Instant Pot Creamy Tuscan Chicken Pasta
A creamy dinner that's done super quick!
When I have the time, I love to spend a long and leisurely day in the kitchen on an involved, multi-step recipe that lets me forget about everything else going on around me. This is not one of those recipes. This is a recipe for those weeknights when you’re pulling in the driveway from soccer practice and it’s already dark out and you have thirty minutes to get dinner on the table. And. It. Is. GOOD. It’s creamy and quick and so layered with flavor. (And no, you don’t have to pre-cook or prep anything. Not even the chicken.)
See, this is a situation where you stir your ingredients together, close up the lid to cook, and you walk away. Due to the magic of the Instant Pot, you only need six minutes of cook time for the pasta and the chicken to simmer in the chicken broth and get beautifully tender. (There’s some thyme and oregano and sun-dried tomatoes in there too to flavor things up.)
Once your cooking time is up, you do a quick release of the pressure and stir in some cream cheese, Parmesan, and a bit of spinach. The cheeses melt into the remaining liquid, making a creamy, flavorful sauce that took pretty much no work, and the spinach wilts enough that it doesn’t step out of a supporting role.
The sauce will thicken up a bit if you leave it to sit for a few minutes, but your work here is done. We all need these kinds of recipes, the kind that don’t take any thought at all. This one just gets major bonus points for being totally crave-worthy too.
Instant Pot Creamy Tuscan Chicken Pasta
Ingredients
- 4 cups chicken broth
- 1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes, drained if packed in oil
- 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
- 3 cloves minced garlic
- 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, cubed
- 12 oz pasta, uncooked
- 3 cups fresh baby spinach
- 1 (8 oz) package cream cheese, softened and cubed
- 1 cup parmesan cheese, finely grated
- 1/4 cup basil, chopped
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Preparation
- To the insert of an Instant Pot, add the chicken broth, tomatoes, thyme, oregano, garlic, chicken and pasta. Stir to combine.
- Close the lid, set valve to "sealing" and set to 6 minutes of high pressure on the manual setting.
- Once cooking time is up, set valve to "venting" to quickly release pressure.
- Once pressure has released, remove lid and stir in spinach, cream cheese, and parmesan.
- Season to taste with salt and pepper and let rest for about 10 minutes to thicken.
- Before serving, stir in fresh basil. Enjoy!
Recipe adapted from Recipes of Holly.