How To Cook Sweet Potatoes In Instant Pot

Key Tips For Instant Pot Baked Sweet Potatoes

How to Cook Sweet Potatoes in an Instant Pot

The process of baking sweet potatoes in the pressure cooker is SUPER simple, but there are a few key tips to keep in mind!

Select sweet potatoes that are similar in size. This way they will pressure cook in the same amount of time.

Pierce sweet potatoes several times before cooking–this will prevent the rare occurrence of a sweet potato bursting in the Instant Pot.
Always add cold water to the inner pot. You will need 1 cup of cold water for a 3 or 6-quart Instant pot and 1.5 cups of cold water for an 8-quart Instant pot. NEVER use warm water as this will change the amount of time it takes for the Instant Pot to come to pressure, which will change the cooking time!
Always use the trivet to keep the sweet potatoes from sitting in the water–this will keep the sweet potatoes from becoming soggy.

How To Cook Cubed Sweet Potatoes In The Instant Pot

Heres how to steam perfect sweet potatoes in the Instant Pot. All the exact ingredients and steps are in the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post!

The first step is to cut your sweet potatoes into cubes. Make sure they are all the same size. If you cut some really large and others really tiny, the large ones wont be as soft and the tiny bits will be mush.

Next, add the water and the sweet potato cubes into your Instant Pot. Its very important that you use the correct amount of water and sweet potatoes. If it doesnt have enough water in it, your food might burn.

After everything is inside the Instant Pot, close the slide and turn the valve to the sealing position. Press the Pressure Cook or Manual button and set the timer to 3 minutes for tender sweet potatoes or 2 minutes if you like them more firm.

When the Instant Pot is finished cooking, quick-release the steam. After that is completely finished, remove the lid and drain the sweet potatoes.

Finally, place the cooked sweet potatoes in your favorite serving dish and add your favorite seasonings on top. Ill share some of my favorite ideas below!

Equipment You Will Need

Instant Pot or Similar Electric Pressure Cooker or Multicooker. This is the Instant Pot I own and loveits a basic 6-quart model. You can use this method for any size Instant Pot . Simply ensure you adjust the number of sweet potatoes and amount of water accordingly.
Trivet. To keep the sweet potatoes from burning on the bottom, you will need to insert the handled trivet that came with it, which also functions as a steamer basket. If you cannot find your trivet, Id suggest finding an inexpensive replacement, such as this one.

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Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes Experiment Results

We conducted 8+ tests with varying sizes of Sweet Potatoes using different pressure cooking times in our Instant Pot Electric Pressure Cooker.

*HP = High Pressure NR = Natural Release

After playing around with various factors, we developed a system for the optimal pressure cooking time for making Sweet Potatoes in Instant Pot.

Why This Recipe Works

Baked potatoes are the absolute perfect side dish because they are so easy to make. When you use an electric pressure cooker to make them, they are even quicker and easier! Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes are the best ever!

Everyone in my family loves sweet potatoes and they have been a favorite in our house for a couple years. We enjoy the flavor much more than that of a regular ol potato, so we cook them in varying ways a lot.

Making Instant Pot sweet potatoes is my new favorite way to make them because they just couldnt be easier! As Ive seen with the dozens of other Instant Pot recipes Ive made recently, the pressure cooker creates consistently perfect and delicious food every time.

If you love baked sweet potatoes, this will be your new favorite recipe!

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Did You Crisp Your Potato Skins In The Oven Afterward

Ive seen other people do this, but honestly I never, ever do it myself. We like them just as they are. Plus, I hate to heat up my kitchen just for the skins. That being said, if crispy potato skins are your jam, feel free to stick them in the oven for a few minutes to crips them up.

What Toppings Can You Put On Sweet Potatoes

Theres many different sweet potato toppings you could use and different combinations.

Butter

Avocados
Quinoa

One of my favorite sweet potato toppings remind me of my sweet potato Thanksgiving casserole that I bake in my Pyrex baking dish.

When Im craving something sweet instead of savory on my sweet potatoes, I top them with cinnamon, butter, marshmallows, pineapples, and pecans.

The sweet potato I made this time didnt have pineapples because I forgot to add them to the shopping list when my husband went grocery shopping for me.

When I have more time, I think Ill try making more pressure cooker sweet potatoes.

I had planned on using two of the sweet potatoes to make other Instant Pot sweet potato recipes, like Instant Pot mashed sweet potatoes and a paleo sweet potato casserole but I ran out of time.

