Instant Pot Rice & Beans (Only 5 Ingredients!)

GFGluten FreeOFOil FreeVVegan

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. I may earn a small commission for my endorsement, recommendation, testimonial, and/or link to any products or services from this website.

These Instant Pot Rice & Beans require only 5 simple ingredients to make! Perfect for Meal Prep or an Easy Weeknight Dinner. Vegan, Gluten Free, Oil Free.

While they may be simple, there is just something that is so satisfying about a big ol’ bowl of rice and beans. As an added bonus, this recipe has BIG flavor, but only required 5 affordable ingredients.

ingredients for rice and beans on wood cutting board

Heck, you may already have all of them in your pantry! And if you don’t you can definitely get them at your local store for a great price.

While the ingredients for this recipe are humble, I promise that the flavors will still “wow” you. I’m not exactly sure what it is, but something magical happens to that Salsa and Cilantro in the pressure cooker – the flavors intensify and become much more complex.

bowl of rice and beans on wood cutting board with lime

While this recipe is so dang easy, I also love how customizable it can be. You can easily increase or decrease the spice level based on the Salsa you choose to use, and you can also add in some extra spices if you’re feeling fancy. Plus, let’s not forget about the toppings! I like this Instant Pot Rice & Beans recipe best when topped with fresh Cilantro, Avocado, and a squeeze of Lime.

This dish is hearty and filling on it’s own as a main, but you could also use it as a side! May I suggest making some Sheet Pan Fajitas to go along with it? 🙂

bowl of rice and beans on wood cutting board with lime

I pretty much only use my Instant Pot to make rice and beans (or both at the same time), but if you’d like me to create more iPot recipes, please leave a comment below and let me know! I think it would be a nice challenge and change of pace 🙂

A Few Final Thoughts:

  • You can also use dried Black Beans for this recipe, but they will make the rice look a little, er, grey. It’ll still taste great though!
  • This recipe is simple, but feel free to add in some extra ingredients if it suits your fancy – I think Corn, Jalapeños, or some extra tomatoes would be great!
  • I have not tested this recipe on the stovetop, so unfortunately I cannot provide modifications for that. You may be interested in my One Pot Mexican Quinoa though !

bowl of rice and beans on wood cutting board with lime

If you’re looking for more easy recipes, you’ll also love this One Pot Spinach and Artichoke Pasta and this Slow Cooker Bean & Quinoa Chili!

Finally, if you make this recipe and decide to share it on Facebook or Instagram, don’t forget to tag me @FromMyBowl + #FromMyBowl! I love seeing your delicious recreations 🙂

Print

Instant Pot Rice & Beans (Only 5 Ingredients!)

These Instant Pot Rice & Beans require only 5 simple ingredients to make! Perfect for Meal Prep or an Easy Weeknight Dinner. Vegan, Gluten Free, Oil Free.

  • Author: Caitlin Shoemaker
  • Prep Time: 10 Minutes
  • Cook Time: 25 Minutes
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 5 Servings 1x

Ingredients

Scale
  • 1 1/4 cup dry Red Kidney Beans
  • 1 1/2 cup dry Brown Rice
  • 1 cup Salsa
  • ½ bunch Cilantro, stems and leaves divided
  • 3 cups Vegetable Broth
  • 2 cups Water

Instructions

  • First, chop your Cilantro, keeping the leaves and stems roughly separated.
  • Add the dried Beans and Rice to the bottom of your Instant Pot.
  • Gently pour the Vegetable Broth and Water over the Rice and Beans, then give everything a good stir.
  • Next, add the Salsa and stems of the Cilantro into the pot. Do not mix!
  • Close the Instant Pot, set the valve to Sealing, and use the Manual Mode to cook on High for 25 Minutes.
  • One the cook time finishes, let the Instant Pot release pressure for an additional 10 Minutes (leave the “Keep Warm” feature on).
  • Finally, move the valve from Sealing to Venting to release all remaining pressure, and serve the Beans and Rice warm. Garnish with the chopped Cilantro leaves, and anything else you desire!

Notes

  • A few of my beans rose to the top of the mixture, and I noticed they looked a little “dry” when I opened the pot. If this happens to you, simply mix the Beans and Rice together, then cover the pot again and let sit for 12 – 15 minutes.
  • Different beans require different amounts of time to cook in the pressure cooker, so I would be wary of substitutions. If you do decide to use a different bean, make sure to cook the mixture for at least 22 minutes, so the brown rice will cook completely.
  • I used this Instant Pot to make this recipe.

Did you make this recipe?

Share a photo and tag us — we can't wait to see what you've made!

Want to save this Instant Pot Rice & Beans recipe for later? Pin the recipe to your Pinterest boards:

ingredients for rice and beans on wood cutting board with bowl

 

About the Author

Hey there, I’m Caitlin! I make easy-to-follow, wholesome, and budget-friendly vegan recipes that are mostly gluten-free and refined sugar-free. I’m also an avid yogi, love the great outdoors, am chocolate-obsessed, and enjoy eating almond butter straight off of the spoon.

Learn More

FREE GUIDE: 5 Tips for Quick & Easy Vegan Dinners

Plus, get all of my recipes sent straight to your inbox!

