New pressure cooker/air fryer! Give me your best pescatarian recipes.

December 6, 2020 10:32 PM

What are your favorite ways to use your pressure cooker or air fryer for vegetarian or pescatarian meals? Specific recipes you have actually tried and loved would be great, but I'd also take recommendations for really great sources for recipes (no-fail sites or books).

Spouse is very excited about a Foodi Ninja, his early Costco-impulse-buy Hanukkah present, and I am hoping spouse will channel some of that excitement into cooking meals for the entire household, which is usually not his jam. Things that don't use a billion ingredients would be best, things that use lots of pantry or freezer ingredients would be even better, things that do all of that and have low potential for giant-prep-mess in the kitchen would be best of all. Assume a relatively well-stocked kitchen/pantry/spice rack and access to a regular but not spectacular grocery store.

That said, if a recipe is really good, not super intensive in terms of active time/prep and doesn't include meat/poultry/pork, we'll find a way to make it work. He (and I) are new to pressure cookers and air fryers, so specific recipes and instructions would be best. Thank you!

posted by charmedimsure to Food & Drink (6 answers total)

For all things cooking, I look first at serious eats (link to all their pressure cooker recipes). You will see that they don't have many vegetarian or fish forward recipes, I think because in my experience the time saved is almost none, except when it comes to risotto, legumes and octopus. But some foods get a richer taste by being cooked in the pressure cooker, such as red sauce and curries. Serious Eats doesn't have a lot of curry recipes, but if you go to Indian cooking books, you will often find pressure cooker recipes.
Same with Moroccan food, I have some Moroccan cookbooks which are heavily into the pressure cooker, but they don't turn up on Amazon, and I can't vouch for those that do. But I find that when you find the method, it's quite easy to adapt, and figure out which recipes are improved by the cooker.
In a complete coincidence, making hummus from scratch using the pressure cooker is on this week's to do list. I usually just use canned chickpeas, despite the fact that I love my pressure cooker. I don't know why, that's why I'm going to challenge myself. I might return to this ask to report.

I have the old original tefal actifry, and though I have tried a lot of different stuff in it, I mainly use it for fries. But I love being able to just have those fries hum along while I make some other stuff, because otherwise fries are a bit of a project. Obviously, you can do this with all root vegs, with great results. I think maybe newer air fryers are more versatile. BTW, there is a segment on Home Cooking where they talk about air fryers with Hrishi's dad. I don't remember which episode, but the show is hilarious, worth listening to regardless.
posted by mumimor at 7:48 AM on December 7, 2020

A friend recently recommended America's Test Kitchen's Mediterranean Instant Pot book, and I just received it Saturday. Anything Mediterranean is going to lean vegetarian/pescatarian, and a lot of the recipes are indeed seafood or bean/lentil-focused. Lots of chickpeas! And most (all?) of the recipes seem to be 100% in the Instant Pot/multi-cooker rather than using other vessels/methods. (Ie, first sautee in the IP, then use the pressure cooking setting, etc).

I've flagged several recipes in it, and plan on making an Italian Shrimp & Tomatoes dish tonight.
posted by writermcwriterson at 8:21 AM on December 7, 2020 [1 favorite]

I love my Instant Pot for cooking beans, chickpeas, or other ingredients like sweet potatoes, and then using those as components in something else. One particular dish I suggest is beans in tomato sauce—cook large white Lima beans in the pressure cooker (no salt while cooking or they’ll get tough!) and then cook them further in a sauce made of tomatoes, garlic, oregano, olive oil, salt and pepper. Look up Greek gigantes recipes for details.

I wouldn’t cook seafood in the pressure cooker (maybe octopus, I guess?) but you could make crispy breaded fish in the air fryer I would think.
posted by music for skeletons at 9:00 AM on December 7, 2020

Vegetarian Indian Cooking with Your Instant Pot is the book that made me think having a pressure cooker was worth it.
posted by medusa at 7:23 PM on December 7, 2020 [1 favorite]

I just made this recipe and loved it. However, instead of sauteeing all the onion, I sauteed half of it and crisped the other half in the air fryer to make it similar to the crispy onions you get on mujadara at restaurants (no specific recipe, but you can find instructions on how to do this, it should be really simple). I think you could do that part ahead of time.

Also, maybe check out two sleevers, the author has lots of popular instant pot and air fryer recipes from many different cultures.
posted by lgyre at 7:53 PM on December 7, 2020

Yes! Another Foodi owner! I have and love my Ninja Foodi and eat mostly vegetarian (minus dairy plus salmon).

I'm generally a lazy cook, so the recipes I like tend to lean simple (not a lot of ingredients/prep) and mostly hands-off. Here are my family's go-tos:

- Kung Pao Chickpeas with Brown Rice: The chickpea recipe is for slow cookers but I do 10 minutes high pressure with 10 minute quick release--comments suggest 7 minutes would do it but I haven't tried.
- Lentil-Kale Curry: This recipe taught me that lentils are delicious and opened up a whole new world.
- Miso-Glazed Salmon with Bok Choy: Love how the whole dish comes together in one pot.
- Vegetarian Okonomiyaki: Instead of using a skillet, I airfry the okonomiyaki at 390 degrees for 10 minutes, flipping halfway through. Easy especially when you buy the cabbage pre-shredded.
- Rice Porridge: Super basic but so good when you're feeling sick.
- Crispy Baked Tofu: My husband's favorite meal topper. The recipe isn't translated for air fryers, but we cook it at 370 degrees for 20 minutes, shaking once in the middle.
- Hard-Boiled Eggs: My favorite way to make hard-boiled eggs because it's so hands-off and hassle-free. I use a silicone basket like this to make it even easier. This is one of my go-to snacks.

Finally, this one goes beyond the scope of your question in that it requires a food processor or blender, but this hummus made with chickpeas made in the pressure cooker is out of this world. I didn't even know I liked hummus until I tried making this recipe (for my husband).

You may have noticed that a few of the recipes above are from Detoxinista. I've found all of her recipes to be delicious and meticulously researched. She has a book about Instant Pot cooking which may be worth looking into--it's available as an ebook at some public libraries.

If there are oven recipes you love and want to try in the Foodi, you can convert to use in an air fryer with this tool.

I recognize that some of the recipes above are ones I've converted for use in an Airfryer. Memail me if you want converted recipes--I already have them written for air fryer use in my recipe file.
posted by saltypup at 10:46 PM on December 7, 2020