serves 4
Active time: 20 minutes – Start to finish: 1hr 10min
This recipe is from Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street Fast and Slow. I was looking for a lighter dish to make, so leafing through the chicken section. What caught my attention, beside the fact that it has ginger in it and I LOVE ginger, was that the braise in this recipe was inspired by a recipe from The Slanted Door – an AMAZING restaurant in San Francisco.
note: don’t forget to remove the skin from the chicken thighs. If you leave it on, the cooking liquid will be too greasy. I forgot initially, but then canceled the cooking, removed the skin and then restarted the Instant Pot. Why they don’t say to buy the thighs without skin is beyond me. I googled and didn’t find anything other than it’s cheaper.
Ingredients
- 1 TBL grapeseed or other neutral oil
- 5 medium garlic closes, finely chopped
- 3-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and sliced into coins
- 4 tsp fish sauce
- ½ cup sake
- 3 pounds bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs, skin removed and discarded, trimmed
- 1 TBL cornstarch
- 5 scallions, thinly sliced on the diagonal, white and green parts reserved separately
- 1 fresno or serrano chili, halved, seeded and thinly sliced
- 1 tsp unseasoned rice vinegar
- serve with jasmine rice, along with coarsely cracked white or black pepper. I also threw together some baby bok choy sautéed with ginger in roasted peanut sauce as a veggie side.
Directions
- START
- On a 6-quart Instant Pot, select Normal/Medium Sauté
- Add the oil and heat until shimmering
- Add the garlic and ginger, then cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 30 seconds
- Add the fish sauce and sake, then bring to a gentle simmer
- Nestle the chicken in an even layer slightly overlapping the pieces, if needed.
- Press Cancel, lock the lid in place and move and move the pressure valve to Sealing (mine does this automatically)
- Select Pressure Cook or Manual; make sure the pressure level is set to HIGH.
- Set the cooking time for 10 minutes ← not a typo!
- When pressure cooking is complete, allow the pressure to reduce naturally, then release the remaining steam by moving the pressure valve to Venting (mine has a release valve)
- Press Cancel, then carefully open the pot
- FINISH
- Using tongs, transfer the chicken to a serving dish and tent with foil
- In a small bowl, whisk together the cornstarch and ¼ cup of the cooking liquid until combined
- Stir the mixture into the pot along with the scallion whites and half of the scallion greends
- Select Normal/Medium Sauté
- Bring to a simmer and cook, stirring constantly, until the sauce is lightly thickened, about 1 minute
- Stir in the chilies and vinegar
- Press Cancel to turn off the pot
- Using potholders, carefully remove the insert from the housing and pour the sauce over the chicken
- Sprinkle with the remaining scallion greens
| Recommended products | |
  | Here’s a link for ordering Milk Street Fast and Slow on Amazon. I gave the book a complete read through the day it arrived. Christopher does a fantastic job at explaining all the tricks to using an Instant Pot that I have yet to read anywhere else. |
  | I purchased the Instant Pot Duo Plus from Amazon in early December 2020. With all the cooking I’m doing now, I was looking for ways to create yummy meals that didn’t require as much supervision so that I could chill more in the evenings. |
  | I had trouble finding fish sauce at the local grocery stores in Washington DC, where I was when I first made this recipe; though I did find it at Whole Foods. Here a link for Red Boat Fish Sauce on Amazon. |
  | I use roasted peanut oil for the bok choy. The brand of roasted peanut oil that I had been using forever, stopped production during COVID. I discovered this brand on Amazon; it has a five star rating from over 900 consumers. |