How To Clean Your Instant Pot
If you own an Instant Pot and use it all of the time, then you need the most essential part of owning this beautiful piece of kitchen appliance is to know how to clean your Instant Pot. There’s a few intricate parts to the Instant Pot that need to be cleaned on a regular basis. I clean my Instant Pot after each use, and I give it a quick deep cleaning once a week. Giving your Instant Pot the proper maintenance that it deserves will ensure that it keeps working for you in the many years to come.
With that being said, lets get to learning how to clean your Instant Pot. Before we get started, there’s no real correct way of cleaning your machine. The way I clean it, may not be the way everyone else cleans it; however, I find the ways that I clean it to be very effective and thorough. Can you put the lid of your Instant Pot into the dishwasher? Yes, you totally can! Although, I don’t feel it gets clean enough and doesn’t get into those hard to reach spots. This is just my personal opinion.
Here’s your first warning: You’re going to be scared to start taking those moveable parts apart, but don’t be. They’re supposed to come apart for a reason. You will find it very easy to assemble your Instant Pot when you’re done cleaning it. Let’s get started!
Before cleaning your machine, it is best to make sure that it is unplugged from any electrical outlet. These are also my suggestions that I have found work best to keep my Instant Pot maintained and working like a well oiled machine
Clean Your Instant Pot Lid
The first thing that we’re going to to do in learning how to clean your Instant Pot, is to start with the lid. The lid has a few moving parts that requires some love and attention from us, especially if you use your Instant Pot very often (like I do!).
Remove the Venting Knob
This is super easy to do. Grab the knob, and pull straight up. This is where the steam comes out of when depressurizing your Instant Pot. With that steam, comes particles of the recipe. It can get layers of gunk and caked up. Take a warm soapy wash cloth or sponge to clean it out very well.
Remove the Silicone Ring
The silicone ring is the part that gets on everyone’s last nerve. Mostly because it can really stink to the high heavens after cooking certain foods like spaghetti, meatballs, and chili. The food tastes amazing, but that ring. Not so nice of a smell, especially for when you want to make a sweet dessert afterwards, like chocolate lava cake, monkey bread, or more. The biggest tip to combat that is to purchase a couple of extra Instant Pot sealing rings. This way you can have one for the sweet recipes and one for the savory recipes. I have lots of other great Instant Pot accessories suggestions for you! Problem solved, kinda. To clean the ring, you can throw it in the dishwasher, or wash it with warm soapy water and allow to air dry. The one trick that has helped me get rid of the funky ring smell is to cook potatoes in your Instant Pot. Yes! I know, it sounds ridiculous to have work, but it totally works for me.
Remove Metal Basket
Wash the metal basket with warm soapy water. It’s easy to pop off and pop right back on. There’s a lot of food particles that can stuck in the basket and under the basket. We want to ensure that it’s nice and clean at all times. This is directly underneath the pressure valve, so when your machine depressurizes, liquid is coming through this. It’s going to try to catch any kind of bigger pieces of ingredients from spewing forth from it.
Remove Silicone Tip
Remove the silicone tip to the float valve. Just be sure your fingers are on the opposite side to catch the pressure pin. You don’t want to lose it, and then have to order another one. You can wash this with warm soapy water. When the liquid is coming to pressure in the Instant Pot, food particulates in the liquid can get stuck under the silicone tip of the float valve. It’s super easy to remove and put back on.
Remove Pressure Pin
You will see the upper are where the steam is released from is dirty. Warm soapy water will clean this perfectly. It can get pretty icky under there, especially in that indentation that goes around the pin. Ingredients have a tendency to get caked on.
Use a Bristle Brush
Use a bristle brush and warm soapy water is a great way to clean the venting hole of the pressure pin float valve. Food and grime can get into there. This is something that I clean on a weekly basis.
Remove Condensation Cup
This is where things can go wrong very, very fast with your Instant Pot if you don’t keep an eye on it. This little cup collects any kind of condensation and liquid that drops into the sealing rivet around the machine, and it does a pretty fabulous job at doing it. However, if you don’t clean this, you can get mildew and mold growth. This is not good for you or the machine. I clean this with warm soapy water after each use, that includes the drip hole that condensation falls through. Use a bristle brush to clean it thoroughly.
Clean the Inner Rivet
Food and other particulates can get dried onto the machine after using it. If it gets too dirty, your machine will have issues in properly sealing and will never pressurize. You’ll see the steam coming out of the sides of the Instant Pot lid, and then you’ll find yourself on Google trying to figure out when your lid isn’t sealing properly…then you’re going to get mad and probably throw your machine out the window (or through the wall…let’s hope not, though). I use good ol’ fashioned Q-tips with warm soapy water to clean and rinse. It works wonders!
Clean Inside the Instant Pot
You don’t want to forget to clean the inside of the Instant Pot machine itself. Liquids and food can slide right down the sides of the machine, if you’re not paying attention when you’re serving food out of it. Take damp warm washcloth (I find a washcloth works best) and wipe down the inside. You don’t want your washcloth to be saturated with water, just enough to make a little damp. Ring out any extra water. We just want to be able wipe things down inside of it, and remove any kind of debris build up.
Wash The Instant Pot Liner
A lot of people have will get some burned particulates of food in their liner, or even a “tattoo” of the food that appears to be etched into the metal. These are just impressions, and happens to any type of stainless product that you can cook with. Don’t worry, there’s an easy solution! A lot of people swear by Bar Keeper’s Friend, but I love using good ol’ baking soda and a little warm water. You can use a green little scrubby pad for cleaning it, as it’s the most effective for when you have a little caked on food or if you want to get rid of any kind of staining that has occurred.
What are some ways that you clean your Instant Pot? Do you have any tips that you’d like to share?
Do you have an Instant Pot, and not sure what kind of accessories to get? Then check out this article, it’s fabulous!
Thank you that was very helpful. I didn’t know any of this.