Instant Pot Soup

I have a lot of Instant Pot soup recipes here, but to be honest I usually just wing it with whatever ingredients I have handy. The trick to winging it is using a balance of ingredients that have or can take similar cooking times.

Serves 2–4.

Ingredients

Sofrito

• 2 T. olive oil
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1–2 garlic cloves, minced
• ⅓ of a green pepper, chopped (optional)

Liquids

• ~4 c. chicken broth and/or water
• ~3 chicken thighs or an equivalent weight in poultry parts or cubed meat (7–10 minutes if fresh, 20 if frozen, no restrictions if pre-cooked)
• 1 15 oz. can canned tomatoes (optional)

You can reduce the broth when adding tomatoes, but it’s not required. Do not reduce broth or water below 1 c.

Starch

Choose one of the following:

• ~½ c. couscous (post-release)
• leftover rice, pasta, or potatoes (3 minutes or post-release)
• ~½ c. white rice (3 minutes)
• ~½ c. Israeli couscous (5 minutes) plus water
• ~½ c. Ditalini or other soup pasta (5–7 minutes) plus water
• ~½ c. farro (10–15 minutes or more) plus water
• ~3 russet potatoes, diced (15 minutes)
• ~3 sweet potatoes, diced (15–20 minutes)
• ~⅔ c. barley (20 minutes or more) plus water
• ~½ c. brown rice (25 minutes) plus water
• ~½ c. wild rice (30 minutes) plus water
• ~½ c. wheat berries (30 minutes or more) plus water

Note that some starches require extra water or stock. Usually the same volume or one and half times the starch’s volume will do. Quantities of starch are approximate.

Vegetables

• spinach (post-release)
• tomato (no restrictions)
• canned pumpkin (no restrictions)
• ~¼ c. red lentils (3 minutes, no restriction if you don’t mind them disappearing)
• carrots (5 minutes or more)
• diced winter squash (5 minutes or more)
• okra (7 minutes or more)
• up to 1 c. green or brown lentils (10 minutes or more) plus water

Spices

You can take these from any soup recipe. If you have a favorite, you can also pre-mix it. Here’s our favorite:

• 1 tsp. cumin
• 1 heaping tsp. whole coriander (optionally freshly ground) or ½ tsp. pre-ground
• 1 tsp. smoked paprika
• ½ tsp. pure chili powder (optional)
• ½ tsp. turmeric
• ½ tsp. oregano
• heaping ¼ tsp. red pepper flakes (optional)
• 1 tsp. salt
• pepper to taste

Directions

1. Sauté onions in the oil (on the Sauté setting) until limp. If using, add green pepper halfway through.
2. Add garlic and sauté 1 minute.
3. Optionally, sauté any fresh bone-in chicken for up to 5 minutes.
4. Cancel Sauté and add all remaining ingredients.
5. Close Instant Pot, seal vent, and cook at high pressure for 20 minutes with keep warm.
6. Do a natural release (unless you need the soup hotter for a post-release addition).
7. Use the sauté setting to simmer any post-release additions as necessary.
8. If the poultry was whole or bone-in, shred it and return the meat to the pot. Freeze the bones for making stock.

Variants

The whole thing is variants already, but you can also throw in any cooked leftovers. Do it at the beginning if they can take more cooking, or as a post-release addition if they cannot.

Of course you could leave out the poultry altogether; I’d just have a revolution on my hands if I did so.

The sofrito steps are optional; you can toss these ingredients into the Instant Pot raw if you’re in a rush.