Italian Instant Pot sausage and peppers is a super simple yet amazing dish that is packed with flavor. Not only is it quick and easy and takes less than 30 minutes from start to finish, but it tastes like a sausage pizza! It's a WHOLE LOTTA YUM!
Serve the Italian sausages straight from the pot, melt some cheese on top, or serve on a stadium bun. The instant pot Italian sausage and peppers recipe is also low carb, no sugar, gluten-free, and keto-friendly. It's paleo and Whole 30 if you skip the cheese and used approved sauce.
Sausage and Peppers in Instant Pot
This easy Instant Pot sausage and peppers recipe is one of our favorites and something we make regularly. Not only is it just a handful of basic ingredients, but there's also just something amazing and special about this combination of flavors.
This is a pressure cooker sausage and peppers recipe with sauce, you'll find some recipes out there I'm sure that don't add sauce at all, or use crushed tomatoes or tomato sauce instead of pasta sauce. However, using a marinara sauce is the BEST way to make this recipe!
Why You'll Love This!
- The Instant Pot sausage recipe just takes a few basic ingredients yet tastes incredible!
- You can get dinner on the table in less than 30 minutes.
- The recipes works for a variety of health considerations and is easy to adapt.
- It's easy to double or triple when you're serving a crowd.
Ingredient Notes
- Italian sausages ( 1 pkg mild/sweet or spicy)
- red pepper
- green pepper
- onion
- garlic salt
- Italian seasoning
- black pepper
- chunky marinara sauce
- Mozzarella cheese (optional)
- buns (optional)
Depending on which brand of Italian sausages you buy, some brands call these mild Italian sausages and other brands might call them Sweet Italian sausages--they're basically the same thing. Just make sure you're buying the uncooked sausages and not pre-cooked.
Personally, we always love to make instant pot sausage and peppers with Johnsonville Italian sausages or the Trader Joes Sweet Italian sausages.
Optional
- shredded cheese (mozzarella, Italian, Monterey Jack, or Colby Jack)
- stadium style buns
Rao's is our favorite store bought marinara sauce, it's the closest store-bought sauce that literally tastes like homemade, plus it has no added sugar or any artificial ingredients.
Instant pot sausage and peppers is a super simple recipe to double if you want leftovers, want to freeze a batch, or if you're cooking for a crowd. This is a fantastic recipe for football game days!
To double a batch in a pressure cooker, you'd just cook the Italian sausages on both sides in two batches and then stack them on top of each other in the pot before adding the remaining ingredients.
My husband and I are recent empty-nesters so we just made one batch, which I instantly regretted, even just for 2 people. We seriously could've eaten this for days on end as leftovers!
So what did I do? I made the recipe twice in one week but created the instant pot sausage and peppers recipe, of course! 😉
Step by Step Instructions
I love to make instant pot sausage and peppers since it comes together in 10 minutes and then slow cooks during the day while you're gone. We've also made a crockpot sausage and peppers if you want to try these in a slow cooker! Both methods turn out great.
Turn your Instant Pot to Saute High and preheat your pot.
Once the pot is heated, drizzle some olive oil in the pot to help prevent the sausage from sticking.
Sear the Italian sausages 2-3 mins on each side until starting to brown. You aren't trying to cook them all the way through, you're just browning the outside which always increases the flavor while under pressure.
Press Cancel to stop cooking on the Saute.
Add the uncooked sliced onions and peppers on top of the sausages.
Sprinkle the garlic salt, black pepper, and Italian seasoning over the top.
Spread the marinara sauce over the onion and pepper mixture.
**No extra liquid was necessary for this recipe, we used to add 1 cup chicken broth "because we were supposed to" but after numerous tests with 1 cup of broth, ½ cup of broth, and NO broth, the recipe turns out best skipping the liquid entirely since the marinara sauce acts as the liquid.**
Pressure cook the instant pot sausage and peppers for 6 minutes, the peppers and onions should be soft and the Italian sausages will be cooked through.
Natural Release for 5 minutes before do a Quick Release.
The easy instant pot Italian sausage and peppers are seriously SO delicious just the way they are, but to make them even more amazing you can take them out of your instant pot, add a little shredded cheese on top and broil them until the cheese is melted.
Optional - Add Cheese
Sprinkle with your favorite shredded white cheese, I think mozzarella, Monterey Jack, an Italian blend, or Colby Jack would all be great choices. We used mozzarella since that's what we had in the fridge at the time we made up the slow cooker sausage and peppers recipe.
We used about ½ cup+ of shredded cheese for 5 sausages.
Broil the Italian sausage and peppers mix for 1-2 minutes 4" from the heat source until the cheese is melted.
Optional - Serve on a bun with cheese
Many people also love to eat sausage and peppers in a pressure cooker served on a bun like a big messy hot dog, which is so tasty too! I'd recommend toasted the buns slightly before serving, if you want the crockpot sausage, peppers and onions with BOTH cheese and a bun, you'll want to:
- toast the bun and add a little butter to each
- add the instant pot sausage and peppers mix
- sprinkle with shredded cheese
- broil the sausage and peppers in the bun until the cheese is melted, keeping an eye on things so the buns don't burn.
