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Instant Pot Beef Stew with Vegetables

Thirty-five minutes under pressure for meat that would take three hours in the oven. The vegetables go in for a second, shorter round.

Prep
25 min
Cook
55 min
Makes
Serves 6
Jump to the recipe
Beef stew with carrots and celery in a shallow bowl
Photo: tomateoignons / Pexels

A pressure cooker gets to about 120°C instead of the 100°C a pot can manage, and collagen breaks down roughly three times faster at that temperature. Thirty-five minutes gives you meat that an oven would need three hours to produce.

That speed is also the trap. Potatoes and carrots are done in four minutes at pressure; give them thirty-five and they dissolve, leaving you with beef in a thick orange soup. So there are two cooking rounds — beef alone, then a quick release, then vegetables for four minutes. It sounds like extra work and it is about ninety seconds of it.

It is the same argument for browning that crockpot tortellini makes about sausage.

Sear in batches, on sauté, before anything else. The sear is where the flavor of a stew comes from and a crowded pot steams instead. Three batches for two kilos of beef, and take the time.

Then deglaze properly and scrape every brown patch off the base. Any left behind will trigger the burn warning under pressure, and the machine will stop and refuse to continue — this is the single most common Instant Pot failure and it is entirely preventable with a wooden spoon and thirty seconds.

Diced beef and prepared vegetables on a board
Photo: Laura oliveira / Pexels

Beef stew with vegetables, printed

Thirty-five minutes under pressure for meat that would take three hours in the oven. The vegetables go in for a second, shorter round.

For the stew, and for the second round

For the stew

  • 2½ lb (1.1 kg) chuck steak, cut into 4 cm cubes
  • 2 tbsp neutral oil
  • 2 onions, diced
  • 4 garlic cloves, minced
  • 3 tbsp tomato paste
  • 3 tbsp all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup (240 ml) red wine
  • 3 cups (700 ml) beef stock
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 2 tsp dried thyme
  • 1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

For the second round

  • 1½ lb (700 g) waxy potatoes, in 4 cm chunks
  • 4 carrots, in thick coins
  • 7 oz (200 g) mushrooms, halved
  • 1 cup (150 g) frozen peas
  • Chopped parsley, to finish

Two pressure cycles, not one

  1. 1 Dry the beef and season it hard. On sauté, sear it in the oil in three batches until deeply browned, moving each batch to a plate.
  2. 2 Soften the onions 5 minutes, add the garlic and tomato paste and cook 90 seconds, then stir in the flour and cook another minute.
  3. 3 Pour in the wine and scrape the base of the pot completely clean. Nothing should still be stuck. Let it reduce by half.
  4. 4 Return the beef and any juices, add the stock, bay, thyme and Worcestershire. Seal and cook on high pressure 35 minutes, then let the pressure release naturally for 15 minutes before venting the rest.
  5. 5 Add the potatoes, carrots and mushrooms. Seal again and cook 4 minutes on high pressure, then quick release.
  6. 6 Stir in the peas — the residual heat is enough — and rest 10 minutes before serving with parsley.

Cut of beef, and the natural release

  • Chuck, brisket or shin. Anything lean turns stringy under pressure rather than tender.
  • The 15-minute natural release matters: venting immediately after the beef round squeezes juice out of the meat.

When the pot says BURN

Food stuck to the base. Cancel, release the pressure, and scrape the bottom thoroughly before resealing. Deglazing completely after searing prevents it entirely.