Ode to the Instant Pot

Last year I became the owner of an Instant Pot. If you have never heard of the phenomenon which is the Instant Pot you're either Amish, a time traveler, or technology deprived!

Let me back up and say I had over $100 in Amazon credit which had built up (a perk of being an Allrecipes Allstar!) and I could have easily purchased an Instant Pot. I rebelled against the fad though, after all, my first time to use an updated stove top model pressure cooker resulted in my lovely roast looking like a prehistoric rock! Don't judge!

I reluctantly became an owner of an Instant Pot - did I just say that? Yes, I did. You see I won my Instant Pot in an Allrecipes Allstar Contest. When it arrived I briefly contemplated selling it, after all I live alone, and I have an apartment sized kitchen. So it sat in the box...and hibernated. 

About a week later I was looking at my instant pot - I decided to unpack it and I used it! I've now owned my instant pot and have converted MANY non-IP recipes. The latest...Spaghetti and meatballs! Yummo!!! 

Note to say - I make my pasta by hand and did not use the instant pot to cook the noodles, although I could have. So now you have the meatball recipe, and here's how I made the meatballs... I used the ingredients called for BUT also poured Bertolli spaghetti sauce over the meatballs along with 1/3 cup water, and cooked them on low pressure for 15 minutes before doing a quick release! How amazing is this...dinner start to finish in under 30 minutes!!!

DIY -homemade is best

We are just a little over two weeks into the New Year, and looking back I didn't intentionally set out to make a food resolution, but ironically it happened!

I often find myself buying items at the grocer which I can easily make at home, but really never bothered to do. Think about it. If you're a serious foodie (NO this doesn't mean you simply love to eat, it means you love to COOK and eat!) why buy what you know you can make better at home? Sure there's convenience, but there is also a price to pay. This price is not just in a monetary sense of the word, but in health also. So what food items have I been making at home? Well seasoning mixes for starters.

If you have ever looked at the ingredients for seasoning mixes you’ll see they’re often high in sodium, and sometimes there are ingredients you can’t even pronounce!  This is an amazing taco seasoning mix and you'll actually surprise yourself when you discover how much of a difference there is, not just in taste, but in money saved.

Another area where I've started a DIY trend is with pasta!  Oh momma mia! There is such an AMAZING difference between store bought boxed pasta, and pasta you make yourself! When I visited New York, I was gifted a $100 gift card to Williams-Sonoma; I also had a coupon for 15% off.  I decided to buy the Kitchenaid pasta press attachment!  It comes with 6 presses: spaghetti, large macaroni, small macaroni, fusili, rigatoni and bucatini. 

I decided to try the spaghetti, and made a simple Italian sausage sauce to go with it, complete with some lovely herbs a friend bought while visiting Florence, Italy.  I only wish I could figure out what the ingredients are in this herb seasoning. It's just beautiful with the flecks of purple!!! So if anyone knows the mixture I would love to know myself!!! It looks like parsley, mixed with cayenne, and garlic, but there are also edible flowers I believe?