Instant Pot Creamy Tuscan Chicken Pasta

Creamy, cheesy, oozy, and cozy...what’s not to love? This pasta is super-satisfying and will feed a crowd! Don’t stress out too much about the exact proportions, which type of sun-dried tomatoes to buy, or whether to use home-made or store-bought chicken broth. Use what you have and what you can find easily at the store. There are really only a few key guidelines for this recipe: • 1 lb dry pasta requires 4 cups liquid (in the IP), I added 1 extra cup because of the bulk of the other ingredients and you need the steam to reach that top layer of pasta. The liquid doesn’t need to cover the pasta, it just needs to be within a half inch below it. • Use any short/medium shape pasta that has curls and nooks and crannies for all that cheesy sauce to get into. These trumpetti looked fun and I had never seen them at the store until today. Other great options would be farfalle, radiatore, campanelle, conchiglie, cavatappi, cavatelli, or fusilli. • Read the instructions on your pasta package! Rule of thumb with an IP is to cook your pasta at half the time recommended on the package for traditional stovetop cooking. One final note: You don’t absolutely have to brown the chicken first. I usually do brown my meats because I like the bonus flavor it creates. But if you’re short on time, the recipe works just fine as a dump-and-go recipe while reserving the cheeses and spinach to be stirred in at the end. Today’s Ingredients: 2 TB extra virgin olive oil 1½ lbs chicken thigh meat, cut into bite-size pieces ½ tsp salt 1 TB garlic powder 1 TB Italian seasoning 1 TB red pepper flakes (more or less to your liking) 4 oz mushrooms, quartered 4 oz sun-dried tomatoes 5 cups chicken broth 1 lb trumpetti pasta (use any short shape with lots of curls and crevices to hold the sauce) 8 oz cream cheese, softened and cubed 5 oz shredded parmesan cheese 6 oz baby spinach Instructions: 1. Brown the meat in oil until there’s no more pink on the outside. 2. Add the seasonings, stir, and continue to cook until there’s almost no liquid in the pot and the meat starts to show browning. 3. Add mushrooms and sun-dried tomatoes and stir to combine. 4. Add chicken broth and pasta and stir to evenly distribute everything. 5. Lock the lid and cook on manual/high for half the time that the pasta’s package instructs for stovetop cooking. For example, the package I used had a boiling time of 12 minutes, so I set my pot for 6 minutes. Once the time is up, quick-release the pressure and open the pot. 6. Stir in the cream cheese and parmesan cheese until mostly melted. 7. Add the spinach and continue to stir until the cheeses are fully melted and the spinach is wilted. 8. Let the pot stand for 5-10 minutes so the sauce will thicken even more.