Instant Pot chicken stew is comfort food at its best. The stew is a one-pot meal with tender chicken and hearty vegetables in a savory broth. When the weather turns cold, there’s nothing more comforting than this flavorful stew and you’ll be wanting to add this comfort food to your regular meal rotation.
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There’s nothing like a hearty, comforting bowl of chicken stew on a chilly evening. This easy one-pot chicken dinner comes together quickly in the Instant Pot, with tender chicken and vegetables simmered in a savory broth.
The key to great Instant Pot chicken stew is choosing the right ingredients. Use boneless skinless chicken thighs to lend moisture. Vegetables like potatoes, carrots, and celery provide a hearty flavor. And herbs like rosemary and thyme add earthy flavor and aroma.
➡ Chicken soups and stews are so comforting! Try Instant Pot creamy chicken soup, chicken curry soup, and Thai coconut chicken soup.
The Instant Pot traps steam to build pressure, pushing the liquid into the chicken and vegetables to make them ultra-tender in record time. Your dinner is ready to be ladled into bowls in under 30 minutes but with a 4-minute cook time!
❤️ WHY YOU NEED TO TRY THIS INSTANT POT CHICKEN STEW RECIPE
- This Instant Pot chicken stew with potatoes and carrots is a quick, wholesome, comforting meal for the family that’s perfect for busy weeknights.
- It’s a one pot meal that’s convenient and easy.
- The Instant Pot makes it so easy to cook chicken stew with zero fuss, and no mess.
- This recipe is healthy and full of vegetables.
- It’s a great way to use up vegetables and pantry staples.
- The recipe is versatile and customizable.
🧂 Instant Pot Chicken Stew – Ingredients
💡 Tips for making the best Instant Pot chicken stew
Using different cuts of chicken
This stew is made with chicken thighs. I’m a big fan of chicken thighs because they’re so flavorful and they are hard to overcook. For that reason, most of my chicken recipes use chicken thighs. However, if you wish to use other cuts of chicken, here are the pressure cooker cook times:
- Cubed chicken breast: 4 minutes
- Whole boneless skinless chicken breast: 10 minutes
- Bone-in chicken thighs or legs: 12 to 14 minutes
- Whole boneless skinless chicken thighs: 10 minutes
If using whole pieces of chicken, remove the chicken after pressure has been released and shred it with a meat shredder or two forks. Add the chicken back into the pressure cooker chicken stew after shredding.
Instant Pot pro tips
- To streamline the recipe and make it quick, I skip searing the chicken pieces. However, browning the chicken first does add flavor. Sear the chicken on both sides, remove it, and proceed with the recipe. Add chicken back to the pot before pressure cooking.
- Cut the chicken into cubes so it cooks quickly and evenly.
- Deglaze the Instant Pot after sauteing by adding a bit of chicken broth or stock to pick up all those tasty browned bits off the bottom and help you avoid the burn message.
Recipe variations
- Add your choice of vegetables including bell peppers, peas, sweet potatoes, baby potatoes, green beans, corn, and tomatoes.
- Add a chopped jalapeno or serrano green chili pepper for extra spice.
- Add lemon juice for a more complex flavor.
- Use Italian seasoning or herbes de Provence instead of thyme and rosemary.
- Add in a bay leaf to deepen the flavors.
- Add ¼ cup of heavy cream or half and half at the end to make it a creamy chicken stew.
- To make this an Instant Pot beef stew recipe, substitute chicken with beef stew meat and pressure cook the beef first before adding the vegetables. See my beef curry stew recipe for instructions.
Thicken the stew
- Thickening the stew is optional because it tastes great even without doing so and it does thicken up a bit as it cools.
- However, you can choose to thicken the stew with a cornstarch slurry for a richer consistency. Mix a tablespoon of cornstarch with a tablespoon of cold water till well blended. Slowly add this cornstarch slurry to the cooked stew and heat through on Saute mode.
- You can also take half a cup of the vegetables and blend them into a smooth paste and add it back into the stew to thicken it.
Learn more about your Instant Pot…
- Start Cooking Later: If you want to have dinner piping hot, set your Instant Pot Delay Start.
- Deglaze and avoid food burn message: Learn how to deglaze Instant Pot and avoid the burn message.
- Symbols on Display: What do all those Instant Pot symbols mean on your Instant Pot display panel?
- Elevate Your Food: What is a trivet and why should you use it?
- Cook Two Dishes at Once: The Instant Pot Pot in Pot method allows you to cook multiple dishes at once, make cheesecakes, casseroles, lasagna, and hard boiled eggs in your Instant Pot.
