Looking for a fast, easy way to make potato salad? Two words — Instant Pot or Pressure Cooker!
I’ve had a pressure cooker my entire adult life. I inherited an old one from my grandmother. I only used it for beans and the occasional swiss steak. I don’t ever recall being told how to use it so it always held a bit of mystery. About 10 years ago, my parents decided I needed a new one and purchased one for me, complete with a manual. What a concept! I still used it mostly for dry beans but stews and soups snuck onto the menu as well.
Google became the bearer of great information. Pressure cooker recipes abound on the net. My mother had a great laugh about how popular slow cookers and pressure cookers had become. “You grew up with many dinners in the slow cooker. You’d think that someone had recently discovered something magical.” It’s true. Slow cookers, pressure cookers and pickling are all the “new” thing. What’s old is new again!
The Instant Pot is a Game Changer
Fast forward…… I’ve listened to my friends expound on the virtues of their Instant Pots — an electric multi function cooker. I looked at them but I have my perfectly good stove top pressure cooker as well as multiple slow cookers. I do not need one more appliance in my small home. The slow cooker made a couple trips in the camper and I had every intention of buying one for the camper. Slow cookers are perfect for camping, I thought. I even had one in my basket when I walked by Walmart’s versions of the Instant Pot. I think you probably heard the light bulb pop on in my head!
Amazon has amazing deals on Instant Pots on a regular basis. I purchased this one which has 7 functions but there is one that has 6 functions. In a small space, multi function devices rule (Thanks, Alton Brown!). This Instant Pot, a can be a slow cooker and a pressure cooker. It can saute and do rice. It might have magical abilities. If it would only choose something for dinner or do laundry, we might be onto something.
Anyway, do a search for recipes and you’re going to be surprised. I thought I’d seen it all when someone posted this potato salad recipe — which cooked the potatoes AND the eggs at the SAME TIME! I know, crazy. Color me in!
This isn’t our type of potato salad (we like sweet pickles), use your own recipe, just cook the potatoes and the eggs in the pressure cooker, at the same time. First wash the potatoes, cube, and stack in the steamer basket in the pressure cooker. Add 1 1/2 to 2 cups of water and put the eggs on top of the potatoes. I did salt the potatoes as I layered them. I like cooking my potatoes with salt and since these wouldn’t be boiled in salted water, this was my fix. Get the cooker up to pressure and set the timer for 4 minutes (I did 5 minutes but we’re at higher altitude). Everything came out perfect….. and the eggs — peeled spectacularly and were perfectly cooked.
Here are a couple more recipes:
http://hip2save.com/2016/05/31/pressure-cooker-potato-salad-recipe/
http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/10-minute-potato-salad.html
Enjoy this fabulous time saver! Potato Salad in under 30 minutes and the longest part about it is chopping everything? Perfect!!
