A couple of years ago my parents gave me an Instant Pot for Christmas. The only thing I knew nothing about Instant Pots was they were the all the rage at the time. Sadly mine sat, in the box, unopened, in the pantry, collecting dust.
It was 4 months later, when my son was 6 months old and I was ready to start introducing him to purees, that I finally decided to give this fancy kitchen gadget a try. My first attempt was sweet potatoes and it was a game changer! It was so much easier than microwaving, baking or boiling sweet potatoes to get a perfectly cooked sweet potato that blended into an incredibly creamy consistency.
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For about 4 months I exclusively used my Instant Pot for making purees (zucchini, carrots, squash, butternut squash, spinach, etc.) before I decided it was time to try out some other items. Jackson was about 10 months old and loving scrambled eggs so I decided it was time to try hard boiled eggs. We have an article on how to boil an easy to peel hard boiled egg, and it works amazingly, but a coworker was telling me about Instant Pot hard boiled eggs so I decided to give it a try.
We have a steamer basket (I paid $9.99 for this one on Amazon and it’s worth it!), so I placed that in the pot and added a dozen eggs. They were obviously not 1 layer but I decided to risk it and left them in their piled on top of each other state. If you don't have a steamer basket, use the steam rack, it works just as well (place the rack in the bottom of the Instant Pot and pile the eggs on top).
After I had all the eggs in the Instant Pot I added 1 cup of water. I put the lid on top and set it to sealed (turn the little knob on top to the “Sealing” position and not “Venting”). I set the machine to High Pressure Cook and set the time for 5 minutes. While the eggs were cooking I got a bowl of ice water ready for when they were done.
About 10 minutes later, the Instant Pot beeped, signifying it had reached the right pressure level, and the timer started counting down. 5 minutes after the first beep it beeped again, and the timer was at 0 minutes, letting me know that they cooking time was done.
I immediately changed the knob on top to venting and let the steam release. Once the steam was fully released, and the lid had unlocked itself, I lifted the steamer basket out of the Instant Pot and submerged it into a bowl of ice water, to stop the cooking process. If you used the rack and not the basket, carefully transfer the eggs to the ice water with a spoon or tongs.
Once the eggs had cooled down to the touch I cracked on and was able to peel the shell off in 2 large pieces. The membrane/skin didn’t stick to the egg at all and the shell didn’t break into a ton of tiny pieces. The yolk was perfectly cooked in all the eggs.
I have since used my instant pot for a lot more things than purees and hard boiled eggs but these items made me an Instant Pot believer and I am always trying new recipes in it, like this chicken tortilla soup from 40 Aprons!
