Get my Cookbooks! Instant Pot Spaghetti
This Instant Pot Spaghetti has perfectly cooked spaghetti noodles in marinara sauce with ground beef, simple seasonings, and cream cheese as an amazing secret ingredient. Your family will love this 30 minute meal!
Try my Eggplant Parmesan next! And don’t forget a side of Garlic Bread with Cheese.
Instant Pot Spaghetti
If you’re looking for an easy dinner idea that the whole family can actually agree on, this is it.
Not only is it super convenient to cook this entire meal in one pot, but the flavors blend so perfectly together, you’ll never make spaghetti any other way!
See below for my PRO tips for freezing, this makes a great freezer meal.
How to Make it
See recipe card below this post for ingredient quantities and full instructions.
- Set the Instant Pot to Sauté mode. Heat the olive oil and add the ground beef. Cook and crumble the beef, drain any grease.
- Stir in the seasonings. Break the spaghetti noodles in half and criss-cross them over the ground beef to prevent them from sticking together.
- Add the chicken broth and undrained diced tomatoes.
- Add marinara sauce and ensure spaghetti noodles are completely submerged.
- Pressure cook for 8 minutes.
- Flip the quick release valve. Stir in the cream cheese. Sauce will thicken upon standing. Serve!
Using a 6 Quart Instant Pot
- I us my trusty 6-quart Instant Pot for this recipe, which is what I recommend for most families, and is what most Instant Pot recipes are based on.
- It can cook enough food for a family of four and won’t take as long to come to pressure as an 8 quart will.
Burn Message Indicator
The burn indicator can sometimes trigger more easily with starchy foods, (i.e. – pasta). Rest assure, there is a sufficient amount of liquid in this recipe to avoid burning this pasta.
Even so, I commonly see this indicator when I am cooking but I just let it continue to come to pressure and eventually it goes away.
For more information you can check out these 7 Instant Pot Burn Mistakes you need to avoid.
Storing Leftovers
Refrigerate for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months.
Tips for Freezing
- Cook the pasta to the Al Dente Point, but no more. That way the pasta won’t be overcooked when you reheat it. The quick release of the pressure valve helps to halt the cooking process.
- I make portion-sized foil packets for these and place them right from the freezer to a 350° oven for about 20-25 minutes, depending on the portion size.
- You can also freeze them in Ziploc bags and place in the fridge overnight to defrost.
More Instant Pot Meals:
- Creamy Chicken Stew
- Chicken and Stuffing
- Hamburger Helper
- Roasted Potatoes
- Broccoli Cheddar Soup
- Split Pea Soup
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Instant Pot Spaghetti and Meat Sauce
Ingredients
- 1 Tablespoon Olive Oil
- 1 pound ground beef, I use 85% lean
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon onion powder
- ½ teaspoon Italian Seasonings
- Salt/pepper, to taste
- ½ pound spaghetti
- 24 oz. marinara sauce
- 14.5 oz. diced tomatoes, undrained
- 2 cups chicken broth, can sub water
- 2 Tablespoons cream cheese, softened (optional, but recommended!)
Instructions
- Set the instant pot to Sautee. Add the Olive oil and ground beef. Cook and crumble the ground beef until it is browned and cooked through. Drain any excess grease if needed,
- Stir in the seasonings. Use a silicone spatula to scrape up any brown bits that might be stuck to the bottom of the pan. (This helps prevent the burn indicator message.)
- Break the spaghetti noodles in half. Crisscross them over the meat so that they don't stick together.
- Add the chicken broth and undrained diced tomatoes over the noodles. Top with marinara and ensure the noodles are submerged.
- Cover/Seal the Instant Pot and set it to pressure cook for 8 minutes (Or, select the manual button and hit high pressure for 8 minutes). Note: It might sound like nothing is happening but if you put your ear up to the instant pot after a few minutes, you can hear it working.
- Turn the quick release valve to let all of the steam escape, and open the pot. (Do not let the pressure release naturally as this will overcook the pasta.)
- Stir in the cream cheese. The sauce will continue to thicken upon standing. Serve, and enjoy!
Notes
Substitutions and additions:
- Ground Turkey or Chicken may also be used.
- Thin Spaghetti may also be used. Pressure cook for 6 minutes instead of 8.
- For a similar flavor to Bolognese, saute diced onions, celery, and carrots when browning the meat.
Nutrition
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Can’t ask for a simpler spaghetti recipe. And it tastes excellent. Nothing fancy, just good food.
Thank you Linda! My thoughts exactly!!!
Yum! My husband loved it!
Excellent Judie! I’ve definitely made this one the most of any instant pot recipe- my toddler loves it!!! The hamburger helper one is awesome too!
