Instant Pot Turkey Spaghetti

Hello, strangers! We are finally home and settled from our big East Coast adventure. Seth had two weeks of post-deployment leave, so we headed down to North Carolina to visit family and friends for a week, and then for our second week, we left Ford in North Carolina with Seth’s parents and headed off on our own for another week.

We left on a Friday, drove to Charleston and stayed there until Monday, drove to Savannah and stayed there until Tuesday, drove to Orlando and stayed there until Friday, and then we drove back to North Carolina to spend a day with his family before heading back home to Kansas!

It was super fun, but man oh man, did we miss our little baby Fordy. I’ve never been away from him for more than a few days, so an entire week was pretty tough. Luckily, we still had a fantastic time and it wasn’t ruined by our missing-Ford-ness, and his mom sent us a TON of pictures and videos every day, which helped.

We had a great time, but it feels really good to be back home and back to regular life. I feel like I’ve abandoned the blog for YEARS. Even though it’s been a little over two weeks…I missed youuuu 😥. Do you love me as much as I love you, or is this more of a one sided relationship? Don’t answer that. Ima just say the answer is yes.

Let’s talk spaghetti. The easiest spaghetti of all time, to be exact. It’s not only one pot, but our one pot is an Instant Pot, which, roughly translated, means you might as well just take a nap on the kitchen floor, because that’s the equivalent amount of effort that this meal takes to make. Exaggeration? Maybe slightly, but only slightly.

Your process = the following:

1. Brown turkey
2. Add veggies, seasoning, jarred pasta sauce, water, and noodles
3. Cook for four minutes
4. Release pressure, remove lid, and stir in parmesan

The end! I meannnnnnnnnnnn, right?! It’s not even fair. And what’s even less fair is how delicious it turns out with how little effort you put in. You didn’t even make your own pasta sauce…it just doesn’t even make sense.

The reason this spaghetti ends up being so delicious is because of the sauce that cooks together under the high pressure of the Instant Pot and tastes like it’s been simmering for hours. We do start out with jarred sauce, which tastes pretty dang yummy on it’s own, but when we add onion, garlic, oregano, basil, pepper flakes and that browned ground turkey? All of it cooks together in the pressure cooker and takes that jarred sauce to the next, next, waaaayy next level,  coating the spaghetti in saucy heaven.

The spaghetti noodles cook in the sauce, loading them up with so much more flavor than if they’d been simmered in water, so everything is just working together for you here – working together to give you the easiest, fastest, and most delish dinner EVA.

It’s yummy right when it’s done, but it’s even yummier when you stir in some parmesan cheese and sprinkle over some fresh basil (optional, but I highly recommend)!

There’s just something about spaghetti, isn’t there? Maybe it’s because 99.9% of us grew up with our parents cooking it almost weekly because it’s easy and picky-kid approved. I’m not sure why, but whatever the reason, there’s just something cozy and homey about the simplicity and flavor of spaghetti. I’m a meat sauce fan vs. meatballs, but that’s just because I grew up eating it that way. I won’t turn down a good meatball if you put it on a plate in front of me.

But…I mean, I wouldn’t really turn down anything if you put it on a plate in front of me because #food.

Regardless of your specific spaghetti preferences – meatballs, meat-free marinara, baked – you gotta give this one a try with your Instant Pot and step into the bliss of pure spaghetti simplicity. LOVE.

Have a wonderful, spaghetti-filled (hopefully) Tuesday, friends!

Instant Pot Turkey Spaghetti

★★★★★

5 from 2 reviews

• Author: Annie Chesson
• Prep Time: 5 mins
• Cook Time: 10 mins
• Total Time: 15 minutes
• Yield: 8 servings 1x

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• 20 oz ground Turkey* (see note about amount)
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• 1 onion, finely diced
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• Few pinches of red pepper flakes
• 24 oz jar pasta sauce (I like using the arrabiata flavor, but any type is yummy!)
• 8 oz spaghetti (about half a box), noodles broken in half so they fit in the Instant Pot
• 2 cups water
• 1/4 cup parmesan cheese
• Sliced fresh basil (optional topping)

Instructions

1. Turn your Instant Pot onto the saute setting on high and add your olive oil
2. When the olive oil is hot, add your ground turkey and season well with salt and pepper. Break the turkey up with a wooden spoon and cook until the turkey has browned
3. Add the rest of your ingredients into the Instant Pot (onion, garlic, oregano, basil, pepper flakes, pasta sauce, noodles [that have been broken in half], and water). Season with salt and pepper, and stir to combine
4. Close your lid on the Instant Pot, seal the vent, and cook on manual high pressure for 4 minutes
5. When the time is up, quick release the pressure, remove the lid, and stir in your parmesan cheese until melted
6. Season to taste with salt and pepper and top with fresh basil (optional)

Notes

*The grocery stores in my area sell ground turkey in 20 oz packages. If your grocery store doesn’t, you can use a pound or a pound and a half of ground turkey for this recipe and it’ll work just fine!

Total cook time does not include time Instant Pot takes to come to pressure.

Nutrition

• Serving Size: 1 cup
• Calories: 223
• Sugar: 6 g
• Sodium: 525 mg
• Fat: 10 g
• Carbohydrates: 14 g
• Fiber: 2 g
• Protein: 19 g
• Cholesterol: 55 mg

If you make this or any of my other recipes, be sure to Instagram it and hashtag #thegarlicdiaries!

In the mood for more Instant Pot goodness? Check these out:

Instant Pot Chicken and Wild Rice Soup

Instant Pot Curry Rice with Almonds

Instant Pot Carnitas