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Making Instant Pot recipes is one of my favorite ways to save time and stay healthy. These Instant Pot pot in pot recipes are a great way to multitask and make great use of your Instant Pot!
If you are not familiar with the jargon just yet, Pot in Pot Instant Pot recipes refers to the method of cooking that all of these recipes use: putting a smaller pot or another container inside the IP inner pot. This method is sometimes called the PIP Method.
If you need a quick overview of your Instant Pot, you can see a diagram below of your Instant Pot. This is from my article about how to clean your Instant Pot.
When cooking with your Instant Pot, the stainless steel inner pot must always be in the base. You can cook directly in that pot, or your can cook by adding another pot–that’s PIP!
Cooking Pot In Pot
Like I mentioned above, pot in pot cooking is a great (and less mess) way to use your Instant Pot. The key to cooking these recipes is to have a pan for the Instant Pot. Any oven safe pan will do, but I love the Instant Pot brand pot, and it’s less than $10 on Amazon.
You don’t have to have a pot for PIP cooking–you can use any oven safe cooking vessel. Ramekins, silicone cupcake liners, a stainless steel bowl, springform pan, or even a casserole dish. As long as it’s oven safe and fits in your pot, you’re all set.
These recipes allow me to avoid the Instant Pot burn message and sometimes even cook more food in the pot. Pot in pot recipes along with stackable Instant Pot recipes are my favorite ways to make meals in the Instant Pot.
Pot in Pot Staples
Foods like brown rice, white rice, and quinoa are easy to cook right in the pot, but they’re also perfect pot in pot recipes. The trick here is to always use a pan that can handle the expanded size of the food you’re cooking.
For example, this Instant Pot Quinoa recipe uses 1 cup of quinoa, but after cooking you’ll be left with 3 cups of cooked quinoa. As long as your pan holds three cups of food, you’re all set!
These are my favorite freezer staple recipes to cook in the Instant Pot, and they can easily be made pot in pot:
- How to cook brown rice in the Instant Pot
- How to cook white rice in the Instant Pot
- Brown rice and quinoa blend
IP Pot In Pot Recipes
These are some of my favorite Pot in Pot recipes. They are delicious and easy to make. All of these recipes are linked below and they all have diet information included for the 21 Day Fix and Weight Watchers.
Tip: Be sure to always add a cup of water or other liquid to the Instant pot liner, even when you’re cooking with the Instant Pot pot in pot method. The Instant Pot (or any other electric pressure cooker) has to have liquid to come to pressure.
Breakfast Recipes
- Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cups Made in heat safe coffee mugs.
- Amish Baked Oatmeal Made in the Instant Pot round cake pan.
- Starbucks Egg Bites Made in silicone egg bite molds.
- Fajita Breakfast “Casserole” Made in a ceramic casserole dish.
- Mini Breakfast Frittatas Made in ramekins.
Lunch and Dinner Recipes
- Healthy Spinach Artichoke Dip Made in a glass casserole dish.
- Mini BBQ Meatloaf Bombs Made in a Stack and Cook pan.
- Delicious and Healthy Lasagna Using a springform pan (but you can use any pan you’d like!)
- Egg Salad Using the “hack” in the picture above, you can avoid peeling the eggs for your egg salad!
- Mini Meatloaves Made in egg bite molds.
- Lasagna Stacks Made in egg bite molds.
- Teriyaki Meatballs Made in egg bite molds.
Dessert Recipes
- Peanut Butter Lava Cakes Made in egg bite molds.
- Lava Cakes Made in glass ramekins.
- Banana Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosting These are made in silicone cupcake molds!
- Instant Pot Brownies Made in a springform pan.
- Healthy Instant Pot Cheesecake Made in a springform pan.
- Key Lime Pie Bites Made in egg bite molds.
- Lemon Bars Made in the Instant Pot cake pan.
Stackable Instant Pot Recipes
It’s so easy to stack foods in the pot, as long as the cook times are similar. This is a great way to cook your main and side dishes in the pot together.
This means that you could cook frozen chicken breasts (takes about 20 minutes) and a dry brown rice recipe (takes about 20 minutes) together, and then when they’re done cooking, quick release pressure and add a vegetable on top of the food in the pot.
Close the lid to cook for 15 or so minutes using the heat already in the pot, or speed it up a little by pressure cooking the food again–allow the food to come to pressure again for 1 minute or so, depending on the vegetable.
If you prefer to follow a recipe for this stackable cooking method, you’ll want to try this delicious BBQ Meatloaf that cooks with potatoes and vegetables all in the same pot!
Cooking rice or potatoes, a main dish, and vegetables at the end is one of my favorite ways to make dinner.
Pot in Pot Cooking Accessories
I know finding the best Instant Pot accessories can be tough to find, and since so many people asked where I got some of the accessories I use, I put together a post detailing all of my favorite Instant Pot accessories.
Can I cook one stuffed bell pepper using pip method? I’ve seen some recipes for stuffed peppers without pip method using multiple peppers. Most of the recipes use raw ingredients Can I use my crockpot recipe and cook on the pressure cooker using pip method. Thanks for the help in advance.
You can! I’d peek at the stuffed pepper recipes for time and use that time. :) Whether you’re cooking one or 4, the time should be the same.