It’s so confusing! How long should we cook pot roast in the pressure cooker? 20 minutes, 45 minutes, 75 minutes, 90 minutes, or ??? Let’s discover the BEST Pot Roast cooking time through this pressure cooker experiment!
With such a huge difference, which cooking time should we follow?
Jump to Full Recipe: Instant Pot Pot Roast
Time for another pressure cooker experiment!!
Materials & Methods for Best Pressure Cooker Pot Roast Cooking Time Experiment
Pressure Cooker: Instant Pot Electric Pressure Cooker
Altitude: close to sea level
Meat: USDA Choice Grade chuck roast/ Canada AAA Grade blade roast
Meat Thickness: roughly 2 inches thick
Meat Weight: 598 – 608 grams (1.3 pounds)
Liquid: 1 cup of chicken stock
Pressure: High Pressure (10.15~11.6 psi)
Cooking Time: 20 minutes, 45 minutes, 75 minutes
Release Method: Full Natural Release for 25 minutes
Oh, look at this baby! So excited when we brought home this 5 pounds chuck roast!!
First, we cut it into 3 nearly identical pieces of chuck steaks and made sure each piece was roughly 2 inches thick.
Pressure cooking time is mostly dependent on the meat’s thickness, so regardless how much they weigh, as long as they’re 2 inches thick, results will be very similar.
We also made sure each piece was similar in weight. They weigh from 598 grams to 608 grams (1.3 lbs). Close enough 😉 Again, weight is not the most important factor for determining the best cooking time, the thickness matters the most.
To ensure the experiment is as accurate as possible, we repeated the exact same steps for each piece of chuck steak in the pressure cooker.
How We Cooked the Pressure Cooker Pot Roast
- Pat dry, season, and brown each piece of meat for 10 minutes on each side.
- Sauté the onions, mushrooms and garlic, deglaze the pot, then pour in 1 cup of chicken stock.
- Add in herbs. Place the chuck roast back into the pot and pour in all the meat juice.
- Close lid and cook at High Pressure for 20 minutes, 45 minutes, and 75 minutes.
- Full Natural Release for 25 minutes. Then, open lid and cover the chuck roast with aluminum foil on a chopping board, and rest the meat for 8 minutes prior to cutting.
Ready for the results?! Here they are!! 🙂
Best Pressure Cooker Pot Roast Experiment Results
Our meat evaluation is based on 4 factors: Texture, Juice, Flavors, and Sauce.
20 Minutes Pressure Cooker Pot Roast
- Meat Texture: less fatty pieces were tough and chewy, the pieces with more fat were tenderized
- Meat Juice: moist
- Meat Flavors: very flavorful, full of strong beefy flavors
- Sauce: flavorful
45 Minutes Pressure Cooker Pot Roast
- Meat Texture: tender & slightly chewy, more tender than the 20-Minute Pot Roast
- Meat Juice: since most of the connective tissues have broken down, it tastes more juicy and moist than the 20-Minute Pot Roast
- Meat Flavors: flavorful – slightly less flavorful compare to the 20-Minute Pot Roast
- Sauce: much more flavorful than the 20-Minute Pot Roast
*If you’re thinking how come the picture above has less meat compare to the other two, you’re right! Jacky kept “taste-testing” one piece after another (while I wasn’t looking) and totally forgot we haven’t taken a picture yet!!! This happens more often than you think. Oops… 😛
75 Minutes Pressure Cooker Pot Roast
- Meat Texture: super tender, but dry
- Meat Juice: meat juice have mostly gone to the sauce, so if you remove the sauce, the meat is dry. Some people call this the distinct “pressure cooker taste”.
- Meat Flavors: beefy flavors have mostly gone to the sauce
- Sauce: super flavorful with depths, amazing sauce
Since this 75 Minutes Pot Roast is already overcooked, we didn’t go further to test the 90 minutes cooking time.
Watch: Comparison Video of the 3 Pressure Cooker Pot Roast
Can’t see the results video? Watch it here.
Best Pressure Cooker Pot Roast Experiment Conclusion
Cooking and eating are all about adjusting to your personal preferences. Someone may like a certain texture while another prefer the exact opposite.
We enjoyed the 45 Minutes Pressure Cooker Pot Roast the most out of the 3 tests because it was overall the most well-balanced roast. The tenderized meat is still flavorful, juicy and moist. Plus, the sauce was so deliciously flavorful.
However, we suspect an even more delicious Pot Roast hiding between 35 – 40 minutes cooking time. We’ll update you when we purchase some more chuck roast! 😀
Umami Pot Roast Recipe: Pressure Cooker Pot Roast
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