- Soak Dry Beans Hack: If you forget to soak dry beans ahead of time, this Instant Pot hack allows you to quick soak beans in no time!
❓ FAQS
To make this recipe in a slow cooker or Crockpot, add all ingredients to the slow cooker and cook on low heat for 7 to 8 hours. You can sear the chicken first before adding it to the slow cooker for more flavor.
Yes, you can double the recipe. Keep the cooking time the same.
You can use chicken broth or water instead of white wine to deglaze the pot.
Use vegetable broth, omit the chicken, add more vegetables, and pressure cook for 4 minutes.
📝 How to make Instant Pot chicken stew (step by step instructions)
- Saute onions and spices, and add the remaining ingredients
- Pressure cook
- Thicken the stew
Saute onions and spices and add the remaining ingredients
- Add olive oil to the Instant Pot and once the oil has heated, saute onions until translucent. Add garlic and cook briefly. Press Cancel.
- Add rosemary, thyme, crushed pepper, pepper, and salt, and saute briefly.
- Deglaze with white wine, scraping the bottom to make sure nothing’s stuck to the inner pot.
- Add celery, potatoes, mushrooms, carrots, chicken, broth, and tomato paste.
Program the Instant Pot and release pressure
- Close the lid.
- Select Pressure Cook mode and cook on high pressure for 5 minutes.
- The display will go from On to 5:00. The float valve will go up after a few minutes. The display will count down to 00:00.
- Do a 10 minute natural pressure release, where you let the pressure release for 10 minutes on its own and then release the remaining pressure. Once the float valve goes down, the lid can be opened.
Thicken the stew
- The stew is ready at this point, but you can choose to thicken it by adding a cornstarch slurry (a mixture of equal parts of cornstarch and water).
- In Saute mode, gradually add the cornstarch slurry and allow the stew to thicken, while stirring constantly.
Instant Pot Tips and Tricks
Delay Start
Learn about how to use the Instant Pot Delay Start feature, which allows you to begin pressure cooking at a future time.
Pot in Pot
Find out how to use the Instant Pot pot in pot cooking method, which allows you to cook multiple foods together.
Cooking Times
Find out Instant Pot Cooking Times and what method of pressure release to use.
♨️ Stovetop chicken stew instruction
If you don’t have an Instant Pot, you can make this one pot chicken stew on the stovetop:
- Heat oil in a dutch oven over medium-high heat. Brown the chicken pieces on both sides and remove.
- Saute the onions until translucent. Add garlic and saute briefly.
- Add the spices and saute briefly.
- Add the tomato paste and saute briefly.
- Deglaze the bottom of the pan with white wine.
- Return the chicken to the pot. Stir in the broth and vegetables.
- Bring to a boil, stir, reduce heat to medium, and cover. Add more broth if the stew appears too thick as it cooks. You may need to add extra broth compared to the Instant Pot version of the recipe.
- Simmer the stew for up to an hour, stirring occasionally. Cook the chicken until tender and until the vegetables are cooked through.
Detailed instructions are in the recipe card below.
More Chicken Favorites
Love cooking chicken in the Instant Pot but looking for new recipes? Here are a few of my favorite Instant Pot chicken recipes that are easy, delicious, and fast to make.
- Instant Pot African peanut stew
- Instant Pot coconut chicken curry soup
- Instant Pot teriyaki chicken wings
- Instant Pot khao suey recipe (Burmese noodles)
For more chicken recipes, be sure to head over to my list of amazing Instant Pot Chicken Recipes you need to try!
Instant Pot Pressure Cooker Chicken Stew
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoon olive oil
- 2 cups onions chopped
- 1 tablespoon garlic minced
- 1½ teaspoon dried rosemary or fresh, minced
- 1½ teaspoon dried thyme
- ½ teaspoon crushed red pepper or to taste (I like to use ¾ tsp)
- 1 teaspoon black pepper powder
- 1 teaspoon salt or to taste (I like to use 1½ tsp)
- ½ cup dry white wine
- 1 ½ cups celery sliced into ½ inch chunks (abour 3 stalks)
- 2 cups potatoes cubed into 1 inch pieces (9 oz or 250 grams)
- 2 ½ cups mushrooms sliced (8 oz or 225 gms)
- 1 ½ cups carrots sliced into ½ inch chunks (about 6 oz or 170 gms)
- 1 ½ lbs boneless skinless chicken thighs (⅔ kg) cut into 1½ inch pieces)
- 2 cups low sodium chicken broth (about one 14.5 oz can) – more for stovetop
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
To Thicken (Optional)
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 tablespoon water
Instructions
Instant Pot Instructions
- Select the Saute function and pre-heat the Instant Pot.
