Instant Pot Pot Roast for Two

Jeff the Chef

Instant Pot Pot Roast for Two: beef chuck roast and winter vegetables get together in one of the all-time classics of everyday home cooking.

Instant Pot Pot Roast for Two
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Instant Pot Pot Roast for Two

Recipe by Make It Like a Man!Course: DinnerCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: Medium
Makes

2-3

servings
Cooking time

1

hour 

Ingredients

  • 1½ lb. chuck roast

  • 1 bay leaf

  • 1½ tsp salt, divided, plus more for seasoning

  • 1 tsp pepper, plus more for seasoning

  • 2 Tbs olive oil, divided

  • 1/2 med-large white onion, finely diced

  • 1 stalk celery, thinly sliced

  • 1 clove garlic, minced

  • 1/4 cup dry red wine

  • 1½ cups beef stock

  • 1 Tbs tomato paste

  • 1 tsp dried thyme

  • 1 tsp Worcestershire

  • 1/2 tsp dried rosemary

  • ¾-1 lb. baby yellow potatoes (peeled)

  • 2 med-large carrots, peeled and sliced into 1-inch segments

  • 3 Tbs flour

  • 1 Tbs softened butter

  • 1/2 tsp Dijon

  • Rustic bread and soft butter, for serving (optional)

Directions

  • Wrap the beef in paper towels to thoroughly dry it off. Process the bay leaf with a spice grinder, to very small pieces. Mix with 1 tsp salt and pepper. Rub this mixture all over the beef. Set the Instant Pot to SAUTÉ, more, 30 minutes. When you get the “hot” indication, pour 1 Tbs of oil onto the beef and roughly spread it around with your fingers; wipe your fingers off. Then, do these three things in very quick succession: 1) add the remaining 1 Tbs oil to the pot; 2) lift the inner pot out of the exterior pot and swirl it around to make sure the entire bottom of the pot it coated in oil; 3) and place the beef, oiled-side down, into the pot. Cook until browned, about 3 minutes per side. Remove to a plate.
  • Add onion and celery, and cook, stirring frequently, until the onion is translucent, 3 minutes. Stir in garlic and cook until fragrant, 1 minute. Stir in wine and thoroughly deglaze the pan (although the onion may have taken care of that for you for the most part).  CANCEL the sauté.
  • Stir in beef stock, tomato paste, thyme, Worcestershire, rosemary, and 1/2 tsp salt. Add potatoes. Lay the beef onto the potatoes. (The beef should not be submerged in the liquid.) Set the Instant Pot to MEAT/STEW, high (pressure), more (60 minutes); natural release for 15 minutes.
  • Add carrots. Set the Instant Pot to MEAT/STEW, high (pressure), less (10 minutes); natural release for 15 minutes.
  • Remove beef, potatoes, and carrots from the Instant Pot. In a small bowl, knead together flour and butter. Set the Instant Pot to SAUTÉ, accepting its default settings. Vigorously whisk the butter mixture into the pot along with the mustard, and bring the pot’s contents to a boil. Continue to cook, stirring constantly, until thickened, which should happen almost instantly. Taste for seasoning. CANCEL the sauté and allow the KEEP WARM function to kick in. (Strain the gravy through a fine-mesh sieve.) Add the beef, potatoes, and carrots back the pot. (Serve with bread and butter.)

Notes

  • I developed this recipe for a six-quart Instant Pot. If using a different size or type of pot, you may need to make modifications.
"Pot Roast," from Make It Like a Man!

Intro

This recipe produces beef that is everything you want it to be: tender and flavorful. I love the rare hits of bay that you get in the finished dish. What I really love, though, is that the veg is perfect: the potatoes are buttery but still hold their shape. The carrots still taste like carrots. And there’s a ton of gravy that you can sop up with a really great bread.

Social Learning: tips, tricks, advice, and details

In my experience, you never really know how long it will take to cook a pot roast. You have to trust, though, that if you cook it long enough, it will become tender. If you’ve gotten yourself all the way through Step 4 and find that the beef isn’t fork tender, but the veg is, simply remove the veg and keep cooking the meat at 10-minutes-pressure-cook+15-minutes-natural-release intervals. Eventually, it will be tender.

You’ll know it’s done when it’s fork tender. By that, I mean that on the one side, you won’t even for a moment think that a knife is necessary whatsoever: not to cut it into serving portions, and not to eat it. If you feel even slightly tempted to grab a knife, it’s not done yet. On the other side, you should need a fork to pull it apart; it shouldn’t have fallen completely apart all on its own.

If it’s hard to predict when it will be done (at least for me), pot roast is pretty forgiving once it is done. Screw the lid on, and you can use the KEEP WARM function for as many as four hours. (Don’t take food safety advice from me.) If you intend to refrigerate it, though, that should be done within two hours. (What did I tell you about not taking food safety advice from me?)

If you don’t have a spice grinder, you can use a coffee grinder on the bay leaf if you assiduously clean it before and after, although chopping the bay leaf finely with a knife might be even better.

I’d say that there is a solid three servings here. That leaves room for ample leftovers or seconds if for two. I wouldn’t try stretching it to four servings.