How Long Does It Take To Cook Sweet Potatoes In The Instant Pot

The cook time for Instant Pot sweet potatoes is 16 minutes. Wait, 16 minutes?! But hold on for one second. The Instant Pot requires about 10 minutes for preheating to come up to pressure before cooking. Then this recipe requires a 10 minute Natural Release for cooling down, where the pressure cooker releases the steam inside naturally.

Whats the total time for pressure cooker sweet potatoes? The total time for this recipe is 35 minutes. Thats pretty good compared to about 1 hour for baked sweet potatoes.

A final note: the timing for how to cook sweet potatoes in an Instant Pot does depend on the size of the potatoes. This recipe is for medium to large potatoes, about 10 to 12 ounces each. For very large sweet potatoes, use about 18 minutes. Smaller potatoes could use less time, about 14 minutes.

How To Set Up Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes

How to Cook SWEET POTATOES IN THE INSTANT POT | Quick Easy way to Cook Sweet Potatoes! Instant Pot

First things first not all sweet potatoes are grown equally.

Ideally, you want to make sure all the potatoes youre cooking are roughly the same size. Sometimes I get lazy and just throw them all in, which is fine they still cook.

Just know they will cook at different rates. Youll want to choose your time based on the largest sweet potatoes in the batch, because no one likes undercooked sweet potatoes.

Youll want to keep the rack in the pot. This keeps the potatoes from sitting in the liquid. You want them to steam, but not turn into a mushy mess of watery mashed potatoes. So make sure you keep the rack in there, and arrange the potatoes on it.

You can stack potatoes if they wont fit in a single layer. Youll need to increase cooking time depending on how many layers/potatoes you have, but other than that, everything else remains the same.

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More Instant Pot Recipes

If you loved this recipe for Instant Pot cubed sweet potatoes, check out some of my other Instant Pot side dishes!

These are some of my familys favorites:

Sushi Rice In The Instant Pot
Instant Pot Frozen Mixed Veggies

Cooked Chickpeas In The Instant Pot
Instant Pot Black Beans
Frozen Spinach In The Instant Pot

Instant Pot Red Kidney Beans Recipe

Instant Pot Steamed Sweet Potatoes And Puree Recipe

Posted on Published:

By: Author Diane

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Instant Pot Steamed Sweet Potatoes cook evenly and thoroughly in short order. Cooking any vegetable under pressure with an instant pot is a quick, easy and nutritious cooking method. Learn how to make Instant Pot Steamed Sweet Potato puree in this video. This process Also works for ALL squash that are seeded and chopped into 3 inch or smaller chunks. I use this process to make my Instant Pot Butternut Pumpkin Soup.

Pureed Sweet Potatoes are tasty!

This Naturally sweet, no fat, high fiber root vegetable adds an incredible wealth of nutrients and flavor options to your family diet. Sweet potatoes are loaded with antioxidants, beta carotenes, and much more.

If you are a homemade food junkie like me theinstant pot opens new and better possibilities in the kitchen. Making puree with your instant pot is simple to do and store for later.

Wanna invite sweet potatoes to your breakfast menu? Try our Chocolate Chunk Sweet Potato Granola. Kids love it and this granola will fill them with delicious nutrients not a lot of unnecessary sugar.

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Top 3 Ways To Serve Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes

How can you serve Instant Pot sweet potatoes? Let us count the ways! We created our Thai sweet potatoes recipe especially for the pressure cooker method, and we get lots of messages on and from readers that they love it! Here are our three favorite ideas:

Topped with Thai peanut butter sauce: These Sweet Potatoes with Thai Peanut Butter Sauce feature a crunchy cabbage and pepper slaw and lots of cilantro. Theyve become a fan favorite.

With Moroccan lentils: Try Healthy Sweet Potato with Moroccan Lentils, a warm-spiced mix of lentils drizzled with our best tahini sauce.

Timesaver: Cubed Sweet Potatoes

Sweet Potatoes in the Instant Pot Recipe

You can cube sweet potatoes to shorten their cook time in the Instant Pot. Cut them into 1 cubes and add them to a steamer basket. Add 1 cup water and cook for 8 minutes at HIGH pressure. Quick release the pressure when cook time is up.

Cubed sweet potatoes are delicious when used to top these Chickpea Buddha Bowls, or easily mashed with a bit of butter and milk or cream for Mashed Sweet Potatoes.

What Is An Instant Pot

Is it a pressure cooker? A slow cooker? A steamer? A yogurt maker? A warmer?

Answer: its all of these and then some.

It can be intimidating at first. One pot with anywhere from six to nine kitchen tools or appliances that it is replacing. Thats a lot for anyone to keep up with!

It has multiple functions, lots of buttons, and doesnt come with a whole ton of instructions on exactly how all of these things are supposed to work. So, like the rest of us, you turn to the internet to figure out how to use it, amiright?

