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Fluffy Soaked Quinoa In The Instant Pot

Cook perfectly fluffy quinoa in just 3 minutes in your pressure cooker! Soaked first to reduce phytic acid and saponins for better digestion, this is the easiest and best way to cook quinoa! Learn how to cook Soaked Quinoa In The Instant Pot!

CourseSide Dish
Prep Time 3 minutes
Cook Time 3 minutes
Total Time 12 hours 6 minutes
Servings 6 servings
Author Lindsey Dietz

Ingredients

Instructions

  1. First, place the quinoa, water, and ACV in a glass bowl. Stir together and cover. Set aside for at least 8, but not more than 24 hours.
  2. See all that bubbly foam? That's the phytic acid being broken down!
  3. Second, pour the soaked quinoa into a fine mesh sieve, catching the soaking liquid in a bowl or quart-size Pyrex measuring cup.
  4. I had 1 cup of soaking liquid left after draining my quinoa. So my quinoa absorbed 2 cups of the soaking liquid. To cook the quinoa, I added 1 cup of broth to the Instant Pot.
  5. Set aside. Then rinse the soaked quinoa very well under cool, running water.
  6. Place the rinsed quinoa into the Instant Pot.
  7. Now, note the amount of liquid you caught. Subtract the amount of liquid you caught from the 3 cups of soaking water you started with.
  8. (For instance, if you caught 2 cups of water, then 3-2=1. So the quinoa absorbed 1 cup of water while soaking. If you caught 2-1/2 cups of water, that means the quinoa absorbed 1/2 cup of water while soaking. And so on.)
  9. So for 2 cups of soaked quinoa in the Instant Pot, subtract the amount of water the quinoa retained after soaking -- then ADD that amount of cooking liquid back.
  10. Cooking 2 cups of unsoaked quinoa in the Instant Pot requires 3 cups of liquid. However, soaked quinoa requires less cooking liquid because the quinoa has already absorbed liquid during soaking.
  11. Cook on high pressure in the "Manual" setting for 3 minutes.

  12. Immediately release the pressure, remove the lid, and fluff the quinoa with a fork.

Recipe Notes

Unless your quinoa was extremely dry or left uncovered and soaking liquid evaporated, you shouldn't be left with less than a cup of soaking liquid.

Never add less than 1 cup of cooking liquid -- even if you caught more than 2 cups of soaking liquid. The Instant Pot requires at least 1 cup of liquid to properly come to pressure.

For example, if you caught 2-1/2 cups of soaking liquid, by my ratios you would only need to add 1/2 cup of cooking liquid. But that's not enough liquid to cause the Instant Pot to come to pressure. So you should add a full cup of cooking liquid anyway.

If there's more than a little bit of cooking liquid left after releasing pressure, cook on high pressure for 1 more minute. That should allow the remaining liquid to absorb.