You May Also Like

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe rating

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Comments

  1. Thanks for a great recipe. I did a double batch, did not put in salsa. It was a bit on the watery side when I opened it up, so I took a bowl out to eat and put it back on pressure cook for 15 minutes, and got the “burn” display of shame. 😀 (I’m pretty new to the Instant Pot – thankfully it saved my stupid ass from burning up a pot) Texture on the rice and beans is great though, there were perhaps a few underdone beans at first, and now that I cooked it to “burn” it’s all good. Next time I’ll try it for 30 minutes instead of 25 and see how that goes.

    I also wanted to mention, if people are getting beans that won’t soften up, the salsa might be a contributor? I remember having issues with trying to make BBQ baked beans and the beans refusing to soften due to the BBQ sauce being added too early (acidity keeps the outer coat of the bean from softening and letting water in.) Just a thought! Cheers.

  2. I tweaked this a bit because I had no veggie broth. I also soaked my beans. So I did rice, beans, 24 oz salsa, 2 cups water and used the rice setting which made it cook on low pressure for 12 minutes. Then I let it self release for 20 minutes. Came out perfect!

  3. Your pictures look delicious and beautiful but this didn’t turn out well. Next time beans will have to be soaked because they were kinda hard and rice was mushy. Definitely going to try again!

  4. Made this for dinner tonight, turned out great. I listened to other comments and soaked my beans while I was at work so the would be softer… don’t need to buy expensive canned beans now!!

  5. I liked the idea of cooking the rice and beans at the same time, but using this timing, the rice was done but the beans were not. I tried to start the pot back up again, and I got the dreaded “burn” recipe from the Instant Pot. I guess I needed to add more water before restarting, but then the rice would have gotten overcooked. I did let it naturally pressure release and left it on warm for quite a while before opening the pot, so that wasn’t the problem.

    1. Hi Barbara! I’m sorry you felt this way – the beans are definitely firm in this recipe, but should still be cooked. If you would like them to be softer, you can add in a little more liquid (~1/2 cup) to the iPot and cook for an additional 3-5 minutes.

      1. Thanks — I made a sort of burrito with my leftovers today and heated it up for lunch at the office, it was quite tasty!

      2. Hi Caitlin,
        If I soak my beans that change the cooking time? This will be the first recipe I try with my new Instant pot. I am a vegan and gluten free due to tummy issues so I definitely want to soak them. Also I am not a big fan of cilantro but my partner is. Do you think leaving that out will ruin the recipe and I opt for using cilantro only as a topping?

  6. I made this last night and it was delicious, although, most of my red kidney beans were still quite dry. Perhaps it was the brand of bean? No idea but I will definitely make this recipe again but perhaps with a bit more liquid. Thanks for sharing this!!!!

  7. Hey! I would love to see more instant pot recipes! We just got one from our registry and I have no idea how to use it 🙂 Please keep tagging them!

  8. Had some dry red kidney beans in the pantry which were growing old enough to almost start collecting retirement pay. Your recipe helped me turn them into a delicious feast! I’m a kitchen rebel who never follows a recipe exactly, so of course I had to dump in many more spices – we like things spicy/sweeter/smoky! and left out the cilantro (I am one of those folks who only taste soap when cilantro is involved). I used an organic chipotle lime salsa and RiceSelect Brand’s non-GMO Royal blend of texmati white, brown, wild & red rices. The times you stated were perfect. So nice to be able to prepare such a quick and tasty red beans & rice dinner!

    1. Also a big fan of this recipe, but would love to add more spice to it, also! I tried jalapeños in it and it was fantastic! Any tips for adding more spice outside of using jalapeños?

      1. Depends on what you like! You can use chipotle powder, a small amount of cayenne, or even habanero if you’re adventurous!

    1. Hi Rachel! I have not tested this recipe in the crock pot, but I imagine it would take a lot more time. You could probably sub the dry beans for canned, and then look up how long it takes to cook brown rice in a crock pot – you would also have to adjust the liquid in this recipe just so it is enough for the brown rice to cook.

  9. As a new vegan from Louisiana, I was so excited when I saw this recipe on one of your videos. The flavor was great, though I added some Cajun spices. The only thing I’ll do differently is soak the beans. I am used to a very tender almost creamy red beans and this time I had some “hard” beans. They were cooked just not to the texture I am accustomed to.

    Thanks

  10. Thanks for the great receipe, I can’t wait to try it!
    Yes more iPot receipes I love mine but there isn’t a great deal of receipes out there 🙂

  11. Hi Caitlin. I found your site while looking for vegan instant pot recipes to try when my daughter visits. This one looks good and simple (my favorite) and so do your other recipes.
    Since I noticed that this is so recent, I thought I’d let you know that the Amazon link to the instant pot you use is broken. There was an interesting link to an article about the dogs of Amazon though, so it wasn’t all bad. 😉

      1. it does work in a rice cooker, comes out fantastic
        ! just make sure your brown ruced to liquid ratio is correct!

    1. Yes please post more Instant pot videos! There aren’t many vegan + oil free recipes for instant pots out there right now. I’ve been searching! It’d be awesome, I love your videos!