Instant Pot Red Beans and Rice
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Thanks to the pressure cooker, everyone’s favorite New Orleans dish can be made in no time! No need to presoak the beans either. Simply throw everything into the Instant Pot and let it do the work for you. SO EASY!
So I’ll be completely honest with you.
I never cook with dried beans. Never, ever, ever.
I have always used canned beans instead. That is, until now.
Because hello? The IP can pressure cook the beans in just a fraction of the time it would take in real life! (“Real life” meaning stovetop.)
And guess what? There’s no pre-soak needed here either!
So there you have it. Red beans and rice literally from scratch using dried beans.
If you want to keep it vegetarian, you can omit the andouille sausage but still keep the same cooking time in the IP.
Just be sure to serve warm with rice and a dash of Tabasco for a kick of heat!
Instant Pot Red Beans and Rice
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups white long grain rice
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 12.8-ounce package smoked andouille sausage, thinly sliced
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 green bell pepper, diced
- 2 stalks celery, thinly sliced
- 1 pound dry red beans
- 1 ½ teaspoons Cajun seasoning
- 1 teaspoon dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- ¼ teaspoon dried sage
- 2 sprigs fresh thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 4 cup low sodium vegetable broth
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 1 teaspoon hot sauce, or more, to taste
- 2 green onions, thinly sliced
Instructions
- In a large saucepan of 3 cups water, cook rice according to package instructions; set aside.
- Set a 6-qt Instant Pot® to the high saute setting. Add olive oil and sausage. Cook, stirring frequently, until sausage is lightly browned, about 3-4 minutes. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate; set aside.
- Add garlic, onion, bell pepper and celery. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 2-3 minutes.
- Stir in sausage, red beans, Cajun seasoning, oregano, basil, sage, thyme, bay leaves and vegetable broth; season with salt and pepper, to taste.
- Select manual setting; adjust pressure to high, and set time for 30-35 minutes. When finished cooking, release pressure naturally according to manufacturer's directions, about 20-30 minutes.*
- Serve immediately with rice and hot sauce, garnished with green onions, if desired.
Notes
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This recipe is so good. We love beans and this is definitely a favorite. The spices are perfect together. We make a big batch and have it throughout the week. I don’t add the sausage to the instant pot because I prefer to sauté it right before serving, then adding the cooked beans on top. Our 5 year old always asks for it and it’s perfect to send to school on a thermos.
Living in the South, some of that time in New Orleans, I’ve cooked a lot of red beans and rice. I think this recipe is one of the most authentic I’ve come across for instant pot. Thanks, it’s great.
Terrific take on red beans and rice. I never would have thought dried beans would become soft and chewy without soaking – superb. Served it with brown rice and home-grown Cajun spice mix. Delicious and comforting A definite keeper
Lived in NOLA for years. This is just like we bought there and it is sooooo good. Just made it for dinner.
If you cook the vegetables with the beans, IMO they get mushy and have a strange texture. It’s my biggest peeve about using the Instant Pot. What I do, instead, is I leave out the vegetables and do everything else more or less as described here. I use 45 minutes on high pressure (or Bean setting if you have that) and natural release. I don’t think 35 minutes is going to get the job done. Once the IP is doing its pressure cycle, saute the aromatics and spices. When they are done, set them aside. I usually use the same pot to cook my rice, so that I capture some of the flavor from the aromatics and spices. When you open the IP after it’s done, just stir in the vegetables and you’re set.
I’ve used your recipe many times and put chicken broth in as well substituting different meats because I didn’t have andouille and made the recipe without meat and added liquid smoke. I appreciate you sharing your recipes with us, it is a good one.
Use a immersion blender when done and it makes it creamier and just like my cajun grandma made it. I will never not blend it at the end. So good
This was a delicious recipe. We substituted low sodium chicken broth for the vegetable broth and had to cook for an hour to get the beans soft to our liking. Flavor was all there though!
This was absolutely amazing!! Thank you!! I always love your recipes.
Very, very good.
Followed recipe closely, without modifications, and it was delicious. Thank you for the recipe.
Legit amazing. So comforting. So delicious.
I grew up in Louisiana and this is the standard recipe I use for the Instant Pot. Don’t be afraid to make this if you don’t have andouille sausage! You can just use any old smoked sausage and it will still taste great!
I had to cook it an extra 20 min- for the beans to soften- which was fine.
Not happy with how Spicy/ salty it was.; way to much Cajun seasoning/ it had so much salt. I even used salt -free broth.
I will use 1/4-1/2 of the amount listed next time.
At least this way, the other spices used, will be tasted.
Oh well, will try again this winter.
Thanks for sharing.
Interesting. The only salt the recipe calls for is “to taste.” Yours came out too salty which means… it’s the author’s fault?
Now… there are many brands and formulations of Cajun seasoning. Is it also the author’s fault that the one you chose is too spicy for you? Knowing this, of course, I mixed my own Cajun seasoning without too much cayenne, and it was perfect for my four-year-old, but then he’s not very picky.
And even if half the Cajun seasoning was salt, it would be very surprising that 3/4 teaspoon salt in addition to low-sodium broth would result in an over-seasoned dish, considering that bean recipes typically call for at least one teaspoon of salt more per pound of beans alone (and usually more.)
Great! Used Rancho Gordo’s Domingo Rojo beans for this. Cooked 35mins. Beans cooked though with great texture. // subbed in beef broth as that’s what I had on hand.
Time for me was really off. I used dried beans without soaking, and started at 50 min, plus 30 min natural release, and the beans were about halfway done. So I closed the lid and cooked again on high roughly another 35 min and 20-30 min natural cool down. Then they were perfect. Either way, around 2 hours for dried beans isn’t bad. The flavor was good for this recipe.
So easy and tasty! The beans definitely needed to cook longer than 35 mins. I did not pre soak them, though. Also, my sausage was precooked. I added it to the beans before cooking, but would not do that again. It shriveled up too much. I would add the sausage and the rice after cooking the beans – but that’s just me!
Flavor was delicious, but even after 50 minutes at high pressure and 20 minutes of slow release, the beans were still firm. This recipe just doesn’t do what it advertises, which is to deliver red beans and rice without the soaking.
If the beans are old, they take longer to cook. 🙁 I discovered that with some pinto beans I used.
As I am reading this recipe, I would change it to cook it in a way of a mixture, precooking first the bean alone in the instant pot until 70% cooked and then add the spicing to them and add water and rice to finish cooking the remaining 30%. That is what I would do.
Followed others and soaked my beans overnight. Cooked for 22 minutes and natural released for 25 minutes and it was perfect. It was more soupy but I like that with the rice!!
Yummy! I made a few modifications…After sautéing the sausage and removing it from the pot, I did not return it to the pot until after cooking the beans, I used chicken broth bc I did not have any veggie broth on hand and increased the cook time to 42 mins with a natural release – the beans seemed perfect at this length