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Instant Pot Chicken and Rice close-up on a wooden plate.
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Instant Pot Chicken and Rice

Instant Pot Chicken and Rice is the perfect comfort food all year round! Make it entirely in the electric pressure cooker to save on dishes! Either chicken breast and white rice or chicken thighs and brown rice.
Course Main Course
Cuisine American, International, Peruvian
Keyword chicken and rice, instant pot, instant pot chicken and rice
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Total Time 30 minutes
Servings 3 people
Calories 405kcal

Equipment

  • instant pot

Ingredients

  • 2 5oz / 10 oz chicken breasts / bone-in skinless chicken thighs (Either 2 five-ounce chicken breasts if you are making the recipe with white rice. OR. 2 ten-ounce bone-in chicken thighs if you are making the recipe with brown rice.)
  • 1 bunch cilantro
  • 1 cup water (at room temperature, not cold!)
  • 1/2 Tbsp ghee or bacon fat or avocado oil
  • 1 small diced onion
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1 cup white basmati rice or brown basmati rice (choose white or brown depending on the type of chicken you are using)
  • 1 cup diced carrot
  • 1 cup diced celery
  • 1 cup diced red bell pepper
  • Salt
  • Pepper
  • cilantro for garnishing

Instructions

  • Generously season chicken with salt and pepper on both sides and set aside.
  • Peel and dice carrot, dice celery, deseed and dice bell pepper. 
  • Add cilantro and room-temperature water into a blender and blend until completely smooth.
  • Peel and chop onion and garlic.
  • Preheat Instant Pot by pressing the "sauté" button.
  • Once the Instant Pot's display says "hot": add fat or oil, chopped onion, and garlic, and sauté until translucent.
    Stir often. Make sure no burnt bits of onion or garlic are stuck to the bottom of the pot. If for some reason there are, deglaze by adding a tablespoon or two of water and scrape with a wooden to remove all bits from the bottom.
  • Now work fast: add rice, salt and pepper to Instant Pot and then pour in cilantro water and give it a quick stir. Add diced vegetables on top in one layer (do not mix in!) and then top with seasoned chicken breasts. Then IMMEDIATELY close lid to avoid water from evaporating (<-important!)
  • Turn venting knob to "sealing", hit "cancel" and then "manual" and adjust to 6 minutes high pressure for chicken breast / white rice version OR 22 minutes for chicken thigh / brown rice version.
  • Wait for full natural pressure release. This means once the pot beeps don't do anything. Don't touch the valve and instead just wait for the safety pin to drop on its own. This can take anywhere from 15-25 minutes.
  • Open the pot and enjoy the smell! Then use two forks to shred the chicken. Mix it all and serve immediately with some fresh cilantro sprinkled on top.

Video

Notes

  • *Please read the blog post section where I go into detail about what to pay attention to in order to succeed to avoid any error messages from the pot.
  • nutritional info is for white rice and chicken breast.
I might have come to the bottom of the "burn" warning. If once you add the liquid you work slowly, too much water evaporates and then there isn't enough liquid left in the pot to get to pressure and cook the rice. To be able to work at whichever pace you feel comfortable you can simply, turn off the pot once the onion is translucent, take two oven mitts and remove the inner pot from the instant pot and put on a heat-proof surface, then add all the remaining ingredients (rice, liquid, veggies, chicken...) and then put the inner pot back into the instant pot and proceed as written in the instructions.

Nutrition

Calories: 405kcal | Carbohydrates: 60g | Protein: 26g | Fat: 6g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 60mg | Sodium: 178mg | Potassium: 805mg | Fiber: 4g | Sugar: 6g | Vitamin A: 9043IU | Vitamin C: 71mg | Calcium: 66mg | Iron: 1mg