Instant Pot Banana Bread & Iced Tea

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Today's Friday in the Kitchen is about making banana bread and iced tea in the Instant Pot. What I loved was that I made both of these things this week, plus a few other things and never heated my house up. We have had a hot string of days, near and over 100 degrees and I don't have air conditioning in my home. So making efforts not to overheat the house is a high priority.

If you think an Instant Pot is just for cooking meat, think again! I'm constantly amazed at all you can do with an IP. I seriously feel like it is one of the best investments I've made for my kitchen and my life in quite some time. 

Here is a link to the Instant Pot I own:  

 

Banana Bread

I started off with the idea to make banana bread and ended up not having enough bananas and used applesauce to make up the difference. Either way.. all bananas or banana/applesauce .. it's pretty simple to make and enjoyable to eat.

You'll need a 6 cup bundt pan for this. I shared on Wednesday the little bundt pan I purchased through Amazon. 

You can find the pan here: Nordic Ware 6-Cup Bundt Pan, Multicolor 

   
Instant Pot Banana Bread (or variation: Banana Applesauce Bread)

½ cup butter, room temp
½ cup sugar
2 eggs
3 mashed bananas, or 2 mashed bananas and enough applesauce to equal 1 ¼ cups
2 cups flour
½ t baking soda
½ cup nuts or chocolate chips, or a combo of both, this is totally optional

Using a mixer combine the butter and sugar until smooth. Add the eggs and mix well. Add the bananas (or bananas and applesauce) and mix well. Add the dry ingredients and mix until all is combined. Add the nuts and/or chocolate chips if you are using and mix.

Spoon batter into a well greased and floured 6 inch bundt pan.

Put trivet in bottom of the Instant Pot. Pour in 1 cup water. Using a foil sling lower the bundt pan into the IP (this is made by taking a long a piece of foil and folding it a strip about 2 inches or so thick. You use this to lower the pan into the IP, and to remove it when cooking time is done). If you are not familiar with a sling you can see an example of how it's used HERE.

Put the lid on the IP, set the sealing knob to, SEAL. Press “Manual” and set the timer for 50 minutes. When the time is done, let the pressure release for 10 to 15 minutes on it's own, then do a quick release.

Remove the pan, and let it cool for 30 minutes. And remove from pan.

Instant Pot Ice Tea

Why would choose to make tea in an IP? I've discovered 2 reasons. One, is I don't have to boil water and heat up my kitchen. :) The other, which I think is actually more important is this, black tea becomes bitter when the temperature of the water gets to the boiling point. The beauty of a pressure cooker is that it does not boil the contents in the pot.

Making black tea in the IP made the best tasting tea I have ever had. No bitter taste at all. And it's so easy to make!

Put 8 cups of water in the IP pot, add 4 tea bags, add sweetener.

The amount of sweetener and type is up to you. You can add whatever you normally would add, honey, sugar, Stevia, and add the same amount you typically add. I like my tea only slightly sweet and usually add either honey (a little less then ¼ cup) or sugar (about 1/3 cup or less).

Put the lid on the IP, set the sealing knob to “seal”. Press “manual” and set the time for 4 minutes.

When the time is up, let the pot do a natural release for about 15 minutes (longer won't hurt anything) and release whatever pressure is still left.

When you open the lid you may see a little boiling of the tea going on. This is normal and does not mean it has been boiling, it's caused by the temperature change. Next time let the pot the do a natural release a little longer.

Remove the tea bags and pour into a container and refrigerate. Serve over ice and enjoy!!