Healthy Instant Pot Meatball Soup

Easy Instant Pot meatball soup made with homemade or frozen meatballs in under 20 minutes flat! A healthy low carb and keto friendly dinner you’ll love. 

Instant Pot meatball soup is so simple to throw together and I bet your whole family will love it! One of my kids’ favorite Instant Pot recipes, I bet yours will like it too.

• We love this healthy meatball soup when it is chilly outside! Now that we’re trying to incorporate more low carb soups into our diet, this one has been a fave.

To make things easier (and under 30 minutes) we use frozen meatballs so it can be made in under 20 minutes flat. That’s my kind of semi homemade dinner.

We always incorporate ALL the vegetables we can, especially when it comes to Instant Pot soups. Use what you like, or swap out those you’d rather have inside really.

• This Instant Pot meatball soup is super versatile.

This is what we used:

1. Frozen meatballs
   1. you could make this basic meatball recipe and bake them beforehand
      1. use ground beef or ground turkey to make Italian meatballs
   2. or make air fryer meatballs
2. Carrots
3. Broth 
   1. either chicken broth or beef broth, your choice
4. Olive oil
5. Onion
6. Celery
7. Garlic
8. Tomato sauce
   1. crushed tomatoes could be used as an alternative
9. Salt and pepper
10. Basil
11. Parsley

Unlike our Instant Pot Italian wedding soup recipe we did not add any pasta or noodles to this one to keep it keto. If you wanted to add some you’d need to cook it 3 minutes shorter, release steam, add noodles and add 3 more minutes with a quick release.

How come I don’t I add raw homemade meatballs into the mix? Because they tend to fall apart in the cooking process. If you don’t want store bought, just bake beforehand.

Why do my meatballs fall apart when cooking?

The binder is usually the problem if they do. Most meatball recipes call for using bread crumbs and eggs. Too many bread crumbs makes them loose, but not enough bread crumbs won’t help them hold together either.

• Adding homemade versions into liquid like this doesn’t seem to work real well as far as them staying in tact. Using frozen eliminates this issue, so that’s my preference.

How long do you brown meatballs before putting in sauce or soup?

Give them a minute or two on each side to fully brown. Then finish cooking them in the oven.

Here are some simple step by step directions:

1. Set pot to saute and add olive oil.
2. Dump in veggies and allow them to soften.
3. Add tomato sauce and broth, then give it a good stir.
4. Drop in frozen meatballs at this time, stir, then fasten lid and close steam valve.
5. Set to high pressure for 15 minutes cooking time followed by a quick release.

Serve in bowls alone or with parmesan cheese on top. I have yet to make this in a slow cooker, but our easy Italian wedding soup is pretty close.

I’ve made another version using ground sausage where I didn’t form them into balls at all. I just browned it on saute and left it as it. That worked well too.

• If you’re interested in that version you can try this Instant Pot sausage soup with kale. It’s another one of our favorite comfort foods.
• This Instant Pot minestrone soup is packed with vegetables with pasta too if you want another simple dinner idea.

What should you serve with pressure cooker meatball soup?

1. Our favorite is probably this semi homemade garlic pull apart bread.
2. You can also make this easy roll recipe.
3. Garlic bread goes well with just about anything.

Printable recipe is below with nutritional information including saturated fat and calorie content.

Print Pin

Instant Pot Meatball Soup

Easy Instant Pot meatball soup made with homemade or frozen meatballs in under 20 minutes flat! A healthy low carb and keto friendly dinner you'll love.

Course Entree, Main Course, Soup

Cuisine American, Italian

Keyword instant pot, meatballs, soup

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Servings 6

Calories 264kcal

Author The Typical Mom

Ingredients

• 1 lb frozen meatballs
• 1.5 tbsp olive oil
• 1 small onion diced
• 2 stalks celery chopped
• 2 carrots sliced or cut into large dials
• 2 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 tsp basil
• 1 tsp parsley
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 1/2 c tomato sauce
• 5 c beef broth or vegetable broth

Instructions

• Set pot to saute and add olive oil. When it is hot add onion, celery, carrots, garlic and all of the seasonings. Cook until onions begin to soften, a few minutes should do it. Then turn pot off.
• Add tomato sauce and broth, stir contents.
• Drop in frozen meatballs and stir again.
• Close lid and steam valve and set to pressure cook high for 15 minutes. Do a quick release of steam when done.
• Serve with parmesan cheese on top and enjoy.

Nutrition Facts

Instant Pot Meatball Soup

Amount Per Serving (3 oz)

Calories 264 Calories from Fat 180

% Daily Value*

Fat 20g31%

Saturated Fat 7g44%

Cholesterol 54mg18%

Sodium 1306mg57%

Potassium 509mg15%

Carbohydrates 5g2%

Fiber 1g4%

Sugar 3g3%

Protein 16g32%

Vitamin A 3545IU71%

Vitamin C 4mg5%

Calcium 40mg4%

Iron 1mg6%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.