This recipe will curdle. It’s just a fact of pressure cooking dairy with the Instant Pot. But, it totally works out in the end, and no one will know about the (deliberately curdled) disaster. Plus, it’s made in half the time. Chicken and vegetables are cooked separately with a pot-in-pot.
Chicken cooked in cream is a standard Ukrainian Sunday meal. This recipe is a much faster, one-pot dinner in about an hour.
This chicken dinner is the meal my Baba would make on Sunday – though with a whole chicken and not boneless, skinless chicken thighs. The chicken would slowly cook in the cream while the family went to church.
New potatoes (like I’ve used) were only something in June and July. It’s somewhat amazing that we can get new potatoes all year round.
Burn warning: I make this recipe in a 6-quart Instant Pot Duo. If you use a different sized Instant Pot, you may get a burn warning. Making both parts (chicken and vegetables) pot-in-pot prevent that.
Mix ½ all purpose flour with 1 teaspoon paprika and 1 teaspoon of freshly ground pepper together in a bowl.
Coat the chicken pieces in the flour. If you’re also using chicken thighs, make sure to unfurl them. Bone-in chicken works just as well. Or use a variety of pieces – but I found chicken breast didn’t work well unless it’s cut into smaller pieces.
Choose a multiple of 3 for the chicken thighs. It’s easiest to manage 3 chicken thighs at a time without overcrowding.
Heat the Instant Pot to Medium with the Saute setting. Brown three chicken thighs at a time for 4 minutes per side.
Top the Instant Pot with a splatter screen and start chopping.
While you’re cycling through chicken browning, chop of all of the vegetables. Cut 2 carrots any way you like that’s roughly the same size as halved baby potatoes. These are chunky matchsticks that are about 1 ½ inches long.
Slice the new potatoes in half. If you’re using regular potatoes, just cut into large cubes. Combine the sliced carrots and halved potatoes into a small metal pot-in-pot container. Add ½ cup of water. I’m using an Instant Pot metal baking dish with a silicon lid (not an affiliate link). Seal the top really well or use a glass or metal container that fits inside the Instant Pot and double seal it with aluminum foil.
Chop up half an onion and 2 stalks of celery into chunky pieces.
After you’ve set aside all the browned chicken, saute the chopped onions and celery in the Instant Pot until softened (3 to 5 minutes). Scrape up any chicken bits off the bottom. If they don’t come up easily, add ¼ water.
Return the chicken to the Instant Pot. Add ½ cup water and ¾ cup 10% cream (“Creamo” in Canada).
Start building layers of Instant Pot accessories. Stack a metal rack on top of the chicken.
Add your silicone sling or aluminum foil sling.
Rest the metal pot with the potatoes and carrots inside the sling. Seal the Instant Pot up and set it to cook for 10 minutes on Manual with Normal/High pressure. From the start to pressurization, cooking and a 10 minute natural release, the total time is 30 minutes. While it’s cooking, chop up one green onion and about ½ cup fresh dill.
Open up the Instant Pot to see the curdling.
What a total mess! Pull the chicken out and remove as much of the curdled cream as you can. A rubber spatula can help here. Arrange it in the middle of a casserole.
Still not great looking but we’ll get there.
Arrange the cooked potatoes and carrots on either side of the chicken.
Pour the curdled mixture into a fat separator. The OXO one is great because it separates out the celery and onion chunks. Put the celery and onion into the blender. Pour the curdled mixture into the blender and discard the fat layer.
Blend that together. My Blendtec blender has a “Sauce” setting – but about 90 seconds in any blender will do it. All the curdled bits will come out smooth.
Top the chicken and vegetables with the green onion and dill. Looking better.
Special equipment
This recipes uses more than the average amount of special equipment. But, there are substitutes for most of the “official” accessories. Note: none of these are affiliate links.
- Instant Pot
- Splatter screen
- Instant Pot 7″ round pan with a silicone lid or a similarly sized glass or metal container sealed with aluminum foil
- Instant Pot metal rack/egg cooker
- OXO Silicone pressure cooker sling or homemade aluminum foil sling
- OXO 4 cup fat separator
- Blender
Time saved
- In the oven, this can take an hour plus to cook the chicken – 30 minutes saved
- Doing everything together means a little less clean-up time
Instant Pot Sunday Cream Chicken with potatoes and carrots
Ingredients
- 1.5 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs approximately 9
- ½ cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
- pinch salt
- 1 Tablespoon vegetable oil
- 2 large carrots cut into thick matchsticks
- ¾ pound 320 g new potatoes, halved
- ½ onion coarsely chopped
- 2 celery sticks
- ¾ cup 10% cream "Creamo"
- ½ cup water
- ½ cup fresh dill
- 1 green onion chopped
Instructions
- Combine ½ cup all-purpose flour, 1 teaspoon paprika, 1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper and a pinch of salt in a bowl. Coat chicken thighs in the flour mixture.
- Heat 1 Tablespoon vegetable oil in the Instant Pot on Saute. Brown 3 chicken thighs at a time for 4 minutes per side. Set aside on a plate.
- While browning the chicken, prepare the vegetables.
- Remove the chicken from the Instant Pot and saute ½ onion and 2 celery sticks coarsely chopped for 3 to 5 minutes - scraping the browned bits off the bottom. Add ½ cup water if necessary to avoid stuck brown pieces.
- Add the chicken back to the pot with ¾ cup 10% cream ("Creamo") and ½ cup water.
- Stack a wire rack on top of the chicken. Layer in a silicone sling. Combine the carrots and potato halves in the metal baking container with a silicone lid with ½ cup water.
- Seal the Instant Pot and set it to cook on Manual for 10 minutes on Normal/High pressure.
- Chop up ½ cup fresh dill and 1 green onion.
- Wait 10 minutes after the cooking time completes to do a natural pressure release. Unpack everything from the Instant Pot. Set aside the vegetables. Remove the chicken pieces to a casserole.
- Strain the curdled cream-onion-celery mixture in a fat strainer. Put the onions and celery in the blender. Add the curdled liquid and discard any fat. Blend until smooth.
- Arrange the carrots and potatoes in the casserole. Top with onions and dill.
- Pour the cream mixture on top. Serve extra sauce in a gravy boat.
- Smachnoho!