Finally tried this, my second of your Instant Pot recipes, and, Oh Mah Gahd.
I followed the recipe to the “T” this time, with the lone exception of adding 14 frozen meatballs on top of the beef. In the future, I’ll brown up the meatballs in the pot first; they were good, but it’s a texture thing.
Rao’s sauce is delectable! Really expensive as you warned so I’ll look for sales next time.
Thank you so much for this wonderful, easy, satisfying recipe. The cream cheese was the thing that really amped up the recipe. I would have never thought of it. Mmmmmm…
Garlic bread, salad and ohhh maybe a glass of red wine made this a delicious comforting meal. Respect!!
Jennifer! Can I just say that you are awesome?! Your comments made me so happy! (Totally agree on needing sales on Raos, I came across one at the Christmas tree shop of all places, but I am already out!) I love your meatball suggestion! You are the best, have a great rest of your weekend!
Can I just tell you that the next-day leftovers were even more scrumptious? Something about all those herbs and seasonings and flavors getting to know each other, I think! Yuuuum! What a game changer your recipe is!
You’re the bomb! Thank you for taking the time and effort to share with us!!
OH MY GOSH I totally agree!!! You are like my twin. I love the leftovers even better too and look forward to it ALL night- is that weird? Like I have dreams about eating it the next day, after I’VE just had it for dinner! HAHA. I am so happy that you appreciate this as much as I do!! It’s the little things! 🙂
Hi, should I do a quick release right after the cooking stops? Or do a natural release, which typically takes about 15 minutes?
Thanks!
Hi Joseph! You would want to do a quick release, I’ve updated the instructions so it’s clearer! Thanks so much, I hope you enjoy this one, it’s one of my favorites by far. Simple, but delish!
Easy and delicious comfort food! I didn’t have the diced tomatoes, so just added some extra tomato sauce and seasoning. I definitely recommend adding the cream cheese at the end! YUM:-) Great leftovers too.
I am SOOO happy that you enjoyed this recipe as much as I do- I am obsessed with it, I make it ALL the time. I will never cook spaghetti any other way now, and I totally agree with you- the cream cheese at the end is a MUST-MUST-MUST! Thanks for taking the time to comment!!! Have a great day!
Yummy first time doing spaghetti in my new instapot!! I’ll never go back to the stove top!!! Recipe was delicious!! My kids and I live on pasta thank you!!!!!
Yaaayyy!!! Oh I’m so happy you
Enjoyed this! It’s a recipe that I make probably every other week! – thank you for taking the time to tell me what you thought of it!! ❤️
Great recipe. Easy as can be. I prefer sausage myself so will use ground sausa and maybe a little ground beef next time. But great solid meal for my boys. I never mind doing the work but it’s nice to let the pot do the work.
Great Rob! I love your variation suggestions and I’m so happy your boys love the meal too!
I loved this & total game changer Stephanie. I made a few tweaks based on ingredients I had available.
-saute 1 onion and 3 cloves of garlic
-added 1 lb of ground turkey, cooked through
-added spices (Italian seasoning, salt, pepper, 1 bay leaf)
-1 tablespoon of tomato paste
-1 lb of dried pasta (ziti I think)
-3 cups of water
-1 can of crushed tomatoes w/ basil (32 oz)
-1 can of tomato sauce (15 oz)
Finished with the cream cheese and parm.
Hi Matt! Thank you for taking the time to write down your alterations, I should give this a try next time! I’m so glad you enjoyed it! 🙂 (And I’m glad you chose to add the cream cheese- it’s SO good!)
This is now a favorite of mine. Thank you so much for posting it. I can’t get over how delicious it is with the cream cheese. I have to admit that I was very skeptical. Both my girls and my husband like it as well. 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
YES! You made my night Sara! You know what is so funny? Sometimes when I see a review on a recipe, I think to myself, “I hope they loved it!!??” … but when I just saw a comment come in for this recipe, I already knew! It had to be good! I really appreciate you taking the time to comment, and I am so happy that you loved it as much as we did! The cream cheese really does make a difference! And instant pots are awesome! Thanks again!
Omg this was so very good. We used Italian diced tomatoes, and Italian sausage instead of beef and it was such an easy fix and so yummy that even those in my family who don’t like spaghetti wanted more… 9.9 out of 10 times there are leftovers but not tonight… pot scraped clean!
HEY DeeAnna! Oh my gosh I woke up and checked my email first thing this morning and saw this comment. It made my whole day! I am SO happy that your family loved this recipe as much as mine did…. I mean, it’s so simple but something about making it in the instant pot makes it SO tasty, I don’t know what it is… I made a massive batch of it but it’s all gone, just like you said! Time for another batch for me! Thanks again for taking the time to share!