This is how you make tender and delicious pressure cooker frozen chicken wings! Makes a great appetizer or dinner in your Instant Pot using your favorite barbecue sauce. Wings are the best finger food we say and with this trick you can make them often. From freezer to dinner in less than 30 minutes!
Don’t these look delicious! We love chicken wings any way we can get them, but knowing how long to cook frozen chicken wings in the Instant Pot or a pressure cooker can come in really handy! Whether you’ve forgotten to make something for a potluck, people come over unexpectedly, or you just want a quick yummy meal for dinner with what you have in the fridge, freezer and pantry…this pressure cooker frozen chicken wings recipe is the bomb! Here on The Typical Mom we’ve come up with a lot of easy Instant Pot recipes and this is one of our favorite pressure cooker appetizers because it is super quick and requires only 2 ingredients really. (originally published 1/18)
I’m serious….just TWO ingredients!!
I always seem to have frozen chicken wings and breasts in the freezer for just in case situations and started with sharing how to cook frozen chicken in the Instant Pot.
That worked really well when preparing shredded chicken to use inside sliders…another great appetizer idea, but then moved on to chicken wings and experimented a bit with the timing until I got it just right!!
Here they are! Super moist and really almost fall off the bone but I didn’t want the meat to just fall off. The fun is eating them off the bone in my opinion. I guess that is the part that is up to you. I cooked mine for 21 minutes and they were perfect.
- Now if you wanted the meat to fall off the bone I would set for 25 minutes. But to me that would just be a pot of bones and chicken pieces.
The bag of frozen chicken wings I bought from the store had rather large pieces. Just remember to not exceed the 3/4 mark inside your 6 qt. Instant Pot. I only felt comfortable adding 12 in that size.
I think if mine were a bit smaller I could add closer to 15, but you just want to keep it below the 3/4 mark. 1 bottle of bbq sauce was enough once they were cooked down. It won’t cover them all when initially put into the pressure cooker but when they thaw it will be plenty so don’t worry about that.
Pick any brand of sauce you like but not honey style. I like whatever is on sale and has a bit of sweet and spicy personally. Honey may cause the burn notice to occur though.
You can add a bit of hot sauce in there to give it a kick, some sliced onions if you want, and even some pineapple tidbits are a good add in like I did with our Hawaiian Instant Pot shredded chicken dish…super easy too.
Here I used barbecue sauce to cook my pressure cooker frozen chicken wings in.
They soak up all those delicious flavors. If you just want to make them plain it would work the same way using chicken broth.
If you aren’t down for bbq wings then use a teriyaki style sauce like I used in our Instant Pot spicy teriyaki chicken thighs recipe. It is up to you but barbecue sauce is pretty much loved by all and really cheap too. There are so many different types of sauces with a variety of flavors and heat levels too.
If you prefer the skins to be a bit crispy, once these are done you can put them into your convection oven or oven at 375 degrees for a few minutes like we did here with our Instant Pot teriyaki ribs. Or you can use your broiler for about 5 minutes to crisp them up.
We don’t eat the skin either way so we are fine with them straight out of the pot.
If you like REALLY crispy chicken wings you can throw them under the broiler for a few minutes and for another trick you should read our post on how to bake crispy chicken wings in the oven!
This is what you’ll need to make some bbq pressure cooker frozen chicken wings. Tender and delish in your Instant Pot + a video!
- Barbecue sauce – use one that is not super high in sugar (honey style) as those may burn (I like this one) – If you like really spicy buffalo wings use Franks hot sauce
- Use 12-15 frozen chicken wings. Do not fill your Instant Pot or pressure cooker more than 3/4 full. So the total number depends on the size of your wings.
- Water
- Optional additions – pineapple chunks and/or hot sauce
After you try this you should make these Instant Pot recipes
- Pressure cooker frozen whole chicken
- Tasty Pressure cooker chicken and rice
- Instant Pot chicken legs
- Easy Instant Pot chicken recipes
Frozen chicken wings in air fryer are easy too!
Here’s a video showing how we made them:
Here’s the printable recipe too!
Pressure Cooker Frozen Chicken Wings
Ingredients
- 12 - 15 chicken wings frozen
- 1 bottle barbecue sauce 20 oz.
- 1 tsp hot sauce (optional, more or less depending on taste)
- 3/4 c water
Instructions
- Pour half the bottle of barbecue sauce into your Instant Pot or pressure cooker.
- Put your frozen chicken wings on top of your sauce and pour the remainder of your barbecue sauce on top of them. Then add 3/4 c water into your bbq sauce bottle and shake it well to get remaining sauce out. Pour this on top of your wings (this is an important step).
- If you choose to add hot sauce sprinkle on top now.
- Close the lid and steam valve. Set to manual, pressure, high for 21 minutes. ** Note, if your wings are much smaller or you're using fewer wings than I did (mine were quite large) it will not take this long (set for 18 min. for 10 wings and perfect)
- Do a natural release, lift lid carefully and serve!
- If you'd like them crispy put your chicken wings on a baking sheet and under your broiler for 3-4 minutes or until as crispy as you'd like.
