Instant Pot Korean Beef
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The best and easiest Korean beef you will ever make in the pressure cooker. 10 min prep or less! And the meat comes out amazingly flavorful and melt-in-your-mouth tender!
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why i love this recipe
- Quick prep. All you need is 10 min of prep time. There’s no searing, no sautéing, no nothing.
- Tender beef. Thanks to the Instant Pot®, the beef comes out so tender and juicy, simply melt-in-your-mouth perfection, infusing the meat with so much flavor (as if it’s been simmering for hours on end!).
- The sauce. The sauce is simply the best part about this recipe. Serve it over rice, serve it over noodles, serve it over all the things.
tips and tricks for success
- Use reduced sodium soy sauce. Reduced sodium has less sodium and less salt without compromising flavor.
- Add vegetables. Mushrooms, carrots, bell peppers or snow peas can be added for a more heartier meal.
- Add some heat. For a spicy kick, add gochujang (Korean red chili paste), contributing a slightly savory, spicy, sweet taste to the dish.
- Make a cornstarch slurry. Adding cornstarch directly into the pressure cooker can cause lumps. Always use a mixture of cornstarch and cold liquid (aka cornstarch slurry) to thicken the sauce, yielding a smoother, gravy-like consistency.
- More protein. In need of more protein? Top your Korean beef bowls with a fried egg.
- Serve with your favorite grains. White rice, brown rice, cauliflower rice, quinoa or farro are all great options.
- Freeze as needed. Korean beef freezes like a dream! Label, date and freeze up to 2 months, great for meal prep and making weeknight (and weekend) meals even easier and quicker.
freezing and storage
Storage
Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for 2-3 days.
Reheating
Let the meat sit at room temperature for 10-15 minutes. Reheat over low heat, stirring frequently, until heated through.
Freeze after cooking
Let cool completely. Transfer the meat into individual servings in plastic freezer bags. Label, date and freeze up to 2 months. To reheat, thaw overnight in the fridge, reheating over low heat, stirring frequently, until heated through.
more favorited korean recipes
Tools For This Recipe
6-qt Instant Pot®
Instant Pot Korean Beef: Frequently Asked Questions
Black pepper can be substituted but because black pepper has a stronger, spicier flavor than white pepper, start with a smaller amount and adding more, to taste.
Gochujang is a red chili paste, a pantry staple in Korean cooking. It can be found in most grocery stores in a red, rectangular tub.
A cornstarch slurry is a mixture of cornstarch and cold liquid (such as water or stock) used as a thickening agent. To avoid over thickening, always add the cornstarch slurry towards the end of cooking time.
Korean beef can be served over a bed of white rice (or your favorite grains) with a side of kimchi, cucumbers, perilla leaves and ssamjang.
Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for 2-3 days.
Yes! Let cool completely; portion into plastic freezer bags in individual servings, squeezing out any excess air before sealing. To reheat, thaw overnight in the fridge, reheating over low heat, stirring occasionally, until heated through.
100%! This is one of our favorite crockpot recipes, perfect for those chilly months.
Instant Pot Korean Beef
Ingredients
- ½ cup beef broth
- ⅓ cup reduced sodium soy sauce
- ⅓ cup brown sugar, packed
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tablespoon sesame oil
- 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
- 1 tablespoon freshly grated ginger
- 1 teaspoon Sriracha, or more, to taste
- ½ teaspoon onion powder
- ½ teaspoon white pepper
- 3 pounds boneless beef chuck roast, cut into 1-inch cubes
- 3 tablespoons cornstarch
- 1 teaspoon sesame seeds
- 2 green onions, thinly sliced
Equipment
Instructions
- In a large bowl, whisk together beef broth, soy sauce, brown sugar, garlic, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar, ginger, Sriracha, onion powder and white pepper.
- Place chuck roast into a 6-qt Instant Pot®. Stir in beef broth mixture until well combined.
- Select manual setting; adjust pressure to high, and set time for 15 minutes. When finished cooking, quick-release pressure according to manufacturer’s directions.
- In a small bowl, whisk together cornstarch and 3 tablespoons water; set aside.
- Select high sauté setting. Stir in cornstarch mixture and cook, stirring frequently, until the sauce has thickened, about 2-3 minutes.
- Serve immediately, garnished with green onions and sesame seeds, if desired.
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This was super tasty!! I didn’t have enough beef so I used some carrots, and I used tapioca starch instead of corn starch. It turned out very delicious, with plenty of sauce for side veg.
Help! Recipe calls for 6 quart and I have an 8 quart. Have you dealt with this? Thanks so much!
