Learn how to make a healthy meal of Instant Pot jerk chicken and quinoa with this gluten-free and dairy-free recipe. Serve with your favorite salad or vegetable side.
This pressure cooker chicken dish is from Instant Pot Miracle Healthy Cookbook: More than 100 Easy Healthy Meals for Your Favorite Kitchen Device by Urvashi Pitre. Photo credit: Ghazelle Badiozamani.
This pressure cooked jerk chicken and quinoa recipe is great for showcasing that not everything that comes out of an Instant Pot needs to be a soup or stew. It's also a good example of how to use a pot-in-pot method to cook two different foods in the pot at the same time.
While this is a jerk chicken recipe, there’s no reason you can’t season it in a variety of different ways to keep things interesting. You can swap some of the spices to whatever you have one hand. How about a Tex Mex spiced chicken? Spanish paprika and garlic? Indian tandoori? You get the idea!
What You Need For Instant Pot Jerk Chicken & Quinoa
- Chicken – for this recipe, the author used skinless, boneless chicken thighs. In general, chicken thighs are more tender and have more flavor but you can also use chicken breasts instead.
- Jerk spices – the chicken is marinated briefly in a delicious jerk spice rub that features herbs like dried thyme and oregano, allspice, cayenne pepper, cinnamon, garlic powder, salt and sugar. If you don't have all of these on hand and would rather use a pre-made jerk spice rub, there are plenty of store-bought options. This is a lovely, organic brand of jerk spice blend we love.
- Quinoa – white quinoa was used in this recipe but you can easily choose red or mixed-colour quinoa here. It's a healthy, protein-rich seed (pseudo grain) that is also high in vitamins and fibre.
- Heat-proof pan – a 6-inch heat-proof pan (like this 6x3 inch pan) is recommended by the author to cook the quinoa inside the Instant Pot. It's a clever hack that slows down the cooking of quinoa (which can normally be done in 2 minutes at HIGH pressure directly in the pot) and thus allowing the chicken to cook through properly at the same time. You will also need some foil and the trivet that comes with your Instant Pot.
As we mentioned above, this one-pot chicken and quinoa dish is from Instant Instant Pot Miracle Healthy Cookbook by Urvashi Pitre. You can read about in our review post coming up.
MORE HEALTHY INSTANT POT RECIPES TO TRY
- Instant pot Ground Turkey & Potato Stew (Whole30, Gluten-Free)
- Instant Pot Chicken Breasts & Gravy (Step-By-Step)
- Quinoa Corn & Crispy Bacon Salad (Instant Pot or Stovetop)
- Instant Pot Kale & Quinoa Pilaf (Gluten-Free, Vegetarian)
- Best Instant Pot Recipes With Quinoa
Rate This Recipe
Instant Pot Jerk Chicken & Quinoa
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground allspice
- 1 teaspoon ground thyme
- 1 teaspoon ground oregano
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 pound chicken thighs 450 - 500 g, boneless and skinless, each cut into 3 pieces
For the Quinoa
- 1 cup quinoa rinsed and drained
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 2.5 cups water divided
- 6x3” round heat-proof pan & foil
Instructions
- For the Chicken:In a small bowl, combine the oil, sugar, allspice, thyme, oregano, salt, cinnamon, cayenne, and garlic powder. Whisk until well combined.
- Place the chicken in a resealable plastic bag. Add the marinade, seal, and massage until the chicken is well coated. Marinate at room temperature for 30 minutes or in the refrigerator for up to 8 hours.
- For the Quinoa: In a 6x3-inch round heatproof pan, combine the quinoa, salt, and 1 cup of the water. Cover with foil.
- Pour the remaining 1.5 cups water into the Instant Pot. Place a trivet in the pot. Set the pan on the trivet, and place the chicken on top of the foil-covered pan.
- Secure the lid on the pot. Make sure the steam release valve is set correctly. Select Pressure Cook/Manual and set the pot at HIGH pressure for 6 minutes. The Instant Pot will show ON and will take about 7-9 minutes to come to pressure, then the 6-minute timer will display.
- At the end of the cooking time, allow the pot to sit undisturbed for 10 minutes (natural pressure release), then release any remaining pressure manually by using the quick-release button/handle on top of the lid.
- Transfer the chicken to a plate. Carefully remove the pan of quinoa from the pot. Serve the chicken over the quinoa.
- Note: You may choose to brown the chicken slightly before serving.
Nutrition
SAVE THIS JERK CHICKEN QUINOA RECIPE TO PINTEREST
Rita
Delicious!!! I recommend browning the meat in some oil in a pan afterwards and then pouring some of the juice back on it.
Instant Pot Eats
Great tip, Rita!