Here's how to avoid that dreaded BURN warning when cooking thick, tomato-based sauces like spaghetti sauce and chili.
A little while ago, my son phoned me to say he got the Burn warning while cooking my spaghetti sauce. He loves that sauce; we all do.
“Mom, help! My pot says 'Burn.' What should I do?” I gave him the standard “deglaze the pot” thing, but it got me thinking. And a few minutes later, a light bulb went off in my head.
Of COURSE, it burns. It's a tomato-based sauce just sitting still on a hot element. I wouldn't dream of putting a sauce like that together, setting it on a hot stove and just walking away to let it heat for 15 minutes without stirring. Neither would you, right? That's essentially what's happening inside the Instant Pot. Once a sauce reaches the boil, it virtually stirs itself, but until then, it will likely burn without stirring. But with this method, as long as a sauce has enough liquid to produce the necessary steam, it'll work without having to water it down.
For these thick sauces, the trick is to brown the meat/vegetables on Saute as you would on the stove, add the other ingredients and be sure to scrape any browned bits off the bottom. Then...the KEY: bring it to a full boil using the Saute function, stirring frequently. Only then do you close the lid and cook under pressure.
When you do close that pot, it will come to pressure within a minute or two so it won't have time to burn.
So, I phoned my son back and told him what to do. And it worked. He used Saute to bring the spaghetti sauce to a boil and then closed the pot to pressure cook it. It has worked for me ever since. Problem solved.
He brought me some spaghetti sauce the next day to show off his “SKILZ.”
(Don’t tell him this, but I think it was even better than mine!)