The thing is, you can use it in multiple ways, so theres no one right answer. When I first started cooking in it, I decided to start out with basics. Sweet potatoes, chicken breasts, and eggs.

And for six months, those were the only three things I cooked in my Instant Pot.

If your Instant Pot is still in the box, check out this post on how to finally start using it once and for all.

Tips For Perfect Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes

Get the same size sweet potatoes, this will ensure all the sweet potatoes are done at the same time.

Pierce the sweet potatoes with a fork or knife before cooking. The holes will allow the steam cook the sweet potatoes thoroughly.

Allow at least 10 minutes for a natural release. This really aids to fully cooked fluffy sweet potatoes because of the extra steaming!

Now that you have this base recipe you can add anything you want to these sweet potatoes. You can turn them into mashed sweet potatoes or add a variety of flavors to it. These are great for meal prep cook earlier in the week and top with whatever you want through the week!

Here are some of my favorite ways to stuff sweet potatoes, although truth be told my husband cook eat these with just butter, brown sugar and cinnamon! Happy Instant Potting, and let me know how these turn out and what you do with them.

Bon Appetit friends!

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Other Delicious Instant Pot Side Dishes To Try

If you enjoyed making these tender and easy sweet potatoes here are a few other Instant Pot side dishes to try next!

Instant Pot Steamed and Sautéed Brussel Sprouts These tender on the inside, pan crisped Brussels sprouts make the perfect vegetarian side dish for any weeknight meal!

Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes This delicious Instant Pot mashed potatoes recipe yields creamy and fluffy mashed potatoes all in one pot and in under 30 minutes.

Honey Glazed Instant Pot Carrots Learn how to steam carrots in the Instant Pot and glaze them to make this delicious side dish.

Instant Pot Hummus With a few simple ingredients, you can easily whip up this delicious Instant Pot Hummus recipe for a gluten-free and vegan appetizer or snack!

Instant Pot Baked Potatoes Learn how to cook this classic, comfort food side dish with just two ingredients and very little prep work.

Storing And Reheating Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes

How to Make Sweet Potatoes in an Instant Pot | You Can Cook That | Allrecipes.com

Storing: Keep leftover cooked potatoes stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 4 days.
Freezing: Allow the potatoes to cool completely then wrap each sweet potato individually first in plastic wrap and then in foil. Freeze for up to 3-4 months and thaw in the refrigerator before reheating.

Reheating: Reheat in a preheated 350 F oven or in the microwave.

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Storing And Reheating Steamed Sweet Potatoes

Cooking a big batch of sweet potatoes at once is a great way to get ahead on meal prep for the week.

To Store. Leftover sweet potatoes can be stored in an airtight storage container in the refrigerator for up to 4 days.
To Reheat. Rewarm potatoes in the oven at 350 degrees F until hot. You can also reheat them gently in the microwave.
To Freeze. Individually wrap leftover potatoes, and freeze them for up to 3 months. Let thaw overnight in the refrigerator before reheating.

What To Serve With Sweet Potatoes

Baked sweet potatoes are perfect for stuffing with BBQ chicken, pulled pork, black beans and cheese, or even chili.

I love to enjoy them plain, with just butter and a pinch of salt. You might like to serve a sweet potato with any of these single serving recipes:

For this easy Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes recipe, I use an Instant Pot Duo Mini 3-quart. For best results, use an Instant Pot of similar size.

If you would like additional information on the dishes I use in our recipes for one, please visit our FAQ page.

For examples of the dishes we use, please visit our Store page.

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Cooking Times By Size

The cooking times for this recipe vary depending on the size of your sweet potatoes. You can use any size of potatoes as long as you adjust accordingly!

Small Potatoes: If your sweet potatoes are 6-8 ounces, youll want to cook them for 12 minutes and naturally release the steam for 10 minutes.
Medium Potatoes: Cook 8-10 ounce sweet potatoes for 15 minutes, and release the steam for about 13 minutes.

Large Potatoes: 10-12 ounce sweet potatoes should be cooked for 18 minutes. It will take the pressure cooker 7 to 10 minutes to come to pressure. Release the steam for 15 minutes if using large potatoes.

Can I Combine Different Types Of Potatoes In The Same Pot To Cook Together

How to Cook Sweet Potatoes in Instant Pot?

Yes! We do this all the time since my husband prefers russets, and my kids and I prefer sweet potatoes. It works great! It helps if they are all similar in size. If not, set your cook time to the largest potato. I have found that potatoes are pretty resilient to over cooking. Alternatively, you could cut the biggest one in half.

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