- Add olive oil to the pre-heated inner pot of Instant Pot and allow it to heat up.
- Stir in onions and saute till soft, about 2 minutes. Saute the garlic for about 30 seconds. Press Cancel because the spices will cook in the residual heat.
- Add rosemary, thyme, crushed red pepper, black pepper, and salt, stirring until fragrant about 15 to 30 seconds. *
- Press Cancel.
- Deglaze the Instant Pot with white wine. Stir to remove any brown bits. There should be nothing stuck to the bottom of the inner pot.
- Once deglazed, add celery, potatoes, mushrooms, carrots, chicken, and broth. Stir to combine.
- Add the tomato paste, but don't stir.
- Close the lid and pressure cook on High Pressure for 4 minutes.
- Do 10 minute natural release of pressure. [Read More: The Different Pressure Release Methods]
- Select Cancel and open the Instant Pot lid.
- If you wish to thicken the stew, either heat in Saute mode until reduced or add cornstarch slurry to the stew while stirring constantly and heat through in Saute mode. **
- Serve crusty French bread.
Stovetop Instructions
- Heat olive oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Brown the chicken pieces on both sides and set aside. The chicken just needs to brown on the outside, and doesn't need to cook through.
- Saute the onions until translucent. Add garlic and saute briefly.
- Add rosemary, thyme, crushed red pepper, black pepper, and salt, stirring until fragrant about 15 to 30 seconds.
- Add the tomato paste and saute briefly.
- Deglaze the bottom of the pan with white wine, stirring to scrape up all the brown bits.
- Return the chicken to the pot. Stir in the broth. celery, potatoes, mushrooms, and carrots.
- Bring to a boil, stir, reduce heat to medium, and cover.
- Simmer the stew for 45 minutes to an hour, stirring occasionally. Cook the chicken until tender and until the vegetables are cooked through. If the stew appears to be too thick, add more broth. You may need to add an extra cup of broth compared to the Instant Pot version of the recipe depending on how much evaporates.
- Serve with crusty French bread.
Notes
- * If the Instant Pot becomes too hot and the ingredients are burning, turn it off to cool it down and turn back on once cooled. You don’t want to burn the spices! If you need to, add a tablespoon of broth to deglaze the inner pot if you find that the ingredients are browning too quickly.
- ** Cornstarch slurry is made with equal parts cornstarch and cold water. Combine into a smooth paste. You can use an extra tablespoon of each to thicken further. Add the slurry to the stew gradually while stirring constantly, and heat through till thickened.
- Add one can of cooked cannelini beans for an exra dose of protein.
- Prep time does not include steps that are already accounted for in the ingredient list, e.g. minced garlic, cut vegetables, etc.
Nutrition
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I am not a certified nutritionist. I provide my best estimate of nutritional information merely as a courtesy to my readers. If you depend on nutritional information for dietary or health reasons, I suggest using your favorite online nutrition calculator to confirm the nutritional value of this recipe based on the actual ingredients that you use.
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✅ Why Trust Neena at Paint the Kitchen Red?
I’m Neena, and I have a lifetime of experience working with pressure cookers. I know how to maximize the potential of a pressure cooker to consistently produce delicious and easy meals. With my Instant Pot expertise, I can provide valuable insights, troubleshooting advice, and innovative recipe ideas so you can trust me on all things Instant Pot!
➡ New to the Instant Pot? Get my Instant Pot instructions for beginners.
Beth says
This is the third time I have made this and my family can’t get enough of it! It is so delicious! I even make a vegetarian version with plant based chicken in a separate instant pot for my daughter and it is also great. Thank you so much for this recipe! Beth
Neena Panicker says
Beth, thank you for taking the time to comment. I’m glad you enjoyed the recipe and that’s awesome that you made it vegetarian!
Jennifer Pena says
At what point do you add the chicken to the instant pot? I got to the part where you lock the lid and the chicken was still on the counter. I had to dump all the ingredients into a bowl so I could sautee the chicken in oil in the instant pot. Chicken didn’t get seasonings until i poured everything back into the instant pot.
Neena Panicker says
Jennifer, I’m sorry you had trouble. I think you missed it – the chicken is added in step 7, with the veggies. To make things easy, the IP version of the recipe doesn’t call for sauteing the chicken. But you can definitely saute the chicken briefly after the onions.