Video
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Ross says
I think the 3/4 c of water isn’t enough. My IP got a ‘burn’ error and when I looked it up it said I need to add more water to lessen the thickness of the sauce.
Cooked Ham says
I have made these several times in my instant pot due crisper. While they do come out flavorful, the BBQ doesn’t really caramelize unless you broil the wings afterwards with additional sauce added to them. With the air fryer attachment, I added some more sauce to the wings after pressure cooking, then air fried in the basket for 7 more mins. Came out pretty good.
Chad says
I did this recipe,following the instructions to a t using a bag of frozen wings and buffalo sauce and a pressure cooker time of 18 minutes. I ended up with something close to bone soup. I used the broiler to firm the meat up a bit but still looks ABSOLUTELY NOTHING like the picture and I can still have to be very gentle to keep the meat from just slipping off of the bones… is it just me or is the instant pot just a gimmicky gadget that has a very long and steep learning curve?
Pj says
If anyone actually read the instant pot user guide you would know that instant cooking isn’t what the pot does with building pressure and releasing ( it’s all explained in the booklet) To complain about an additional 10-15 mins …… get s life.
Instant pot doesn’t crisp (steam pressure) so popping it in an oven if you want that is no biggie. If cooking is a hassle move on. TM works hard with her help be grateful. TM. Enjoy the skin too.
The Typical Mom says
Thanks love
Jen N. says
So I have a mini pot and filled to just under the 2/3 max line. I’m wondering about how long the NR will generally take?
Karen says
Hi, this frozen chicken wing recipe is just what I’ve been looking for! I have a Ninja Foodie, so how long would you recommend I crisp them for after pressure cooking? Thanks!
Sam says
Thank you for this recipe. I’ve used my Instant Pot for 3 weeks. Have done Chicken quarters, baby back ribs, hamburgers and Jambalaya. All have been fantastic. When you read the instruction manual that comes with the pot it is a little confusing. Being able to read and watch video on your site is so much easier. Thank you again for your recipes and instructions.
The Typical Mom says
So glad you enjoyed them
Dave says
This recipe didn’t help as I’m a new IP user. I see what ingredients you use but not which buttons to push on the keypad. It’s like a recipe where you explain how long to cook but don’t tell what temperature to put your oven on
The Typical Mom says
I always explain in detail and it does explain it well in step 4. High pressure for 21 minutes. What pot do you have?
Katie says
This looks delicious but it’s disingenuous to tell someone it’s 26 minutes from start to finish. The prep time of 3-5 minutes makes sense, but it will easily take 6 minutes for the IP to come to pressure (so you’re conservatively 9 minutes in so far), add 21 of cooking time minutes and you’re at 30 minutes. Another 8 minutes for natural release pushes you closer to 38-40 minutes.
I do cook frozen wings in my IP. But if a mom is scheduling getting her kids to practice in time, those extra 15 minutes are crucial to account for.
Sue S says
I agree. I’m a new Instant Pot user. I’ve been taking start to finish time literally, so my dinners are usually later than expected. I print off recipes and then add the actual “pressure” time so I know for the next time I use it. I have found a few Instant Pot recipes where they state the estimated time to come and release pressure. I’m excited to try this recipe and will add on the extra time when calculating dinner time.
Kc says
Geeez!!!!life must be miserable to pick something so silly to complain about
Furbalsmom says
I really appreciate all the time bloggers take to provide their results of their experiments to provide these recipes and guidelines for others. Some newer users need a bit more help. Don’t belittle their honest comments and concerns.
The Typical Mom says
Thank you!
Kayla says
I’m a bit confused. Am I able to omit the bbq sauce all together and use buffalo sauce instead? And I would follow the same instructions, just with buffalo rather than bbq?
Sheila says
Are the chicken wings you use just plain wings or are they breaded?
The Typical Mom says
I do not use breaded wings.
FartSandwich says
is ‘natural release’ when you wait for it to go down on it’s own?
Cause that easily adds 10-15 minutes to the recipe..
Alease says
natural release you wait for it to go down on its own, you dont manually release it at the end
Frances Farmer says
Thank you for the frozen chicken &swings recipes! I’ve had my IP for about 6 months tried a roast, didn’t turn out good so haven’t used again! I needed some new recipes!
The Typical Mom says
OH good!!!
Judit says
Thank you so very much for posting this recipe. I had planned on making wings tonight. After a 14 hour work day, who wants to cook food that takes Forever!! In my career path, I need Instapot or pressure cooker recipes. They have saved me so much time. I can eat home cooked food again!!
The Typical Mom says
OH Yeah!!
Katie says
I keep getting a burn error and can’t figure out why. My seal looks normal, the knob is turned back correctly, and i hear the sauce/water bubbling inside but it never finished pressurizing and the red thing never pops up. Advice?!
Katie says
I got two burn error twice. Turns out I needed to take off the lid, stir the bbq and chicken, and secure the lid again. Third time was a charm and these are officially a family favorite!!
The Typical Mom says
Oh glad you figured out the issue and loved them!!
John says
Check your float valve. On mine the o ring was torn from cleaning and would not allow pressure to build. They are like 5-10 bucks on amazon.