- Serve and enjoy!
More Sausage Recipes
- crockpot sausage and peppers
- baked brats and peppers
- Instant Pot beer brats
- Instant Pot Italian tortellini soup
- Chicken sausage and peppers
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Instant Pot Sausage and Peppers
Intant pot Italian sausage and peppers is a super simple yet amazing dish that is packed with flavor. Not only is it easy, but it tastes like an Italian sausage pizza without the crust.
Serve the sausage and peppers straight from the pot, broil a little cheese on top, or serve on a bun. The recipe is also low carb, no sugar, gluten-free, and keto-friendly.
Ingredients
- 5 Italian sausages (mild/sweet or spicy)
- 1 red pepper, sliced
- 1 green pepper, sliced
- 2 cups onion, sliced
- ½ teaspoon garlic salt
- ½ teaspoon Italian seasoning
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 cup chunky marinara sauce
Instructions
- Turn your Instant Pot to Saute High and preheat your pot.
- Once the pot is heated, drizzle some olive oil in the pot to help prevent the sausage from sticking.
- Sear the Italian sausages 2-3 mins on each side until starting to brown. You aren't trying to cook them all the way through, you're just browning the outside which always increases the flavor while under pressure.
- Press Cancel to stop cooking on the Saute.
- Add the uncooked sliced onions and peppers on top of the sausages.
- Sprinkle the garlic salt, black pepper, and Italian seasoning over the top.
- Spread the marinara sauce over the onion and pepper mixture with a spatula.
- Pressure cook the instant pot sausage and peppers for 6 minutes, the peppers and onions should be soft and the Italian sausages will be cooked through.
- Natural Release for 5 minutes before do a Quick Release.
- The easy instant pot Italian sausage and peppers are seriously SO delicious just the way they are, but to make them even more amazing you can take them out of your instant pot, add a little shredded cheese on top and broil them until the cheese is melted.
Optional - Add Cheese
- Sprinkle with your favorite shredded white cheese, I think mozzarella, Monterey Jack, an Italian blend, or Colby Jack would all be great choices. We used mozzarella since that's what we had in the fridge at the time we made up the slow cooker sausage and peppers recipe.
- We used about ¾-1 cup of shredded cheese for 5 sausages.
- Broil the Italian sausage and peppers mix for 1-2 minutes 4" from the heat source until the cheese is melted.
Optional - Serve on a bun with cheese
- Toast the bun and add a little butter to each
- Add the instant pot sausage and peppers mix to the bun and sprinkle with shredded cheese
- broil the sausage and peppers in the bun until the cheese is melted, keeping an eye on things so the buns don't burn. Serve and enjoy!
Notes
**The recipe and video was updated on March 16, 2021 and after 3 tests we removed the chicken broth from the recipe as it made the sauce too runny and the pot still came to pressure just using marinara sauce**
The marinara sauce used in this recipe added enough liquid that adding additional water or chicken broth was NOT necessary.
If you find that there's still too much liquid in the pot after cooking, use a slotted spoon to scoop out the sausages, peppers, and sauce, and then add as much liquid as is desired.
To lighten up the recipe you can also skip the cheese or use chicken Italian sausage instead of pork.
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Nutrition Information
Yield 5 Serving Size 1Amount Per Serving Calories 340Total Fat 22gSaturated Fat 8gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 16gCholesterol 44mgSodium 1043mgCarbohydrates 8gNet Carbohydrates 0gFiber 3gSugar 10gSugar Alcohols 0gProtein 17g
Valerie Rusch says
How are you figuring the net grams carbs? I must be missing something. I thought you subtracted the fiber from the carbs to get the net grams of carbs.? By the way - we loved this recipe! Used 2 hot and 4 sweet Italian sausages. Saved the leftover liquid and made cioppino, loosely using the recipe by “one dish kitchen”. Wonderful for 2 meals!
Brook says
Do I pressure cook on high?
WholeLottaYum says
Yes! I'll make sure that's clarified in the post. Enjoy!
Christen says
Hi!
My husband and I love, love, love this recipe! I just made it for the first time without the chicken broth and for some reason, our sausage wasn't cooked all the way through and the veggies weren't soft. Would you mind telling me the original recipe? It worked numerous times before for us and we didn't mind the extra water 🙂 Thanks!
Mel says
Hi Christen! The original recipe called for 1 cup of chicken broth in addition to the marinara sauce. We took it out based on reader feedback. We found in our test the marinara sauce had enough liquid to cook the sausage and vegetables, but you're welcome to continue adding the broth or add 1-2 minutes to the cook time. Thanks for your feedback!
Shelly Lightowler says
November 18, 2020
Made these sausages today-out standing? Very simple to put together quick to cook and great tasting. Passed a couple to a few friends that can’t cook often due to i sickness, they really enjoyed them. Mine did end up very juicy wish they had been more saucy is all