Instant Pot for Two: Small-Batch Pressure Cooker Recipes

Chapter 1: Welcome to the Small-Batch Pressure Cooker

If you’re reading this, you probably already know the feeling. You pull out a recipe that promises to feed four, maybe six, and you do the math in your head. Halve the spices, quarter the sauce, try to figure out what to do with the half a can of diced tomatoes that’s now sitting in your fridge with no clear purpose. Or maybe you’ve made a full pot of chili, eaten it for three nights straight, and still had to freeze two containers that you’ll inevitably forget about until they’re furry with ice crystals six months from now.

This book is for that moment. It’s for the two of you—whether that’s a couple, two roommates, or just you and your own appetite—who want a real meal without the math, the waste, or the monotony. The Instant Pot is a remarkable machine, but most of the recipes out there are written for a family of four to six, sometimes more. They assume you want a week of leftovers, or that you have a crowd coming over. This book assumes you want dinner tonight, for two people, and that you want it to be good enough to feel like a treat, not a chore.

I’ve spent a lot of time cooking in a 6-quart Instant Pot, and I’ve learned that small-batch pressure cooking isn’t just about cutting a recipe in half. It’s a slightly different discipline. The liquid ratios change, the timing for vegetables