SO EASY and so good. This will be in heavy rotation at my house! I served it with rice and sugar snap peas (steamed in the microwave). I made it without any changes, but next time I might reduce the sugar a little. This is seriously one of the easiest meals I have ever made. I have 6qt Instant Pot Duo Evo Plus.
My husband and two boys love this recipe, this is the 4 time this year I’ve made it. This time we added mushrooms, onions & carrots to the pot everything else remained exactly the same at the recipe. Thank you!
A great recipe and delicious dish. I added a little more ginger and some gochugaru for extra spice and flavor. Also, I find that mixing the beef in cornstarch and then browning at the start works well.
A quick saute plus 13 mins with a slow release worked perfectly for me. I love how the instant pot tenderizes cheap cuts like this so consistently, without them turning to mush. My only gripe with the dish is a lack of vegetables, so will pair it with broccolini or similar next time.
Just made this during our quarantine. I didn’t have a chuck roast but I had chuck steaks and used those. I also didn’t have sesame seed oil or ginger as I’m going through a lot of pantry staples and not much opportunity to re-stock items. I added about a table spoon of gochujang and that was the only difference. It was an extremely big hit! Will make this one again! Thanks for sharing your talent with us!
What amazing flavor, the meat was tender and amazing! This is a keeper, adding it to my list!
Thanks for the recipe, super easy!!’
I actually put a bit of salt on the meat and marinaded it with all the juices most of the day in a ziploc. Just poured it all in the instant pot when it was dinner time. The 15 minute cook time work well for me but I used just under two pounds of chuck roast. Based on the reviews, I would probably increase the cooking time if I did cook more meat. My family really enjoyed it and will definitely make again. Thank you.
Loved the bold flavours in this quick and easy recipe! A lot of people had mentioned the beef being too overdone or chewy, it really depends on the cut of beef you use, not necessarily the cooking time. If you use top sirloin meat and cut into the 1 inch cubes it does work perfectly for melt in your mouth tenderness. Used Coconut jasmine rice which complemented it, and some oven roasted broccolini with Chile flakes on the side to get some different textures and greens. I did end up sautéing it for about 4 minutes at the end to thicken up the sauce for those that said it was a bit too soupy for their liking.
Made this for dinner tonight. I used a couple of steaks that we had instead of chuck. The meat was perfect and the sauce was delicious!! Served over Jasmine rice. We finished the entire dish. Yum! Going to keep this in our regular rotation for meals.
I made this last night with a smaller roast so I cut the sauce in half and it was delicious. I did add 10 extra minutes to the cooking time and it was perfectly tender. My toddler loved it and cleaned his plate. I tossed the extra sauce with some pasta for an easy side dish. We will be making this again.
I thought I did everything exactly right. The beef wasn’t tender and the glaze was more like a sauce. I failed! I’ll try it again, but clearly need to tweak things.
My kids, my dad, my husband and I all loved it! Finger licked good! Thank you.
Oh no! I had this bookmarked (because it’s DELICIOUS) but now the recipe part disappeared 🙁
This was wonderful! I served it alongside some Jasmine rice. This has to be my favorite pressure cooker recipe to date. I actually mixed all of the sauce ingredients (other than the corn starch and water) about 2 hours before making the actual dish and stored them in the fridge. Worked perfectly to just re-mix and then pour over the meat and start cooking when I was able to start dinner. Thanks for the awesome meal suggestion!
Turned out great, my family loved it. I added some chili flakes to spice it up a bit more. This was a winner!
Excellent flavour and the beef was very tender. The only changes I would make would be the cut the beef into strips and make a flour and water slurry rather than using cornstarch. I like the way a flour slurry finishes better.
So good. So easy
Great idea, easy enough to prep. Had some issues.
The meat was not as tender and juicy as I expected and the sauce was too soupy, even with the cornstarch.
I noticed the sauce thickened up a bit after cooking.
Only thing I might do differently next time is use a lower pressure setting to cook slightly longer. I think it dried the roast out.
Yummy! We had the tough meat situation too but it’s *not* the recipe fellow Korean beef lovers. It’s the quality of the meat you’re using. We skipped Whole Foods (meat quality at ours seems to have gone down hill since Amazon purchased) and tried beef chuck roast from our local meat market, followed the recipe exactly once again and got the desired results! Thank you. My whole family (including the more particular, little preschool-aged food snobs) gobbled right up!
This was my first Instant Pot recipe, and it was delicious! Followed directions exactly, but I increased high pressure cook time to 25 minutes and did quick release. Meat turned out perfectly tender. Sauce was so flavorful and complex- just the right amount of sweet and heat. I used Trader Joe’s angus beef for stew meat that was already cubed. I highly recommend using this! Served over brown rice, and don’t skip the green onions and sesame seeds- they make the dish! My daughter asked if we could have it again this week- that’s how yummy it truly is!