Best Instant Pot Korean Beef

Instant Pot Korean beef has a sweet and savory sauce that’s a cheap meal served over rice. Looking for a pressure cooker ground beef recipe, this is it. 

We make a lot of easy beef recipes here on The Typical Mom blog.

You see, we buy half a cow at the beginning of each year from a farmer so we have a lot! You too can buy meat online in bulk if you want.

What is Korean beef made of?

Traditionally it is made with beef short ribs marinated in a sauce that may contain soy sauce, water, garlic, sugar and sliced onions.

• BUT, I always like to tweak things a bit.
  • Just like with our Instant Pot beef stroganoff casserole that uses ground beef instead of stew meat, you never know which you’ll like better until you try it.

Using this allows us to add this pressure cooker recipe to our list of cheap Instant Pot recipes too. Use 80/20 or whatever you have on hand. With the addition of these bold flavors, I guarantee 

You’re going to set your Instant Pot to saute to get this going. Yes you can use a Crockpot Express or Ninja Foodi too.

Add a bit of olive oil when you cook beef and diced onion so it doesn’t stick. You could add green onions now too.

• I do highly recommend getting this non stick pot though, makes everything easier.
  • My preference is to not drain the grease. It adds flavor to the dish but that step is up to you. Drain if you feel you must.
• Then add all of your other ingredients including:
  • Soy sauce
  • Beef broth
  • Minced ginger and garlic
  • Sesame oil
  • Brown sugar
  • Red pepper flakes

If you’d rather use chicken, follow our Instant Pot Korean chicken recipe instead.

The amount of red pepper is up to you. If you love heat then add more than is listed below. You could also opt for some dry Sriracha so it is a bit spicy. We prefer mild.

• Stir contents together so the precooked hamburger meat is coated with this delicious sauce.
• Close lid and steam valve and set to high pressure cook for just 3 minutes!

Instant Pot Korean beef

• Here’s an optional version if you want to cook the white rice pot in pot at the same time.
  • If you want to make it this way you’ll add a trivet with a pan on top to put your uncooked rice and water into.
  • Cook time of 3 minutes will remain the same, just the natural release time will be doubled from 5 minutes to 10.
• After the natural release time is up let out the rest of the remaining steam and serve in a rice bowl topped with sesame seeds.

I don’t feel like there’s a need to thicken the sauce with any corn starch like a few other dishes we make often. Left to sit for 10 minutes or so the sauce will continue to soak into the meat and thicken on it’s own.

Of course you can cook the rice separately, that is why I include both sets of directions in the recipe card below.

What is Korean beef called?

• It is also known as Bulgogi which means thinly sliced or shredded beef paired with soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, sugar, scallions, and black pepper

Many times it is cooked on a grill, sometimes it’s referred to as Korean barbecue as well. It can be seasoned or unseasoned but typically has a whopping flavor that’s sweet and salty.

This version takes less than 20 minutes though so it is a really easy recipe. You can find all necessary ingredients at your local grocery store primarily. If not I have links to order them online in the recipe card below.

What does Korean beef taste like?

Well that depends whether you use thin sliced steak or this method but the sauce and flavors remain similar.

• With the addition of brown sugar and saltiness of soy sauce you get that juxtaposition of salty and sweet meat.
• Add a bit of heat and you’ll give it a stronger whop of flavor for sure.

You can use ground beef like we did here, or roast as in our Crockpot Korean beef.

What do you eat with Korean BBQ Beef?

Typically we always serve this 30 minute Instant Pot dinner with rice, brown rice would work too. Beyond that here are a few ideas:

• Sliced Asian pear is a fun side dish
• Steamed broccoli is a great choice any night of the week

Looking for other Instant Pot ground beef recipes?

We have a lot of Instant Pot recipes here on The Typical Mom, but we will narrow it down to a few that are similar to this one.

1. Our sloppy joes are always a favorite and so very easy to throw together on busy nights.
2. 5 ingredient chili can use both hamburger and ground sausage. Mixing the two makes this over the top inside baked potatoes.
   1. Chili mac is a second favorite one pot meal with everything cooked together.