Instant Pot Chicken Lemon and Rice Soup (with Rotisserie Chicken). Greek Avgolemono soup, with homemade broth and shredded meat from a store-bought rotisserie chicken.

It's time to make one of my Greek restaurant favorites, avgolemono soup. (In Greece, this is pronounced Av-o-le-mow-no, with a silent G. In America, we use the G - Av-go-le-mow-no). It's a rice soup with chicken broth, with a bright lemon flavor, with a thick, creamy texture from the rice starch and eggs mixed in at the last minute.

This recipe is inspired by this one from Michael Symon: Avgolemono Recipe.

The key to great homemade soup is homemade chicken broth. I use my usual broth shortcut, Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Broth, as I do in a lot of my soups, like Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Noodle Soup and Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Tortilla soup.

(If you're looking for a non-soup rice and chicken dish, check out my Instant Pot Chicken and Rice.)

🥫Ingredients

• Rotisserie chicken (from the store)
• Onion
• Carrot
• Celery
• Bay Leaf
• Fine sea salt
• Arborio rice (or another short-grained rice)
• Corn starch
• Eggs
• Lemons
• Fresh dill (optional)

See the recipe card for details

How to make Instant Pot Chicken Lemon and Rice Soup (with Rotisserie Chicken) - Avgolemono

1. Make the broth: Remove the breast meat from the rotisserie chicken and set it aside for later. Put the rotisserie chicken carcass, onion, carrot, celery, bay leaf, fine sea salt, and 8 cups of water into an Instant Pot or another pressure cooker. Lock the lid and pressure cook for 60 minutes with a natural pressure release. Strain all the solids out of the broth, discard the solids, and set the broth aside.
2. Shred the breast meat from the rotisserie chicken. Put the rice, broth, shredded chicken, and 1 teaspoon of salt in the Instant Pot, lock the lid, and pressure cook for 5 minutes with a Quick pressure release. Remove the pot from the cooker and let the soup cool for 5 minutes.
3. Whisk the eggs, lemon juice, and corn starch, then slowly whisk in 1 cup of the soup broth into the egg mix to temper them. Whisk the tempered egg mix into the soup, top with minced dill, and enjoy.
   

What kind of rice should I use in Avgolemono?

I use starchy short-grain rice like I would in risotto. Arborio is the most common in my local grocery stores. Carnaroli, Vialone Nano, sushi rice, or other short-grain white rice varieties will also work. You can use long-grain or medium-grain rice in this recipe, but it won't come out quite as thick.

🥘 Substitutions

What if I don't have a Rotisserie Chicken?

If you already have chicken broth (like from my Instant Pot Chicken Back Broth), you can make the recipe without the rotisserie chicken. Substitute shredded leftover chicken for the rotisserie chicken breasts, or just skip the chicken meat in the soup.

Homemade Rotisserie Chicken

If you have a rotisserie attachment for your grill, you can make your own rotisserie chicken. (Did I mention I wrote a book on Rotisserie Chicken Grilling? I started making Rotisserie Chicken soups to use up the leftovers while I tested the recipes.)

Vegetarian Avgolemono

To make this recipe vegetarian: Use vegetable broth (like my Pressure Cooker Vegetable Broth) and skip the chicken breasts. Skip the egg, double the corn starch, and whisk the corn starch and lemon juice to make a slurry before slowly whisking it into the soup.

Kid-friendly

Avgolemono is a very lemon-forward soup. (it's right there in the name, "lemono".) But my kids preferred it with less (or no) lemon. And, chicken and rice soup is great, even without the lemon, so I can't fault them. (I still prefer the lots of lemon version myself.)

Why use cornstarch in this soup?

To give the soup the ultra-thick mouthfeel it has at local Greek restaurants. The natural starch in the short-grain rice, and the egg, thicken this soup. . It is optional, though. Or, if you have it, you can substitute rice starch for cornstarch.

Do I have to make homemade chicken broth?

You really should try pressure cooking your own chicken broth, at least once, and you'll see why I insist on it. It's easy to make in an Instant Pot and freezes well. It's one of the secret ingredients that make restaurant food taste so good. Homemade broth was one of the things that converted me to pressure cooking; once I tried a soup made with homemade chicken broth, I couldn't go back.

That said…

If homemade broth is a bridge too far, go ahead and buy 64 ounces of store-bought broth. If you use store-bought broth, unless it is salt-free, skip the teaspoon of fine sea salt I add to the pot with the broth.

🛠 Equipment

• A 6-quart pressure cooker
• A fine mesh strainer
• A second inner pot for your Instant Pot (makes it easy to strain the broth, from one pot to the other.)
  

📏Scaling

This recipe can be doubled in an 8-quart pressure cooker. If you want to halve the recipe for a 3-quart pressure cooker, you can, but you'll have to find half a rotisserie chicken. (Or chop a whole rotisserie chicken in half and save the other half for another recipe.) The cooking time does not change; it takes the same amount of time to make the broth and cook the rice.

☃️ Storage

You can make the broth ahead of time - refrigerate it and the shredded chicken breasts until you are ready to make the soup. It will last for a couple of days in the refrigerator, or for up to 6 months in the freezer, separated into 2-cup storage containers.

This soup can be made ahead, but the egg may separate when reheating. I store leftover soup in 2-cup containers and refrigerate it for a couple of days, or freeze it for up to 6 months.

💡Tips and Tricks

• Tempering the eggs: Tempering eggs means slowly heating the eggs, so they don't scramble. I temper the eggs by letting the soup cool for a little bit. Then I slowly whisk a cup of the warm soup liquid into the eggs, gently bringing them up to temperature. Tempering is the same cooking technique used in custards and pastry creams, where the eggs are heated enough to work as a thickener, but not so much that they curdle or scramble. If the eggs are dropped straight into the hot soup, we get a Greek-style egg drop soup. (Which still tastes good, but is not what we're looking for.)
  

What to Serve with Instant Pot Chicken Lemon and Rice Soup

Soup and salad may be a cliché, but it's a cliché I can get behind. I lean into the Greek aspect of this soup and serve it with a Greek Salad and pita bread. It's also a good match for Eastern Mediterranean dishes, like Pressure Cooker Hummus or Grilled Beef Kabobs.

🤝 Related Posts

Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken and Wild Rice Soup
Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken and Lentil Soup
Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Jalapeno Popper Soup
Rotisserie Chicken with Spanish Smoked Paprika Rub
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes

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Instant Pot Chuck Steak with Beer and Onions. Beer-braised steak and onions from the pressure cooker.

Chuck steak and onions braised in beer…sounds great, doesn't it? Well, it is, and it's easy if you have an Instant Pot or other pressure cooker. The pressure cooking tenderizes the tougher Chuck steaks, making them fall apart on the fork, and the beer, beef juices, and onions make a great sauce to top the steaks, or to pour over some mashed potatoes.

🥫Ingredients

• Vegetable oil
• Beef Chuck Steaks
• Fine sea salt
• Paprika
• Fresh ground black pepper
• Onions
• Dried Thyme
• Beer
• Chicken broth

See recipe card for quantities

🥘 Substitutions

• There are a bunch of different chuck steaks: chuck eye steak, blade steak or top blade steak, flat iron steak, mock tender steak…the list goes on. If it's cut from the chuck, and about 1-inch thick, it will work in this recipe.
• You can also use round steaks, though I don't like the flavor of Round as much as I do chuck, so I tend to save Round for beef stews.
• Finally, please don't use an actual, good steak, like ribeye, New York strip, sirloin, or (shudder) tenderloin in this recipe. This recipe is to braise a cheap steak, and will ruin a good one. Good steak cuts are too lean to stand up to pressure cooking, and are best cooked to (at most) medium. (I love a great grilled steak.)
• For the beer, I prefer a darker beer, to add more flavor to the braise. Think amber ale, porter, or stout. That said, any beer will work, and if you want to skip the beer, just replace it with chicken broth.

🛠 Equipment

A 6-quart pressure cooker.

📏Scaling

This recipe can be scaled up or down, but don't change the amount of cooking liquid. You need 2 cups of liquid in the pot, no matter how many steaks you want to cook. To scale the recipe down, halve all the ingredients except for the beer and chicken broth, and it will fit into a 3-quart pressure cooker. You can double the recipe in a 6-quart pressure cooker, but it's a tight fit, and I prefer to get out my 8-quart pressure cooker.

💡Tips and Tricks

• Why do I brown the meat on only one side? Browning adds a lot of flavor to the recipe. Browning the meat itself adds flavor to the steaks, and the layer of caramelized brown bits left in the pot ("fond" in French) dissolve into the liquid, adding depth and body. That said, I only brown the beef on one side, unlike traditional recipes; it takes too long to brown the meat on all sides - I do not have the patience. Browning one side gives me the best balance of flavor and speed.
• Can I skip the browning step? Well, yes, you can, but as I said above, you're going to lose some of the flavor. I consider it an essential step, but if it's the difference between making the recipe and not having time to make the recipe, go ahead and skip it.

Storage

This braise can be made a day ahead, refrigerated, and reheated - if anything, it tastes better this way, thanks to a day of letting the flavors mingle. It also lets the fat float to the top and solidify, so you can scrape it off with a spoon (and skip the defatting step).

To store for later, portion into 2-cup containers, add the sauce, and refrigerate for up to 3 days, or freeze for up to 6 months. (This recipe freezes beautifully.)

Related Posts

Instant Pot Oxtail
Instant Pot BBQ Braised Short Ribs
Instant Pot Pork Shoulder Chops with Apples and Onions
Instant Pot Beef Tips
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes

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Instant Pot Lemon Pepper Wings. Sauced lemon pepper chicken wings make a great dinner or appetizer.

I've seen lemon pepper wings around, but I didn't realize how important they were to Atlanta's food scene until I read Eric Kim's article in the New York Times. After reading the article, I had to make them myself…

…and I know, I know. Nothing screams "Northerner!" more than a guy from Ohio reading about Lemon Pepper wings in the New York Times. But, when have I ever let that stop me? I was looking for a new flavor for my Instant Pot Chicken Wings, and I always see lemon pepper seasoning at the store, so I had to give it a try. They aren't all that hot - black pepper gives them a little bit of bite, but not much. What they are is a great mix of sweet, spice, and tart lemon flavor. They're definitely worth the effort.

(Looking for a bigger southern-style wing? Try my Instant Pot Turkey Wings)

🥫Ingredients

• Chicken Wings
• Lemon Pepper Seasoning
• Butter
• Brown Sugar
• Ground Coriander
• Lemon juice

See recipe card for quantities, or for details on making your own sauce and rub

🥘 Substitutions

Chicken Wings: When I can, I buy "party wing" packs from my local grocery store, so I don't have to butcher the wings myself. If you do by whole wings, get a little extra, to make up for the lost weight from the tips - you only want the wingette (or flat) and drumette pieces of the wing.

Frozen Chicken Wings: If you have individually frozen wings, you can cook them directly from frozen - cook at high pressure for 12 minutes with a quick release. But, the lemon pepper seasoning won't stick to the wings as well if they are frozen. (Especially if they are ice glazed.) Use half the lemon pepper seasoning on the frozen wings before cooking, and then sprinkle the other half on the cooked wings, right before tossing them in the sauce.

Lemon Pepper Seasoning: There are all sorts of lemon pepper seasonings available. The big question is "how much salt do they have"? Most of the ones I could get had a plenty of salt - listed as the first or second ingredient in the ingredients list. If you get a salt-free lemon pepper blend, or one where salt is way down in the ingredient list, sprinkle a couple of teaspoons of fine sea salt on the wings before the lemon pepper blend.

Butter: Now we're moving into the Lemon Pepper Sauce section of the ingredients. Butter is the traditional liquid base for wing sauces - it clings better to the wings, and, frankly, tastes better. That said, If you want to substitute vegetable oil, you can.

Brown Sugar is my preferred sweetener for this wing sauce, and gives the sauce its tart/sweet flavor.

Ground Coriander: Optional, but I love coriander. It adds an extra spice and lemon depth to the sauce.

Lemon juice: Preferably from a fresh lemon - you need about a half a lemon's worth of juice for this recipe.

If you want dry wings, replace the "sauce the wings" step with an extra sprinkle of lemon pepper seasoning before broiling.

🛠 Equipment

A 6-quart pressure cooker and the pressure cooker rack that came with your pot. Or, you can substitute a steamer basket for the rack, which makes lifting the wings out of the pot easy.

📏Scaling

This recipe can be scaled up or down, but don't change the amount of cooking liquid. You only need 1 cup of liquid in the pot, no matter how many wings you want to cook. To scale the recipe, use 2 teaspoons of lemon pepper seasoning per pound of chicken wings. If you cut the recipe down to 2 pounds of wing pieces, it will fit in a 3-quart pressure cooker. Scaling up runs into space issues. I can get 4 pounds of wings into my 6-quart pressure cooker, but if I want to cook more than that I reach for my 8-quart pressure cooker.

💡Tips and Tricks

• Pressure cooker rack - the rack keeps the wings above the steaming liquid, so they cook a little more evenly. I used to use the rack that came with my pot, but I switched to my vegetable steamer basket, because the easy-grab handle lets me lift the wings out all at once.
• Broiling the wings is an extra step, but well worth the effort. While chicken wings are good straight out of the pressure cooker, they aren't crispy, like a deep fried wing. Broiling the wings for a couple of minutes crisps up the skin a bit and adds a lot to the flavor and texture.

☃️ Storage

I don't think chicken wings store well. I eat them right after cooking. I will save leftovers in the refrigerator, where they're OK for the next day or two, but they're just not as good as they are when they're hot.

🤝 Related Posts

Instant Pot Chicken Wings
Pressure Cooker Asian Zing Chicken Wings (From Frozen)
Instant Pot Korean Gochujang Chicken Wings
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes

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Instant Pot Ragù Tucci. Stanley Tucci's family meat sauce, long-simmered tomatoes with beef and pork ribs, adapted to pressure cooking.

I couldn't put down Stanley Tucci's food memoir Taste: My Life Through Food. It's a fun, funny read, with recipes. (The best books are ones "with recipes" - but I may be biased.)

I read the book looking for stories about Big Night, my favorite food movie of all time, and it delivered. But Mr. Tucci has so many great stories to share. My favorite is "The Departure", a dramatization of his Grandma pushing tomatoes on his Mom, with the header: "It's important to note that these people all love each other very much."

Ragu Tucci is the long-simmered tomato sauce, rich with beef short ribs and pork country ribs, made by his father's side of the family.

This recipe will make enough ragu to sauce two pounds of pasta, which is the point of a ragu in the first place - using a little bit of meat to make a big batch of sauce. And what a sauce it is - rich and meaty, even without the meat. I use it in a second meal, as a sauce with pasta. If I have any meat leftover, I shred it and add it to the sauce, but if I don't, then I just save the sauce - it is meaty and loaded with flavor, so I don't care if it's a "plain" pasta sauce.

Ingredients

• Olive oil
• Beef short ribs
• Pork country-style shoulder ribs
• Fine sea salt
• Onion
• Garlic
• Tomato paste
• Red wine
• Canned San Marzano whole peeled tomatoes
• Fresh basil leaves
• Dried oregano

See recipe card for quantities.

Substitutions

Olive oil: Vegetable oil or butter are good substitutes. I use extra-virgin olive oil, because it's what I keep on hand in my pantry, but any olive oil will do, because heating it to brown the meat cooks out most of the flavor that makes extra-virgin oil worth the extra cost.

Beef short ribs and Pork country style ribs: We want bone-in beef and pork, because the bones give up their gelatin to the sauce as they cook. It's kind of like making chicken broth or beef broth, where the meat helps flavor the cooking liquid. If you have more beef or pork ribs, that's fine, just try for a total of 4 pounds of bone-in meat.

Instead of the beef short ribs, you can substitute beef shanks or thick-cut bone-in chuck steaks.

Pork country-ribs shoulder ribs are cut from the shoulder side of the pork loiny. Or, you can substitute pork spareribs, cut between the bones.

Onion and garlic are traditional Italian aromatics. If you want to add diced carrot or celery you can, but I like the simplicity of just onion and garlic.

Tomato paste: You can skip the tomato paste if you want, but adding it - and taking the time to brown it a bit before adding the rest of the ingredients -

A little red wine helps bring out the alcohol-soluble flavors in the dish, but if you are avoiding alcohol, just add more water.

Chicken broth vs water: homemade chicken broth is a great substitute for the water, but if you don't have it, water is fine. As I said above, the beef and pork bones will help give the sauce that bone broth richness.

Canned San Marzano whole peeled tomatoes: San Marzano DOP tomatoes are fantastic…and expensive. I get good results with American brands of canned plum tomatoes, which are less than half the price of San Marzano tomatoes. The big difference between Italian and American canned tomatoes was the amount of salt in the can. Italian tomatoes don't have salt; they need some, or the sauce comes out tasting a little flat.

Fresh basil leaves and Dried oregano: Mr. Tucci recommends these herbs, and I can't argue - but sometimes I cheat and replace them both with 2 teaspoons of dried Italian Seasoning, which has both dried basil and dried oregano already in it.

Equipment

A 6-quart pressure cooker

Scaling

Doubling this recipe needs an 8-quart pressure cooker; the standard amounts in the recipe just fit below the max fill line of a 6-quart pressure cooker. If you cut all the ingredients in half, this recipe will fit in a 3-quart pressure cooker. The cooking time does not change; it takes the same amount of time to cook the pieces of beef and pork rib, no matter how many there are.

Tips and Tricks

• In an Italian meal, the sauce and meat are served in separate courses. First, serve the pasta and tomato sauce as the Primi course, then serve the meat as the Secondi course.
• As Mr. Tucci says: "Meat, unless it is actually a part of the sauce, as with ragù alla Bolognese, is meant to be served separately... These are the rules that have existed for generations, and I am happy to abide by them, as they make sense."
• This recipe makes extra sauce on purpose. That's right - this is two (or three?) meals for the price of one. I shred whatever meat is left over, add it to the leftover sauce, and freeze it in 4-cup containers. Each 4 cup container will sauce about a pound of pasta.
• Mr. Tucci says this should be served with a pasta that has a firm tube that will hold the sauce, like Ziti, Ziti Rigati, Rigatoni or Penne pasta. Do NOT serve this with spaghetti, or Mr. Tucci will give you a very disapproving look.

Why brown on one side?

There's a lot of flavor in browned meat - it adds depth and body to the sauce. But, the old school approach of browning all sides of meat takes forever, especially with the narrow width of a pressure cooker. So, I short cut the process by only browning one side of the beef ribs, and then one side of the pork ribs. (I brown them meaty side down, bone side up.) That gives me browned bits on the bottom of the pot, which melt into the sauce and build flavor.

Adapted from: Ragu Tucci, Taste: My Life Through Food

Storage

This recipe makes extra sauce on purpose - there is enough for a second pound of pasta - and maybe even a third; 4 cups of sauce will sauce a pound of pasta.

I pull any leftover meat off of the bones, shred it, and stir it into the sauce. Then I store the sauce in 4-cup containers. They keep for a couple of days in the refrigerator, of frozen for up to 6 months. Each 4-cup container will sauce a pound of pasta.

Related Posts

Instant Pot Arrabbiata Sauce
Pressure Cooker Quick Tomato Sauce
Instant Pot Marcella Hazan Tomato Sauce
Pressure Cooker Italian Sausage Sauce
Instant Pot Fettuccine Alfredo Recipe
Instant Pot Braciole
Instant Pot Short Rib Ragu
Instant Pot Baked Ziti
Instant Pot Tomato Soup
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes
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Instant Pot Hawaiian BBQ Ribs. Pacific fusion, combining BBQ ribs with island flavors, in about an hour in my pressure cooker.

I'm eating Hawaiian BBQ Ribs. You have to make them for me when I get home.

My wife, texting me from Florida. (Who am I to argue with a request for ribs?)

I think of Hawaiian food as the ultimate Pacific Fusion cuisine. From the middle of the Pacific, Hawaii pulls flavors from the east and west into its own unique dishes. In this case, it's a mix of US barbecued ribs and Hawaiian Huli Huli sauce, which is itself a combo of Japanese teriyaki sauce and Hawaiian pineapple.

This recipe is based on my baby back ribs technique. You won't believe how good pressure cooker ribs are until you try them, and this recipe is a simple one to start with.

🥫Ingredients

• Baby back ribs
• Fine sea salt
• Soy sauce
• Liquid smoke
• Hawaiian BBQ Sauce or Teriyaki-Pineapple Sauce
• Barbecue Rub

See recipe card for quantities, or for details on making your own sauce and rub

🥘 Substitutions

You can substitute spareribs, shoulder country-style ribs, or western ribs for the baby back ribs. The cooking time and ingredients stay the same.

I add soy sauce and liquid smoke to the steaming water, but they are both optional; you can go with 1 cup of water, and skip the soy sauce and liquid smoke.

Barbecue rub: I mix up my own salt free BBQ rub, and then add the salt separately. If you use store-bought BBQ rub, it will probably have plenty of salt in it., Check the ingredient list; if salt is the #1 or #2 ingredient on the list, skip the salt in the recipe.

Hawaiian BBQ sauce is based on Huli Huli sauce. Huli-Huli sauce is actually a marinade, so it is kind of thin. I mix up my own ketchup-thickened version for my ribs, or buy one of the many Hawaiian barbecue sauces available at my local grocery store. Or, I go for Teriyaki-Pineapple sauce - the big difference between teriyaki-pineapple and Hawaiian BBQ sauce is the BBQ sauce has tomato in it.

Frozen Pineapple Juice concentrate - this was surprisingly hard for me to find at my local grocery stores. If you can't find it, get regular pineapple juice, and simmer the sauce for 5 minutes or so to thicken it up. That's why I use frozen concentrate - it's already thick enough, and doesn't need a simmer.

Liquid smoke.

I know Liquid Smoke weirds some people out, so I make it optional in the recipe. Liquid smoke is a natural product, distilled from wood smoke condensation. Beyond the smoky flavor, I find it adds a meaty, umami flavor when I add it to my pressure cooking liquid. That said, it is optional; skip it if you don't want it (or don't have it).

🛠 Equipment

A 6-quart pressure cooker and the pressure cooker rack that came with your pot.

📏Scaling

This recipe can be scaled up or down, but don't change the amount of cooking liquid. You only need 1 cup of liquid in the pot, no matter how many ribs you want to cook. To scale the recipe down, use a half slab, cut into two 3-rib sections. Scaling up runs into space issues. Most of the time I can fit two racks of ribs in my 6-quart pressure cooker, but a few times I've had particularly large racks of baby backs, and I had to get out my 8-quart pressure cooker.

😤Barbecue Disclaimer (in a Vain Attempt to Head Off Angry Comments)

I know this is not "real barbecue". (Real barbecue baby back ribs recipe here.) These are pressure-braised baby back ribs with barbecue sauce. And…they are good eats, even if they are not "true barbecue". (This disclaimer is a doomed attempt to head off "well, actually" comments by barbecue purists…if they bother to read the recipe before they angrily start typing. Oh, well.)

💡Tips and Tricks

• Pressure cooker rack - the rack keeps the ribs above the steaming liquid, so they cook a little more evenly. I use the one that came with my pot, or this fancy silicone one, to keep the ribs above the steaming liquid. That said, if you don't have the rack any more, just put the first couple of slabs in the pot with the bone side down. They'll be extra-tender from cooking in the liquid, but will still be fine to eat.
• Removing the membrane. You can skip this if it's too much work…but the membrane on the back of ribs will stay tough and chewy no matter how long you cook them.
• Homemade vs Store-Bought rub and sauce. Really, it's up to you. I like making my own, but I have been known to take the store-bought shortcut when I don't have them made up in my pantry.

☃️ Storage

The BBQ rub can be made months ahead of time; I mix up big batches of it and store them in my pantry. The barbecue sauce can also be made ahead of time, and will keep in the refrigerator for weeks.

🤝 Related Posts

Pressure Cooker Baby Back Ribs
Instant Pot Spare Ribs with BBQ Rub and Sauce
Instant Pot Baby Back Rib Sandwich (With Real Baby Back Ribs)
Rotisserie Pineapple
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes

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Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Jalapeno Popper Soup. Creamy, spicy soup, inspired by Jalapeño Poppers, made with pressure cooker broth from a store-bought rotisserie chicken.

My local coffee shop had Chicken Jalapeño Popper Soup as their featured soup of the month. What a great idea. I have to make that!

Their ingredient list was: Bacon, jalapeño, green pepper, chicken, cream, Monterey jack, sharp cheddar, cream cheese, and "spices". So, I got to work…and did some Googling. Turns out, that's a pretty standard ingredient list. Time to break out my Rotisserie Chicken broth technique and get to work.

The only real trick seemed to be from the Jalapeño Popper Chicken Soup recipe at Better Homes & Gardens, where they recommend whisking the cream cheese with a little of the broth to make sure it is completely smooth before adding it to the soup. This is a much creamier soup than my typical Rotisserie Chicken soups - between the flour, half-and-half, and 3 melted cheeses, it very, VERY rich.

🥫Ingredients

• Rotisserie chicken
• Onion
• Carrot
• Celery
• Bay Leaf
• Bacon
• Green onions
• Green bell pepper
• Jalapeño
• Garlic
• flour
• half and half
• Cream cheese
• Monterrey jack cheese
• Cheddar cheese

See recipe card for quantities.

🥘 Substitutions

If you have a leftover roast chicken carcass, substitute it for the rotisserie chicken. Pick as much meat off the bones as you can, then pressure cook the broth with the bones and any skin or clinging meat that's left.

If you already have chicken broth (from, say, a batch of Chicken Back Broth) you can skip the chicken. Jalapeño popper soup on its own is quite good. I cook a little extra bacon to make up for the missing chicken, but you don't have to.

You can substitute leftover chicken and store-bought low sodium chicken broth - but please, try making pressure cooker broth at some point. You'll be surprised by how much better it tastes.

The onion, carrot, celery, and bay leaf in the broth are my favorite mix of aromatics, but you don't have to have all of them. You can skip any of them, or substitute more of the ones you have. If you like garlic, adding or substitute a couple of unpeeled cloves of garlic for the onion is a great addition.

You can make this a vegetarian soup by substituting vegetable broth for the chicken broth, and skipping the chicken and bacon. (Unfortunately, it can't be vegan. The cream and cheese are too important to substitute.)

The bacon is optional, but traditional in jalapeño poppers, and it adds a nice crunch to the soup.

If you don't have green onions, you can substitute a diced yellow or white onion. The garlic is optional.

If you don't like it hot, substitute two more green bell peppers for the jalapeños. (But why are you making Jalapeño Popper Soup if you don't like the heat?) If you like it extra hot, add a half teaspoon of cayenne pepper with the flour to kick up the heat.

The flour and half and half add extra creaminess to the recipe. You can skip them, or substitute more broth for the half and half, but this is supposed to be a cream soup, so I don't recommend it.

The mix of cream cheese, Monterrey jack, and cheddar are what stuff a regular jalapeño popper, so they're what I include in the soup. Cream cheese adds its tang and smoothness, Monterey Jack acts as a thick melting cheese, and cheddar has the flavor, so I try to get all of them for this soup. If you're missing any of them, just substitute an equal amount of the others.

🛠 Equipment

A 6-quart pressure cooker

📏Scaling

This recipe scales down down easily - cut everything in half if you don't need as much soup, or have a 3-quart pressure cooker. Scaling up runs into space issues. If you have an 8-quart pressure cooker, you can double this recipe, but it's too much to fit in a 6-quart pressure cooker. The cooking time is the same as the regular recipe, even if you scale up or down.

