I can’t have enough chicken recipes, no one can in fact. It is one of the most frequently eaten protein at home and there is always a demand for new chicken dishes. I have tons of chicken recipes on the blog and I keep adding more and more to the collection. Like most of my recipes, this recipe is also done entirely in the instant pot. It is quick, easy and so so delicious.
I prefer to use chicken thighs with bone-in and w/o skin. I remain juicy and soaks up all the flavours well. Roasting the chicken thighs first helps to build up the flavour. So first season the chicken thighs and roast each side for 2-3 minutes until little brown spot start appearing. The next thing we need to keep in mind is the cooking time for chicken thighs in the instant pot. Because we have already roasted the chicken for about 4-5 minutes, the chicken is partially cooked. So instead of the usual cooking time of 8 mins, we are going to cook the chicken for only 5 minutes. This ensures the chicken is not overcooked and still juicy. Mince onion and garlic really fine, so that the sauce has a smooth texture to it. Now the important step is when to add the cream. One of the most common issues I hear is the cream splits and makes the sauce grainy. So here is a little tip, make sure the flame is off while adding the cream to the pan ( in this case the Instant Pot should be off). After adding the cream mix everything well and don’t boil the sauce. So it is always recommended to add cream to the end. Alos heavy full fat cream has less chances of spliting.
Second, cooking frozen chicken in Instant pot tends to release more liquid than the fresh one. To adjust the total amount of liquid in the recipe. In this recipe, you can alternatively use frozen chicken thighs. The only step that you need to skip is the browning of the chicken. If using frozen chicken thighs with skin, once the chicken is cooked take the skin off (because No browning of chicken thigs = rubbery skin when cooked). So start with browning the onion and garlic in butter in saute mode. Then add wine to deglaze the pot, followed by tomato sauce and seasoning ( I would add a teaspoon more because the chicken is without seasoning). Add frozen chicken thighs and cook on high ( full pressure) for 15 minutes, followed by natural pressure release for 10 minutes. Release any remaining pressure manually and open the lid. If the amount of liquid is more, put the pot back to saute mode. Cook for 5 minutes more to evaporate the extra liquid and get the desired consistency. Switch off the instant pot and add cream to it. Mix everything well.
Can I Use Chicken Breast Instead?
Chicken breast cooks beautifully moist in Instant Pot. You can use chicken breast instead of chicken thigh in this recipe as well with minor changes to the recipe. Chicken breast gets cooked in fairly less time. I have tried this recipe with chicken breast with a couple of variations. Browning chicken breast and then cooking it on high pressure(reduced it to 4 minutes) resulted in dry rubbery chicken. The chicken also didn’t absorb any flavours. On the second try, I skipped browning the chicken and cooked on high pressure for 7 minutes, followed by natural pressure release for 10 minutes. Chicken breast turned out to be moist and flavourful. First of all, every time the pot is giving a burn notice doesn’t mean something has burned. It might be an indication that the bottom layer of the pot has some brown bits stuck. So it is very important to deglaze the pot to release any brown patches from the bottom. Like in the above recipe, White wine is added to deglaze the pan. Another reason for the burn notice could be because of very little liquid in the pot. In the recipe, the amount of tomato sauce is enough for the chicken. Also when the chicken thigh gets cooked it releases liquid. The last reason could be the Inner pot is very hot, while setting it to manual high-pressure mode. In this recipe, first, chicken thighs are being sauteed followed by onion and garlic. If you tend to get frequent burn notification in your IP, then after you saute the chicken thighs, switch off the IP and let it cool down a bit. Then again switch to saute mode and start cooking onion and garlic.
