Well crap. I should have just read my manual a little better.
Meat / Stew
Make your favorite stew or meat dish in the Instant Pot. Adjust the settings depending on the texture you want. For instance, the “More” setting is better for fall-off-the-bone cooking.
It will default to a High Pressure for 35 minutes. You can adjust for “More” to High Pressure for 45 minutes or “Less” for High Pressure for 20 minutes.
Instant Pot Hack: For a homemade stew with about 1-2 lb. of meat, I typically set to “Meat / Stew” in the Normal setting (high pressure for 35 minutes) and NR for 10 minutes.
I did some cheap bone in pork steaks in the IP last night, absolutely amazing. I browned them first and then went with diced onion, baby bellas, lots of garlic and chicken stock then 13 minutes high pressure with natural release (kind of a guess after reading a bunch of recipes). I pulled the steaks and used saute mode to reduce the liquid…I took a short cut here and went with the Campbells Cream of Mushroom. I then hit the gravy with the immersion blender and holy shit was that good. Sorry no pics but but my family tore it up.
I’ve honestly never used the preprogrammed buttons on my instant pot. Every recipe is just like “and then press Manual and set to X minutes at Y pressure”
Need a little advice and help. I probably did this last year, but I’m doing it again.
I’m tasked with removing all the Chametz from my girlfriend’s home for Passover. She’s out of town until tomorrow night, and so cannot be in possession of anything that is considered Chametz (that is, composed of the grains wheat, barley, rye, spelt, or oats…to avoid anything that has been leavened). So I’m going through all their foodstuffs, and also trying to figure out some things I can get and cook for them over the Passover time period.
I’d appreciate any ideas. Please keep in mind that my girlfriend is vegetarian, though her young son is not. Still, the meat he eats is generally kosher (no pork, no sea creatures without fins or scales).
If any of you has thoughts on tasty stuff I might prepare for them as meals, I’d most appreciate it.
Thank you!
-xtien
P.S. Boo, or favorite vodka is made of grains. Boo!
P.P.S. FWIW, rice is fine as they follow Sephardic rules.
Matzo brei, matzo pizzas, macaroons, matzo with guacamole, flourless chocolate cake, macaroons, paella, rice pudding, fried rice, rice noodles dishes like pad thai… there’s tons of stuff you can make without wheat flour.
Anything that meets the requirements for starters. Doesn’t have to be traditional Jewish fare at the outset. They’re coming back from a trip and I want to be prepared.
Damn, that’s hardcore. I have relatives that keep kosher year round, but I’ve never heard of removing everything from the house for Passover. Honestly, doesn’t make sense to me, since Matzoh would be in that category (made with those grains, not leavened obv)
Well it might be worth doing something like what I made yesterday (and also make @ArmandoPenblade happy, with a picture) as it would be vegan, healthy, and tasty
Sorry, picture isn’t much, but it’s a dead simple and tasty dish. Lentils (I used a cup and a half, with 3 cups water), cook onions in oil until translucent. Add diced tomatoes, ginger, turmeric, and curry powder. Cook down a bit, and mix into the cooked lentils. Then in a pan cook some cumin and garlic in oil for a few minutes until aromatic, then mix into lentil mixture. Add salt as needed.
I am gonna be pure Armando in this post and recommend you make dosa!
Grab some basmati rice–about 2 cups. Idly rice would be better, but it’s harder to find. Grab some skinned black gram/urad dal/vigna mungo/matpe peas–about 1/2 cup. If you’re feeling fancy, add in half a teaspoon of fenugreek seeds. Soak em for 4-8 hours. Grind them up with a good blender or food processor until they form smooth pastes that are mostly not gritty. Add soaking water if you need to help the grinding. Add enough water to get a consistency like thinnish pancake batter–it should coat the back of a spoon, but not crazy thick.
Let it sit for 8-12 hours in a warm place. You’re in California. You’ll be fine. It will ferment and get bubbly. Mix in a teaspoon of salt or so to season.
To cook 'em, heat a wide, flat skillet over medium heat. Spoon out a generous ladle-full of the batter into the pan, then spread it in a circular motion into a thin crepe. Once it begins to set, drizzle a small amount of oil around the edges. When it’s browning on the bottom, remove it from the pan and roll it into a tube about 2" across while it’s still soft and pliable.
You can serve em with all sorts of stuff. I like these things:
And yes, lentil curry like @CraigM posted above :)
For a really tasty treat, I like to pour on some tomato chutney in a very thin layer just as it’s almost done cooking (the dosa, that is). Then sprinkle on cheese and spoon in a generous amount of the potato sabzi (since it’s dry). Fold or roll up the dosa around thoe fillings for a delicious Indian treat called Mysore Masala Dosa.
Recognizing that my above post is absolutely absurd in its time investment (although dosa batter keeps for a good week in the fridge, and @CraigM shows they are very versatile), I will also recommend something marginally less absurd.
Do some Mediterranean fare with falafel, tzatziki, tahini sauce, maybe some chicken souvlaki, and some spiced basmati rice cooked in broth.
The only real modification would be to find a falafel recipe that omits the wheat flour. I think it’s mostly there for insurance, tbh. But besan–chickpea flour–would probably work as a good binder substitute.
And obviously drop the tortillas from the first doc :)
I am happy to say that when I brought up the subject of cat food she drew the line. Some folks also get rid of their pet food and try to make kosher food for their pets during that time, because you cannot derive benefit from foods that are Chametz. There is a workaround wherein you symbolically sell your pets to a non-Jew, but that’s not a thing in this case.
We do this every year, and I like the ritual and discipline of it. It’s important to her so I’m happy to help take it on.
Thank you @CraigM and @ArmandoPenblade. I’m not sure they’ll all go for some of that, although my girlfriend will. We love Indian food. So you’ve given me an idea for lunch this week at our favorite Indian place.
Hey. That’s a really good point. Along with what @stusser said about fried rice. I can make them some fried rice with various other things in it for nutrition. Excellent idea.
I’m also going to make something called Boss Sauce, which is an invention of his grandmother just a beefy tomato sauce that can go over rice. I just have to be really careful how to season it or it’ll be “too spicy” and it’s hard to get a balance on that for a kid.
Apparently my aunt does get rid of stuff, it just wasn’t something I was aware of. Selling pets reminds me of getting someone to push a baby carriage on the sabbath.
Here’s a couple pics of things made recently. I few weeks back I had asked about some wet aged porterhouses. I got them from the Amazon Treasure Truck (kind of scary thought when we’re talking food but I went with it) they were from Porter and York and were 24 oz. I ended up doing them Sous Vide 131 for 2.5-3 hours. I ended up refrigerating until the next day when I setup the Annova to 120 and brought them back up to temp before the sear. We like med rare but I was also keeping the temp lower because I wanted to see about trying a blue cheese crust on them and didn’t want them to cook much more. I added blue cheese, panko and butter into a ziplock and dropped it in with the reheating steaks. After the sear I cut the corner off the ziplock and used it like a pastry bag to get a nice application. Under the broiled for a couple minutes until set and voila.
I love this authors recipes, she’s always doing cool Sous Vide stuff and IP stuff too. I couldn’t find the duck fat they recommended for the recipe but I’m going to order some from Amazon for next time. It came out really good, I increased it all a bit to fit in a bigger pan . I made the homemade refried beans instead of canned and they were amazing.
An immersion blender is my next big kitchen purchase. (I mean I guess they’re probably available cheaply, but my philosophy is to pay the extra for quality, so the competing models I’m looking at are around $100).
