into the kitchen and play.  When you are done come here and tell me about it so can get in the kitchen and play too.

 

• Difficulty: Easy
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Adapted From Budget Bytes

1 cup pure pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 large egg

3/4 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp vanilla

3/4 cup milk

1 1/4 cup old-fashioned oats

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  In a small bowl, combine the pumpkin,  brown sugar, egg, vanilla and milk; mix well.  In medium bowl, combine the oats, pumpkin pie spice, salt, and baking powder.  Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix until combined.  In a 1 quart baking dish, spread the oat mixture in the baking dish.  Bake 45 minutes or until firm. 

 

Strawberry Baked Oatmeal

Life has kind of ganged up on me.  Between the awful heat, work stress, having to put one of my beautiful rattie girls to sleep because of a tumor and having a bird with a lump on her wing that can’t get looked at until my vet, the only vet in the city who takes care of birds, get back from vacation in a week, I haven’t been really inspired to cook any thing.   All I have been inspired to do is curl up in my easy chair and binge watch Supernatural with a big bowl of popcorn on one side and a very large glass of iced tea on the other.  I know this to shall pass and I will get out of my funk and get back into the kitchen more.

The only thing I have managed to cook in the last few days is a strawberry baked oatmeal.

• Difficulty: Easy
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Adapted from My Forkin Life

3/4 cup strawberries, chopped

1 cup  rolled oat

2 1/2 TBS brown sugar

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/8 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/8 tsp salt

1 cup milk

1 egg, lightly beaten

1 TBS butter, melted

1/8 tsp vanilla
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking powder, and salt.  In a separate bowl, whisk milk and eggs. Add in melted butter, vanilla.  Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and stir until combined.   Place the oatmeal mixture in a 1 quart  casserole dish. Place strawberries over mixture. Bake  in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes.