Instant Pot Brisket, It’s What’s For Comfort

As some of you may know, it’s been a tough month. I found out that I have to do some medication tweaking for my epilepsy and probably some dietary tweaking as well. Both my father-in-law and my uncle died within 48 hours.

So, being a good Jewish girl, I decided what I needed was brisket. Back in the day when I had a standard pressure cooker I made brisket fairly regularly. I was a go-to. But then I got married to a vegetarian, and eventually my pressure cooker (which was only being used for beans) died.

People told me to get an Instant Pot. I hemmed, I hawed, I changed my mind a bunch. But I decided to get one. Tonight, in need of comfort (and keeping in mind that my husband now occasionally does eat meat), I decided to update my recipe.

This isn’t a traditional brisket recipe by any means. It has a heavier gravy than most briskets. But I think it’s delicious. I cook the meat the day before, then let it sit in the gravy overnight in the fridge before serving with pearl onions, string beans, and either noodles or mashed potatoes.

1. Dry the meat with a paper towel and season well with coarse salt and freshly crushed black pepper.

2. Turn the the Instant Pot to the “sauté” setting. Add in oil and wait until the display reads “hot”.

3. Sear the brisket well on each side, about 5-10 minutes per side until brown and crispy looking.

4. Remove the brisket and add in the onions, carrots, celery, and tomato paste. Sauté for 5 minutes, stirring regularly and scraping up up whatever sticks.

5. Add in 1 cup red wine, beef broth, garlic, herbs, and rosemary. Scrape the bottom making sure to get all the browned up bits and continue to sauté/boil for another 5 minutes, scraping the bottom of the pan to incorporate all the bits.

6. Replace meat into IP. Press the “keep warm/cancel” button to reset the InstantPot.

7. Press “meat/stew” and set the timer for 50 minutes.

8. Once the timer goes off, allow it to lose pressure naturally.

9. Once the machine has released its pressure, remove the brisket to a large bowl and switch the mode back to “sauté”.

10. Take out 1 cup of liquid and add 1TBS cornstarch to it. Dissolve cornstarch completely and then pour mixture back into Instant Pot.

Boil/reduce for 10 minutes, then whisk in the cream of mushroom soup and the other 1.5 cups red wine. Reduce 5 more minutes for a nice, thick gravy.

If you have a fat skimmer, skim fat from top of gravy. (I can’t find mine, so the pic looks very fatty.)

Cut the fatty bits off brisket and let sit in gravy overnight in fridge.

Slice the brisket and serve.