💡Tips and Tricks

• I'm tricking you into extra homemade broth with this recipe - a whole rotisserie chicken will make 8 cups of broth, but you only need 4 cups for this recipe. Refrigerate the leftover broth for up to 3 days, or freeze it for up to 6 months, and you can make a second batch of soup whenever you're ready.
• Pressure cooker broth is my other PC killer application. (I'm borrowing the killer app phrase from my years working in the computer industry.) I started using my pressure cooker on a regular basis because of the awesome chicken broth it makes. Homemade chicken broth is the key to a good soup, so please, try it at least once. I think you will become a homemade broth fan, like me.

☃️ Storage

This recipe makes extra broth on purpose - there is enough for a second batch of soup. I freeze any broth I'm not going to use immediately in 2-cup and 4-cup containers, usually canning jars. Frozen broth keeps for up to 6 months.

The broth can be made ahead before making the soup - refrigerate or freeze the broth and the chicken breasts - and then start the recipe with the "cook the bacon" step when you are ready.

This soup, like most cream soups, doesn't store as well as a typical broth-based soup. You can refrigerate it in 2-cup containers for a couple of days, or freeze for up to six months, but the fat in the cream may separate and float to the top. It will still taste fine, but needs a good whisking to bring the soup and fat back together.

🤝 Related Posts

Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Noodle Soup
Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken and Wild Rice Soup
Instant Pot Rotisserie Chicken Gumbo Soup
Instant Pot Chicken Pot Pie Soup (with Rotisserie Chicken)
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes

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Instant Pot Pressure Steamed Lobster. Whole, live lobsters, pressure steamed in minutes.

Because it's there

George Mallory, on why to climb Mt. Everest

Steamed lobster? In a pressure cooker? Is that…possible?

I ran across this recipe from my friends at Zavor for pressure cooker steamed lobster, and still didn't believe it. So, I had to try it myself. And, you know what?

It worked (Of course it worked, or I wouldn't be writing this recipe.) I was surprised how well it worked. I was worried about overcooked, rubbery lobster - pressure steaming seems aggressive for something this tender - but it came out great.

Now, if I'm cooking a lot of lobsters, I'm pulling my lobster pot out of storage. If I need a lobster or two for use in another recipe? I'm keeping this technique in my back pocket.

🥫Ingredients

• Lobster
• Salt

See recipe card for quantities.

🛠 Equipment

A 6-quart pressure cooker will work, but it's a tight fit, even for 1 lobster. If you have an 8-quart pressure cooker, use it, and you won't have to wrestle the lobster to get it in the pot.

📏Scaling

If you have an 8-quart or larger pressure cooker, you can cook two, and maybe three lobsters. Don't add any extra water - the 2 cups generates enough steam for the whole pot, regardless of the number of lobsters.

💡 Lobster Tips and Tricks

• Get a good grip on the back of the lobster, away from the claws, then snip the rubber bands off the lobster claws right before putting them in the pot. Be careful of the claws - the larger one is called the Crusher Claw for a reason. (The other one is the Pincer Claw, which you don't want to mess with either.)
• If you're nervous about the claws, leave the rubber bands on. I have read that they can add an off taste to the meat, but I've never tasted it.
• Before cooking, keep the lobsters refrigerated. It makes the lobsters less active, and easier to get into the pot.
• After cooking, save the shells to make lobster broth (recipe coming soon).
• What should you do with the lobster meat once you've cooked it? Lobster rolls.

Inspired by: Steamed Lobster | ZAVOR®

☃️ Storage

Cooked lobster is not good for long-term storage. Lobster meat, picked from the shell, will last in the refrigerator for a day, maybe two on the outside. If I need to store it longer, I freeze it, where it is good for a few months.

🤝 Related Posts

Lobster Rolls
Grilled Paella with Shellfish, Chorizo, and Chicken (Paella Mixta)
My other Instant Pot and Pressure Cooker Recipes

Enjoyed this post? Want to help out DadCooksDinner? Subscribe to DadCooksDinner via email and share this post with your friends. Want to contribute directly? Donate to my Tip Jar, or buy something from Amazon.com through the links on this site. Thank you.