A last-minute meal that’s a crowd-pleaser too.
Last-minute meals are for those hectic days when everyone comes home at six o’clock and wants dinner now. There’s no time to get fancy, so you just whip up something fast and easy, like scrambled eggs or spaghetti. It’s not exciting, but it’s a meal.
Crowd-pleasing meals, on the other hand, are the ones you pull out when you really want to make the whole family happy. They’re meals that you know even the pickiest eaters in your family won’t turn their noses up at. Like, for instance, pizza with pepperoni and sausage.
Of course, what every busy mom would really love is a recipe that does both of these at once: a meal that’s quick to get onto the table, and makes everyone happy when it shows up. But honestly, where are you ever going to find a dish like that?
In your Instant Pot, that’s where!
With the help of the Instant Pot, you can whip up a dinner that’s got all the crowd-pleasing flavor of pizza, and comes together in – no joke – 15 minutes flat. Brown some sausage right in the pot, add the pasta sauce and noodles, give it five minutes to cook, and top it with cheese and pepperoni.
In the time it takes your kids to set the table (after going back twice because they forgot the salt and the napkins), you can have dinner on it. And not just any dinner, but a dinner they’ll love.
Instant Pot Pizza Pasta
Printable recipe directions and ingredient list at bottom of post.
Directions:
- Set the IP on “sauté”. Melt the butter, add the garlic Italian seasoning and sausage. Sauté until the sausage is no longer pink.
- Add both spaghetti sauce and pizza sauce to the sausage mixture . Next add in pasta.
- Add the water. Give a stir and put on the lid, and be sure to set the toggle switch to “seal”.
- Set on Manual for 5 minutes. Do a Quick Release and open the lid after the silver pin has dropped.
- Add HALF the cheese and HALF the pepperoni – mix it into the pasta/meat mixture.
- Sprinkle the remaining cheese and pepperoni over the top of the mixture. Replace the lid and let the cheese melt and the pepperoni warm through.
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Instant Pot Pizza Pasta
Ingredients
- 1 lb. sausage Italian, mild,
- 8 oz. pizza sauce
- 16 oz. pasta sauce
- 28 oz. water
- 8 oz. mozzarella
- 20 slices pizza pepperoni
- 1 lb. pasta I used cavatappi
- 2 tsp garlic minced
- 1 tsp Italian seasoning
- as desired salt and pepper
- 1 tbsp. butter
Instructions
- Set the IP on “sauté”. Melt the butter, add the garlic Italian seasoning and sausage. Sauté until the sausage is no longer pink.
- Add both spaghetti sauce and pizza sauce to the sausage mixture. Next add in pasta.
- Add the water. Give a stir and put on the lid, and be sure to set the toggle switch to “seal”
- Set on Manual for 5 minutes. Do a Quick Release and open the lid after the silver pin has dropped.
- Add HALF the cheese and HALF the pepperoni – mix it into the pasta/meat mixture
- Sprinkle the remaining cheese and pepperoni over the top of the mixture. Replace the lid and let the cheese melt and the pepperoni warm through.
Nutrition Information:
Sarah P says
I have made this so many times, it’s a favourite.
Anne says
SUCH a great recipe!! I was worried when I read that some people were getting “Burn” messages on their instapots so I warned my son since HE is the instapot “Master.” He said, “Yeah I figured out how avoid those burn messages!” I asked him “HOW?!” He said he sets the instapot to “Saute” and brings the ingredients to up to a boil and keeps scraping the bottom to sort of “deglaze” it. Once the ingredients are at the boil point, THEN he sets it to pressure cook. He has never had a burn notice since on any recipe!!
Michelle says
This recipe is a huge hit at our house, and I tell everyone who mentions the Instant Pot about it! I recently started a diet, but I can’t live without this deliciousness, so I’ll have to learn portion control 🤣 what is the serving size?
Amy says
This has become one of our family favorites! I have a Ninja Foodi so I close the lid and “broil” the cheese at the end. Thanks for this one!
Anna Pulsipher says
Finally an instant pot meal that turned out just as I hoped! I’m new to the instant pot world and this is a great recipe to start with! Thank you for sharing!
Corey says
So happy you loved it Anna!
christina oliver says
I have made this many times, and my family loves it. We are having a big family get together next week, and I am wanting to make this for about 30 people. has anyone made this in bulk? we will have 3 instant pots, but I’m thinking of making this in the 3 instant pots, then transferring it into an oven safe pan to keep warm, and then making another round. any advice? thanks!!
