Instant Pot Hamburger Soup

If you have a block of ground beef at home you should try hamburger soup tonight! Packed with tomatoes, peas and carrots too it’s become a new favorite easy Instant Pot recipe at our house.

Ok so of course there are many tweaks you can make to this one which I love. Jimmy Dean spicy ground sausage is a great option we love if we are in the mood for some heat! As far as vegetables go we love carrots, peas and diced tomatoes but you could go well beyond that. Use fresh, canned or frozen is best.

You don’t have to include Instant Pot potatoes if for some reason you don’t want the extra starch but they do make it a heartier dish. The brand on the machine doesn’t matter either.

Ninja Foodi Hamburger Soup

This makes a great Ninja Foodi recipe too. The only difference with this pot is to know which lid you need. To pressure cook you would use the one that is not attached. In this case, at the end, if you wanted to melt and brown a layer of cheese on the top you could do so with the lid that is attached as well.

Hamburger Soup with Frozen Ground Beef

If you need instructions on how to cook Instant Pot frozen ground beef to begin with we have that too! Once that is thawed you just chop that up into small pieces and then continue on with the rest of the steps below. Easy peasy.

It actually works quite well if your meat is frozen solid to begin with. You can easily defrost it in about 15 minutes and then proceed as usual with step 1 below. Same goes with a roll of Jimmy Dean spicy sausage and it is incredible!!

Can you put raw ground beef in soup?

No, you’re going to need to precook it beforehand. That is what’s great about pressure cooker recipes in general. Use one pot to brown and pressure cook. We are only going to use the first two functions to make this potato soup, same as with our Instant Pot sausage soup.

Best Vegetables to Add

Cubed fresh potatoes and onions are best and then canned Rotel will include tomatoes. Beyond that with the carrots and peas I like to just use frozen. You could use the mix with green beans in the mix too if you like. These work better than canned because it takes a bit longer to cook to prevent mushiness.

Can you add macaroni noodles?

If you wanted to add noodles or a grain you totally can. For noodles I would leave out the potatoes, submerge 1 cup below liquid but do NOT stir. Decrease timing to 3 minutes.

Can you add rice?

If you wanted to add rice I would follow our cheesy Instant Pot hamburger casserole for that option. That is thicker than soup though, but you could add more broth to thin it out. I would use the timing from our Instant Pot barley souprecipe for that grain. So many options!

How Long to Cook Hamburger Soup in Instant Pot

With potatoes you need 6 minutes so everything gets tender. Without them, or with just noodles added, you only need 2-3 minutes to heat ingredients together for meat and pasta to absorb flavor of sauce.

You really can tweak it to your liking. Want a thicker base? Decrease the amount of broth or stock and instead use some tomato sauce. I have even used spaghetti sauce at times to really amp up the flavor, and that is what I had on hand.

For more bold flavors, throw in a tablespoon or two of Worcestershire sauce too! I always say you should cook to your liking AND use what you have on hand. If you have red potatoes that need to be cooked, then use those instead of russets.

This is one of our favorite cheap Instant Pot recipes here that your family is going to love.