Instant Pot Spaghetti and Meat Sauce

Weeknight dinner couldn’t be easier than this Instant Pot Spaghetti with Meat Sauce! You’ll simply brown the ground beef in the Instant Pot and toss in spaghetti, sauce, broth, tomato paste and a little coconut milk to keep it dairy-free but creamy.

I recently made an Instant Pot Lasagna that my whole family enjoyed. When everyone leaves the table with no complaints and full bellies, I am one happy mama. Especially when clean-up is just one pot, one spoon and a few bowls. This Instant Pot Spaghetti and Meat Sauce only requires a few minutes of hands-on time and then a quick 8 minute pressure cook.

It’s been 7 years since I bought my first Instant Pot, and we’re still using it multiple times a week. A few of my other favorite Instant Pot recipes include: Instant Pot Nightshade-Free Ropa Vieja, Instant Pot Pineapple Chicken, and Shredded Chicken with Almond Satay.

Can You Make Spaghetti in the Instant Pot?

Yes! Original Instant Pot manuals advised against using their models to cook pasta. With the correct amount of liquid though, you can safely cook a variety of noodles in the Instant Pot and create thick, savory sauces. If there’s one thing I can’t stand (jk there’s many), it’s spaghetti with watery, runny sauce!

This Instant Pot Spaghetti and Meat Sauce includes just a few simple ingredients found at any grocer:

• ground beef
• dried oregano and thyme
• salt and pepper
• dried spaghetti (I use Jovial Cassava to keep it grain-free)
• coconut milk (just a bit to make the sauce creamy without dairy)
• tomato paste (for a concentrated tomato flavor without using extra liquid)
• chicken broth (2 cups for sneaking some gut-healing goodness into dinner)
• water

How to make spaghetti and meat sauce in a pressure cooker:

1. Turn the Instant Pot Saute function on heat olive oil. Brown the ground beef, breaking up with a wooden spoon. Season the beef with salt, pepper, and dried oregano and thyme.
2. Turn off the Saute function. Stir tomato paste into water and pour into pot.
3. Break uncooked spaghetti noodles in half and layer on top of the beef. Pour the tomato sauce and chicken broth on top, covering the noodles as much as possible.
4. Pressure cook for 8 minutes and let the steam naturally release. Stir it all up and taste to season to your liking.
5. Serve with fresh herbs or shredded cheese, if desired.

What are the best jarred spaghetti sauces?

When using store-bought spaghetti sauce, it’s important to source organic. A few of my favorite organic spaghetti sauces include: Thrive Market Organic Tomato Basil Sauce and Primal Kitchen Tomato Basil Marinara Sauce.

How do you make nightshade-free spaghetti sauce?

If you are avoiding tomatoes and spices right now, you can use a homemade nightshade-free spaghetti sauce. My friend Michelle at Unbound Wellness has a recipe for Nightshade-Free Marinara Sauce. The added bonus of using a nightshade-free sauce is a larger variety of vegetables in your family’s dinner like carrots, celery and beets.

Instant Pot Spaghetti and Meat Sauce

★★★★★ 5 from 4 reviews

• Author: Alaena Haber
• Prep Time: 5 min
• Cook Time: 8 min
• Total Time: 13 minutes
• Yield: 4 servings 1x
• Category: dinner
• Method: instant pot
• Cuisine: american, italian
• Diet: Gluten Free

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Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 pound ground beef

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1/3 cup water

1 tablespoon tomato paste

8 oz grain-free spaghetti, uncooked

1 cup pasta sauce (tomato/marinara)

1/4 cup coconut milk

2 cups chicken broth

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Instructions

1. Turn the Instant Pot Saute Function on medium. Heat the olive oil.
2. Saute the ground beef until browned and cooked through, breaking up with a wooden spoon into small chunks. Season with salt, oregano, thyme, and pepper. Turn the Saute function off.
3. Stir together the tomato paste and water and pour over the ground beef.
4. Break the spaghetti in half and layer on top of the ground beef evenly.
5. Stir the coconut milk into the pasta sauce. Pour the sauce and chicken broth on top of the noodles, covering as much as possible.
6. Seal with the lid and pressure cook for 8 minutes. Let the pressure naturally release.
7. Stir the spaghetti with the meat sauce and serve with fresh herbs and cheese, if desired. Taste and adjust seasoning, if needed.

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Notes

For nightshade-free sauce, see the blog post for a link to a recipe. For thin spaghetti (angel hair), decrease the cooking time to 6 minutes. This recipe can also be made with other noodle types, but you’ll need to adjust the cook time based on the thickness of the noodles. For example, penne you’ll want to pressure cook for about 11 minutes since its thicker than spaghetti.

To make AIP: use a nightshade-free tomato sauce and omit the pepper. Use the Jovial grain-free cassava spaghetti.

Keywords: pasta, instant pot, spaghetti, meat sauce