Outro

I don’t find this recipe to be difficult. There’s not much prep work, and the Instant Pot couldn’t really be easier to use (unless it was someone else who was using it for you). Although even in an Instant Pot, pot roast is time consuming, and some people equate time to difficulty. All things considered, I give it a “medium.”

If I miss anything from the traditional oven method, it’s that with it, you get pieces of the roast – the parts that inevitably rise above the liquid as it evaporates – that wind up heavily crisped. I love those bits. The tradeoff, though, is that in the Instant Pot, the meat is far more likely to wind up perfectly tender and succulent.

For further reading: beef and vegetables, Instant Pot, pot roast.

"Pot Roast," from Make It Like a Man!
Instant Pot Pot Roast for Two

Credit for images on this page: Make It Like a Man! unless otherwise credited. This content was not solicited by anyone, nor was it written in exchange for anything. Thank you, Kesor. References: Damned Delicious, Dessert for Two, and “Basic Pot Roast,” in How to Cook Everything, by Mark Bittman. (New York: Macmillan, 1998), 437.. Make It Like a Man! is ranked by Feedspot as #13 in the Top 30 Men’s Cooking Blogs. Just in case you’re wondering, you should not prounce this small-batch, artisan pot roast “Instant Pot, Pot Roast.” It’s more like “Instant, Pot-Pot Roast.” Now you know. 

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46 thoughts on “Instant Pot Pot Roast for Two”

  4. Thanks for this Jeff. I love recipes which use a relatively cheap cut of meat and converts it to a tender tasty meal.

    Reply

  6. I loved that you served this with bread and butter Jeff, just how a classic pot roast should be eaten, to mop up the delicious gravy. I was also interested that you processed the bay leaf in your spice grinder, first time I’ve seen that done. Great idea. I just know this would have been absolutely delicious with a nice glass of red wine.

    Reply

    • Oh, it would – and thank you. I got that bay leaf idea from a Mark Bittman cookbook. I wondered how it would work, since bay leaf doesn’t usually soften when you cook it, but all ground up to bits, it worked just fine.

      Reply

    • I think I’m going to say three years. But I’m a little cloudy on that, because somehow in my memory, the pandemic seems to not have registered itself as “years.” It feels like starting in 2022, I would think of something that felt like it happened “last year,” and it actually happened in 2019. So if I think I started using the Instant Pot three years ago, it could be five. 🙁 The only thing I can say for sure is that I got the thing before the pandemic. You know how there are words like antedeluvian and antebellum? I wonder if one day there will be a word that means “before the pandemic.”

      Reply

    • No, no, no … in a show of apprecitation, your son can now make pot roast for you in his Instant Pot!

      Reply

  11. Your beef pot roast recipe sounds absolutely delightful! those crispy bits from the traditional oven method sound heavenly, but the tradeoff for perfectly tender and succulent meat in the Instant Pot seems more than worth it

    Reply

  12. This is fantastic, JT loves pot roast but I always thought it was for a group or leftovers for ages! It’s also fabulous thst it’s an IP recipe. Your thickening method is interesting, I’ve never kneaded butter and flour together as a thickener.

    Reply

    • Thanks! I’m not sure where I read about the butter and flour trick. I’m sure it was in a cookbook I read long, long, ago … and I want to say it was one of Julia Child’s. It helps the flour slowly melt into the liquid, so you get fewer clumps. It’s called a beurre manié.

      Reply

  13. I can’t understand when people say they have an IP but never use it! It’s the best and I can see that you make good use of yours! Nice recipe.

    Reply

    • Thanks, Judee. I have to confess that when it was given to me, I thought that I’d probably not use it. But it’s proved to be quite useful.

      Reply

    • It’s easy to live without one, for sure. But unlike many gadgets, I’ve found myself consistently using this one.

      Reply

    • I know! Most of the time that’s OK with me, because I depend on leftovers to get me through the work week. But I love the idea of cooking for two.

      Reply

  19. There is a reason that this meal is one of the all-time classics, it is delicious. I’m one of the few people that does have an Instant Pot and cook it low and slow in the oven, adding the vegetable towards the end.

    Reply

  20. Hi my friend, Jeff 🖐😉
    I must say that this dish not just is very tasty, but also very nutritious. Something very fantastic for lunch 👍🙂 Your recipes are always very creative and very interesting that every readers your blog can to get inspired by them. I appreciate your effort and energy how much you put in this 👍🙂 Your blog is very valuable.
    Best regards to you and I hug you very hard 🥰🤗💕

    Reply

  21. I still don’t have an instant pot, but I’ve tried a couple of your instant pot recipes in a Dutch oven. Though certainly slower, they’re delicious! I love how this type of pot roast has traveled through time. 🙂 ~Valentina

    Reply

    • Thanks! Yeah, me too – it’s such and old-school dish. And it deserves to stick around, because it’s so good.

      Reply

  23. What a great recipe! It’s hard for me to cook for two after cooking for 5 for decades. I hope to try your pot roast soon.

    Reply

    • I know how you feel! I’m often cooking for six, even though there are just two of us.

      Reply

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