Recipe Overview
Why you’ll love it: Instant Pot sweet potatoes come out silky smooth every time. Pressure cooking sweet potatoes may be the best (and easiest) way yet!
How long it takes: 40 minutes total
Equipment you’ll need: Instant Pot/pressure cooker, wire trivet
Servings: make as many as you like (within reason!)
I eat a lot of sweet potatoes. I mean, A LOT. Roasted, in a hash, sweet potato toast, mashed, pureed, baked, turned into chips, basically any way I can. On special occasions, I love to make scalloped sweet potatoes with bacon and Gruyère. If you don’t believe me, take a look at my list of 25 easy sweet potato recipes!
I admit, I sometimes resort to the microwave to cook sweet potatoes. Stab them with a fork, wrap them in paper towel, and they’re ready in about 5 minutes. However, that method does tend to dry them out. Enter the Instant Pot! I’ve found that a pressure cooker makes the most perfect sweet potatoes. This is definitely my new go-to method, and I think it’s going to be yours, too.
About Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes
Soft and creamy. Instant Pot sweet potatoes are steamed which causes the flesh to become velvety smooth and creamy. The skin becomes very soft. Instant Pot sweet potatoes differ from baked sweet potatoes which tend to be a bit drier with a tougher skin.
An easy cooking method. This post is more of a how-to than an actual recipe. Once you’ve learned how to use your Instant Pot to cook sweet potatoes, it will be a cooking method you turn to over and over again.
Perfect for food prepping. Instant Pots can be a food prepper’s dream. Just get that Instant Pot working on food for the whole week. You can stock your fridge with boiled eggs, cooked shredded chicken, and now creamy cooked sweet potatoes. Dinner will be a snap! Prep Instant Pot white rice and freeze it in serving size bags. It’s so handy. Works for brown rice, too, or quinoa!
Ingredient Notes
- Sweet Potatoes: Look for medium-sized sweet potatoes that are about two inches in diameter. After testing this recipe several times, we came to the conclusion that larger potatoes just don’t cook as evenly. They tend to stay hard in the middle even if you increase the cooking time. The recipe is written for four sweet potatoes; you can cook fewer or more potatoes as you wish.
- Instant Pot/Pressure Cooker/Multicooker: I use a 6-quart Instant Pot.
A Sweet Little Scrub Brush
Buy a good brush to scrub the outside of your potatoes. I love this one – it has soft and firm bristles and it’s dishwasher safe. I also love the way it fits in your hand.
How To Make Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes
Prep the potatoes. Scrub the sweet potatoes well and trim if necessary. I usually trim the wrinkly ends off.
Add water. Pour one cup of water into the bottom of the pot. Don’t skip the water! Water is necessary to create steam; the steam builds up, and pressurizes the cooker.
Add the sweet potatoes. Place the wire trivet into the pot and arrange the sweet potatoes on the trivet.
Cook. Lock the lid in place and set the Instant Pot to Pressure Cook (or Manual – High Pressure, depending on your model). Set the cook time for 15 minutes. It will take approximately 10 minutes to pressurize.
Natural release. After the 15 minute timer goes off, allow the pressure to release naturally. That means you don’t do anything for fifteen minutes. When fifteen minutes have passed, release any remaining pressure; carefully remove the lid.
The sweet potatoes should be perfectly well-done, silky smooth and delicious! The skin will be very soft and is totally edible. Now you know how to make perfect sweet potatoes!
Serve. Enjoy the sweet potatoes just the way they are or top them with a nice-sized chunk of homemade garlic butter. You can eat the soft peeling or remove it. I like to enhance the sweet potatoes with a sprinkle of cinnamon sugar. Keep reading for more suggestions.
How To Use Cooked Sweet Potatoes
Stuffed sweet potatoes
Cut a slit in the middle of the potato and open it up. Add any sort of filling you like: chili with all the toppings, scrambled eggs with avocado, black beans and tomato salsa, bacon, salmon, shredded chicken, whatever! Recently we’ve been loving these quick-cooking fried chicken bites.
Mashed sweet potatoes
Scoop the sweet potatoes out of the skins and mash it. Add seasonings like chili powder, curry powder, or taco seasoning. A drizzle of hot honey is so good! Top them with a sprinkle of savory granola, toasted pine nuts, or roasted pumpkin seeds (pepitas). Try vanilla bean mashed sweet potatoes.
More ideas
Use these cooked sweet potatoes to make a creamy sweet potato casserole with marshmallows, sweet potato bread pudding, or twice baked sweet potatoes.
Cooked sweet potatoes can be stored in the refrigerator for up to 5 days. They will keep in the freezer for up to 12 months in a freezer safe container. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator before reheating.
To reheat, microwave until heated through.
More Instant Pot Basics
Instant Pot Sweet Potatoes – perfect every time!
