For my first foray into the world of pressurized cooking, I decided to start with a small side dish instead of jumping right into an entire one pot meal. There will be plenty of time to get adventurous later.

This week’s task was simply to cook a sweet potato. Not exactly complex, but I learned a lot about using the Instant Pot and I didn’t blow up my kitchen. As Martha would say, “this is a good thing.”

I love sweet potatoes and I have made them many times before in my oven. Depending on whether I am roasting pieces or baking the whole thing, it usually takes about 35-50 minutes. So, when I saw that the full cook time for a sweet potato (halved lengthwise) in the Instant Pot was only 8 minutes, I thought, “my goodness, what is this fantastical wizardry?”

In actual practice, however, it took much longer. One thing I learned was that just because the cook time in the recipe is 8 minutes, doesn’t mean that it’s going to be ready in 8 minutes.

Once I had put some water in the bottom of the pot, placed the potato halves on the steaming rack, and sealed that sucker in there tight, it took about 10 minutes for enough pressure to build inside the pot to the point where the cooking timer actually started counting down. Add to that the time it took for the pressure to release and the total was closer to 25 minutes.

Timing issues aside, this experience was a resounding success. Once I double checked that the pressure had properly released (who are we kidding? I at least quadruple checked), I pulled off the lid and found tender, creamy, perfectly cooked sweet potatoes waiting inside. Huzzah!

I don’t know if it’s all the Vitamin A talking, but I’m feeling pretty good right about now.