Ashten says
Great recipe! Completely forgot the garlic though because the recipe didn’t have a comma and I thought it was “garlic Italian seasoning.” I added some garlic powder later and it turned out fine. Next time I will know to ad the minced garlic tho 😉
Marie Popal says
I am guilty of making this recipe and hoarding the entire dish to myself over a period of a few days. LOL. It’s perfect and comes together so easily. The first time around I used peps, beef, sausage, ham and mini peps to make an “All Meat” pizza pasta. This time round I used rotini (corkscrew) pasta and mini pepperonis since I didn’t have sliced on hand and it came out just as good. Even though it’s supposed to be served straight out of the IP, I usually spread it between two casserole dishes, freeze one, and sprinkle the cheese on the other and throw it in the oven at 350 for about 15 extra minutes. SOOOOOOO GOOD! This is a forever recipe.
Debbi says
I LOVE the idea of freezing half instead of making only 1/2 a recipe!! VERY convenient.
Ryan says
This has become a regular meal at our house. Even my picky kids love it!
Debbi says
We liked the box version but we wanted to get away from boxed meals. We LOVE the recipe (boys don’t like sausage very much so we just upped the pepperoni, worked great!). Anyway I was sick the other day so I just picked up the box of pizza pasta. Needless to say we threw it out because compared to homemade it was DISGUSTING! I should have just picked up the ingredients. It is actually no more work to make this recipe and tastes SOOOO much better!
Jessica Hulburt says
So easy and delicious! Will be making it again.
sandy says
can you use a white sauce instead of red pasta sauce
Susan says
Can I freeze this?
Alegria Apikelis says
This is a new standard in our house–particularly when we have teenage guests. Thank you for sharing! It is delish.
Sheryl says
The recipe was good but I messed it up because of the ingredients being all out of order and didn’t season until it was done. I used half a pound of pasta and it was perfect. I couldn’t figure out what to do with the sausage so I took it out of the casing and broke it up. Next time I’ll slice it 1/4″ pieces.
1 tbsp. butter
1 lb. sausage Italian, mild (slice 1/4″ pieces)
2 tsp garlic minced
1 tsp Italian seasoning
8 oz. pizza sauce
16 oz. pasta sauce
1/2 lb. pasta I used cavatappi
16 oz. water
8 oz. mozzarella
20 slices pizza pepperoni
Amanda says
So yummy! Quick question. Is it 570 calories a serving or for the 6 servings total?
Corey says
That is per serving Amanda 🙂
Jessica says
Making this recipe now. My cooker doesn’t have a manual button. And this is my first time using it! (Literally right in the middle of trying this recipe) I hope I’m doing it right! I chose pressure cook for 5 minutes. Eeeek!
Sheryl says
Manual and pressure cook on high are the same thing.
Ginger B says
I chose this as my first recipe to use in my new instant pot! It turned out great and very tasty.
I have some suggestions based on what I would change but would definitely try it per recipe first to form your own opinon.
My comments was that pasta was cooked more than needed (next time I will try 4 mins instead of 5). I also thought it was a bit too cheese butt if that is your thing then leave as is 🙂
Maybe it was just me but cooking sausages on saute seemed to take forever, so no idea how someone can cook this entire recipe in 15 mins! I spent 75 mins (again first time user). It was a little inclear about sausages, no where did it say “slice up” or “remove casing” so what did you do with the whole sausages? I sautee for like half hour and then gave up and sliced up thinly and was still pink inside. Any suggestions to make faster next time?
I do plan to make it again! Thanks for sharing!
Michelle says
This was so good! Thanks to the person who answered the doubling question. I doubled everything except the pasta. I used 1.5 lbs. I also threw in some mini meatballs. My family loved it!
Linda Taylor says
I made a vegetarian version, without the pepperoni and sausage because I have to watch my sodium intake. I added thickly sliced mushrooms, onions, red bell peppers, just to see if I could get away with, a finely grated zucchini (my family never even guessed it was in there!). We really liked it, and sprinkled red pepper flakes on top like we do pizza! Thank you for this recipe, I’ll definitely make it again.
Tanya says
The family loved this…even my InstaPot skeptical husband
Krista Buescher says
This is our family’s favorite instapot recipe. I have a plenty of picky eaters in my group. It’s great every time!
Shellby says
Can I use rotini pasta? Or even regular size macaroni pasta? Does it just need to be one pound? Thank you in advance!
Brandi Brock says
My family loved this! I work a lot so it’s really hard to get cooking time. This is quick with an easy prep that takes almost no effort! I’m really happy my family loved it because they are very picky and don’t like trying new things!
Karina says
I have to say, I am not a pizza fan but my husband LOVES pizza, so wanted to try this for him and OMG this was delicious, this will be going on our menu for sure:)
Joni says
We loved this! I made it in my Ninja Foodi and added peppers, onions, mushrooms and black olives (just because that’s how we like our pizza). I think I’ll keep cavatappi on hand just for this dish – it just seemed like the perfect pasta for this one. Thank you for a great recipe!