After all the raves on here, picked up an Instant Pot on special at HEB a while back.

Have tried a bunch of recipes (mostly pork and chicken) and have found it convenient but not a knock-out in the flavor department.

One dish in particular kind of sums it up. It was a chicken recipe, if I'm not mistaken it was the one called "Instant Pot Lemon Garlic Chicken" with the obvious ingredients plus some oil, white wine, paprika, and a few others.

It was good, but not great. The next day, however, it was SO much better reheated. Kind of like the way lasagna or chili or soup is often better the next day - the flavors seem to meld better and the dish then seems "finished".

I find most things cooked in the IP strike me as having the same problem. Good, but not quite living up to the potential of the ingredients.

Has anyone come to this same conclusion, or are my wife and I alone in this opinion?

And, does anyone who gets what I'm saying have any recipes that clearly do NOT suffer from this problem?

Can't say I've had that problem. Our instant pot has been awesome. If it's bland, it needs more salt.

As far as recipes go, anything you would normally put in a crock pot or Dutch oven works nicely. Aka, anything that needs long cooking times simmering.

AustinAgChef's Chili comes to mind.
Carne Guisada. Fido has a great post on this.
Pot Roast. Search the forums for "The Braise" and a really great thread on this topic will come up.
Pulled pork!!
Awhile back I used my IP to cook a whole chicken until it was falling of the bone for a batch of chicken and dumplings.
Tomato soup. Food wishes has a great tomato bisque recipe. I like to cut out the heavy cream. Super low calorie.
Ribs you rub, then cook in the instant pot and finish underneath the broiler, with bbq sauce mixed with a little mustard and apple cider vinegar.

Ways to amplify flavor if the dish is bland:

Salt
Searing protein and veggies ahead of time.
Acid
Not using boneless skinless chicken breasts for anything except cooking on stovetop or baking.

I'm sure other posters will have more to say as well.

Sorry for the triple edit. Kept thinking of dishes we've made. As you can see, we use our IP a lot!

Three things are likely the cause: no evaporation, not enough searing, and trying to make something that it's not really suited for. When you cook in a pressure cooker, you don't get the evaporation that you normally would get in a stovetop or oven recipe. That means there's more water left in the dish. Plus, you don't get those concentrated bits that stick to the side of the pot and get stirred in. That adds flavor too.
Searing what goes in first in another pan will help add more flavor. The Sear function isn't hot enough to develop those flavors.
Finally, there's just some recipes that are better using another method. This falls into the category of just because you can doesn't mean you should.

i've found that adding more salt generally makes things much better than you would expect that simple addition to contribute.

HTownAg98 said:

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The Sear function isn't hot enough to develop those flavors.

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As long as you dont crowd the pan, I have not experienced this issue. I get really good browning on any meats I start in the pot on the saute function.

If you are using a standard recipe to cook something in an insta-pot, it's going to be too watery.

Love the IP

Made some great
Chili
Viet banh mi
Chicken adobo

Banh mi recipe?

CharlieBrown17 said:

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Banh mi recipe?

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it was on the FB asian instant pot group

2-3# pork belly slab

marinade:
2 Tbsp salt
2 Tbsp sugar
1 Tbsp light soy
4 tsp onion powder
2 tsp five spice
1 tsp black pepper
3-4 shallots minced
1-2 Tbsp red natural food coloring diluted in 1/2c water

mix marinade, rub on pork belly, refrigerate ~24hrs
remove belly, roll and tie using kitchen twine -- can do 1 roll or 2 smaller rolls

Sauce for pork:
3/4c light soy
1/4c mirin
1/2c water

Add sauce to IP
Add pork belly roll(s) to IP -- I also added leftover marinade

Seal lid, cook on high pressure for 1.5hr
Natural release ~15-20min
Remove pork and let it cook

Slice up and serve on bread with garnishes (cilantro, jalapeno, pickled carrots, cucumber, etc)


my wife does not like viet food much -- loved the banh mi
kids are not too picky and they loved it too

Thanks, on the list to try

I brown, like over brown, items and get the goodies off the bottom of my cast iron with a broth or wine. Some veggies need browning as well. As far as stuff not to do....chipolte "brisket". I had a throw away point from a lean steer and it tasted steamed. What is fail proof are steamed items like veggies, rice, soups, stocks, some sauces, ect.

It definitely takes fine tuning.