While Max was working on the chili for the SuperBowl Party (see blog entry below), I decided to make pulled pork in the insta-pot.  The hardest part of this recipe was cutting the fat off the pork shoulder…there was a lot of it and it took a while.  After that it was easy: rub a good spice mix on the pork, sautee it and put it in the insta-pot for about 60 minutes.  Usually this takes hours in the oven or crock pot, so it was amazing how quickly it cooked.  We served it with brioche buns.

The ingredients are pretty simple: whatever spices you want to rub in (I used paprika, cumin, onion powder, garlic powder and salt and pepper); vegetable oil to sautee the pork in, tomato paste, brown sugar and apple cider vinegar to cut the pork in (along with water)…and that was it.  Like I said the hardest part was getting the fat off the pork though.

(Me cutting away)  After I finally got the fat off, I decided to cut the shoulder up into a couple pieces so it would be easier to sautee…and would fit in the insta-pot.

Then I rubbed my spice mix on,  gave the pieces of pork a quick sautee.  After Imixed the tomato paste/brown sugar/vinegar/water mix in the insta-pot, I added the meat.  One key thing to remember when using an insta-pot is that you have to use rubber utensils so you don’t scratch the non-stick surface of the pot (we even bought a special teflon whisk since all the other whisks we had were metal.)

The pork cooked for 63 minutes, then I removed it and shredded it.  The last step was to separate the fat from the cooking liquid (so I could add the cooking liquid back to the pork if necessary).  I served it with barbecue sauce on the side.

Tonight we had our friends, the Coronas, over to watch the SuperBowl.  We decided to make turkey chili because a) that’s what you do for the SuperBowl and b) you can make it ahead of time and not worry about it during the game.  Unfortunately the game was pretty boring.  Fortunately the chili was really good and the Coronas brought home made guacamole that was delicious!  We also had pulled pork on the side (see related blog entry) for those few people who don’t like Chili!

Our recipe for turkey chili is pretty easy: ground turkey, onions, tomato sauce, chopped tomatoes and 3 kinds of beans (black, red kidney and cannelini..but you can use whatever kind you like.  We also added frozen corn (not pictured).

First step is to chop the onions, then you sautee the turkey and the onions.

Next step open all the cans, add the turkey/onions to the crock pot and then add all the other ingredients…let cook for 4-6 hours on high and, if you want to add corn, add it during the last 1/2 hour of cooking.

We served it with rice, grated cheese, sour cream, chopped scallions and sliced avocados…sorry no photos: we were watching the half time show.

Hi all, since we are half Swiss, one of our favorite meals to make and eat is cheese fondue, and it’s super easy.  Over MLK weekend we went skiing and what better cold weather/ski meal is there than cheese fondue? We also roasted some vegetables for Mom (she’s not Swiss so she doesn’t love cheese as much as we do).

The first step was to set the table with our Swiss napkins and placemats.  Then we grated a lot of gruyere and cut up a baguette into chunks.  Sometimes we use half gruyere cheese and half vacherin (that is called moitie-moitie…or half-half, but we didn’t have vacherin.)

Then we cut a piece of garlic in half and ran it around the inside of our swiss pot (called a caquelon) and we added the cheese (and a little white wine) and stirred constantly.  (We also chopped the veggies and put them in the oven with a little olive oil.)  When the cheese was completely melted and at the right gooey consistency, we transferred the pot to our fondue stand with a little heater underneath and enjoyed!  You don’t want the cheese to burn but you do want it liquid. Dad (who is Swiss) particularly likes the crust at the bottom of the caquelon…sort of like a cheesey cracker.  It’s called “la religieuse”, which means nun in french and none of us could figure out why.