How to cook an almost whole butternut squash in your instant pot

I love butternut squash (see past recipe butternut squash soup here) but I absolutely hate cutting it up. It's hard, especially peeling it. Making it in the instant pot or other electric pressure cooker, you don't have to peel it! It's amazing.

It doesn't quite have the flavor of an oven roasted butternut but it's still pretty good and it's prefect to use for soups or twice baked or just eating on it's own. It's so healthy and easy.

Too big for the pot!

You can put it in your instant pot without peeling it but you need to cut it up enough so it fits inside. For my 6qt pot, I had to cut mine in fourths. I don't recommend putting it in whole, even if it fits because it won't cook very evenly.

I had one small area where my squash was thick that wasn't cooked all the way after my cook time, if you have a thicker squash, add 1-2 minutes. After this trial, I have suggested 13 minute cook time (I had tried 12 minutes). Or use a few minutes of natural pressure release (ie let the pressure come down without opening the valve) if you have a thick squash.

Ready to go!

Directions:
Cut squash into fourths and clean out the seeds. Place trivet in bottom of instant pot and pour in 1 cup of water. Place your squash on the trivet and close the lid. Set instant pot for high pressure, 13 minute cook time. Make sure the valve is set to sealing. After the cook time has finished you can do a quick pressure release by opening the valve. The overall cooking time including for the pot to get to pressure is about 20 minutes.

**If you have a thicker than normal squash, you can add 1-2 minutes cooking time or allow it to do a natural pressure release for a few minutes so it cooks a little bit more. Be advised 2 minutes is a lot in pressure cooker time!

Now you have a perfectly cooked squash with very little fuss!

You can scoop it out eat it as it is (yum!) or use it, for example, for a butternut squash soup! Just remove the squash from your pot. Pour out the water from the bottom and remove the trivet. Scoop the squash back into the instant pot and turn on the saute function and follow this recipe as if you were on the stove top.