Ingredients
- 4 medium-sized sweet potatoes (10 to 12 oz. each), approximately 2 inches in diameter (see note)
- 1 cup water
Instructions
- Scrub sweet potatoes and trim if necessary. Pour water into Instant Pot. Place wire trivet in the bottom of the Instant Pot and place sweet potatoes on top of the trivet.4 medium-sized sweet potatoes (10 to 12 oz. each), approximately 2 inches in diameter, 1 cup water
- Secure the lid and turn valve to seal, if necessary on your model.
- Select Pressure Cook (or Manual on High) for 15 minutes. It will take about 10 minutes to come to pressure.
- Allow pressure to release naturally (do nothing after the timer goes off) for 15 minutes.
- Release remaining pressure, remove lid, and serve.
Notes
- Selecting sweet potatoes: After numerous tests, we found that sweet potatoes with a diameter much larger than 2 inches cook less evenly, even if you add extra time. Try to find sweet potatoes that are fairly similar in size, about 2 inches in diameter.
- Adjusting yield: You can cook fewer sweet potatoes or add more. Cooking time is the same but it will take less/more time for the Instant Pot to come to pressure.
- Storage: Cooked sweet potatoes can be stored in the fridge for up to 5 days in an airtight container or frozen for up to a year.
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Did You Make This?Share a comment and rating below! I love hearing what you think!
What if you don’t have a steamer mine isn’t a true instant pot brand.
If you have a metal or a silicone steamer basket that will fit inside your pressure cooker, that will work fine!
My husband loves sweet potatoes but when he buys them by the bag we could never use them fast enough before they got bad. I love this recipe and cook the whole bag at once and then wrap them by 2 in foil and freeze. A pop in the microwave and they’re ready.
Awesome, I’m so glad to hear that this recipe is making your life easier! Thanks for sharing your freezer tip!
I skip the foil (for the environment) and just put as many as will fit in a ziploc freezer bag.
Smart!
Alternatively, pop those frozen cooked sweet potatoes into the IP and steam for 5 minutes, natural release.
Sounds like a good idea! I’ll have to try that some time. :) Thanks Marge!
Thanks, gonna try my tater for 10 min, its the size of 2 med, will letcha know !
Let me know how it turns out!
Not sure what’s happening with what I’m doing, but after 22 minutes on high pressure with natural release, the potatoes are still a bit hard in the middle. I did 2 fairly chubby sweet potatoes, but followed the recipe to the letter for the 15 minutes. Put them in for another 7 minutes and still hard in the middle.
Oh no! It must be that your potatoes were a lot bigger than mine. If you have particularly large potatoes, you could try cutting them in half.
How large were yours? I had the same problem and mine was big but not unusual.
It depends on if they are fat or skinny too. If you think yours look large, just bump up the cooking time a few minutes. I did 5 thicker ones yesterday and I set my IP to 18 minutes and they were perfect.
Same problem here too. So over amateur blogger recipes.
Are you sure you had the valve turned to seal and not vent? That can make this recipe fail. I’ve used this method for cooking sweet potatoes many times and it always works.
Can you think of a way these might work in the IP tonpar cook them to be used as sweet potato “toast”? (When you slice the potatoes and bake for 15-20 and then finish in the toaster when you’re ready to eat them?)
It might work if you slightly undercook them, but I would be concerned they might be hard in the centers and cooked on the edges. It’s worth a shot, though! The time investment is small and if it doesn’t work, you still have a baked sweet potato to eat. ;) Let me know if you give it a try!
Tiffany, i was literally reading these comments to figure out how to prep them for “toast” as well!! wondering if you ever tried it?
How many minutes if i cut them in half lengthwise?
I haven’t tested it that way since they cook so quickly whole. I’d be concerned that they might get overly mushy from steam if you cut them in half. Let me know if you try it, though!
I cut two large sweet potatoes in half, placed in trivet, with 1.5 c water in bottom. Cook 10 min, pressure release natural about 10 min. Delicious, just right!
Awesome, thanks for sharing that with us! I’ll have to try it that way sometime.
I’m new to IP and still learning to adjust cooking times. How long would you cook just one BIG sweet potato (please)?
Depending on the size, I think 15-20 minutes would work! Let the pressure release naturally when it’s done.
Do you have to puncture holes in the potoatoes before putting them in the instantpot?
No, it’s not necessary. :) Enjoy!
Hey, looks like you forgot to mention the important part about adding the sweet potatoes into the steamer! lol
Minor detail, right?! Ha! Can I blame it on mom brain? Thanks! ;) It does definitely work better if the sweet potatoes are IN the Instant Pot. Happy New Year!
Can you tell me the best way to reheat these if made ahead of time?
I reheat them in the microwave :)