Vegetable Rice Pilaf or Pulao is an easy one pot rice dish mixed with a variety of vegetables and mildly flavored with various spices. We will make this in the Instant Pot. You can also use the same recipe to make it in a traditional pressure cooker. As you can imagine, this is a one pot dish and hence it is super quick and easy. I make this on any day after I come back from work and don't have much time to get dinner on the table.
The best part is that this is not only a quick meal, it is also very nutritious similar to Spinach Rice and Khichdi. We are adding loads of vegetables and you can choose to add veggies of your choice. I added a mix of carrots, green beans, green peas, edamame and corn.
Looking for other easy Instant Pot Indian Recipes? Here are 29 Best Instant Pot Indian Vegetarian Recipes for you to try!
Tips to make Perfect Rice Pilaf in Instant Pot
- I usually don't use the rice mode in the instant pot to make basmati rice. Instead the manual mode works perfectly and also takes less time. But don't forget to give some time, about 10 minutes, before you release the pressure manually (5 minutes NPR).
- Follow the time and do not overcook. I personally prefer each grain of rice perfectly cooked and separated. It should not be mushy.
- In this recipe, I have used frozen vegetables. But you can also use fresh vegetables.
- Add roasted cashews for additional goodness. You can add them before pressure cooking to the rice.
Rice Pilaf with vegetables can be a complete meal for busy evenings similar to my Instant Pot Vegetable Biryani. Serve it with yogurt, which helps to compliment the spice in the pilaf.
Vegetable Rice Pilaf / Pulao Recipe - Instant Pot Pressure Cooker
Ingredients
- 1 cup Basmati Rice (1 cup=250ml) rinsed
- 1 tbsp Ghee or Oil
- 1 Green Chili Pepper (optional)
- 1/2 cup Onion sliced
- 1/2 tbsp Ginger minced
- 1/2 tbsp Garlic minced
- 1/2 cup Tomato chopped
- 1 Potato medium, cut into small peices
- 2 cups Mixed Vegetables (Carrots, Green Beans, Peas, Corn, Edmame) frozen or fresh
- 1 1/4 cup Water
Spices
- 1/2 tsp Ground Turmeric (Haldi powder)
- 1/2 tsp Cayenne or Red Chili powder
- 1/2 tsp Garam Masala
- 1 tsp Salt
Whole Spices
Instructions
- Start the instant pot in sauté mode and heat it. Add ghee, whole spices and sauté them for 30 seconds until the cumin seeds change color.
- After they start to splutter, add the green chili, onion, ginger and garlic. Sauté for 2 minutes until onion turn transparent.
- Add tomato and spices. Mix well.
- Add potato and mixed vegetables. Mix well.
- Add the rice and water. Mix the rice with the vegetables. If anything is stuck to the bottom of the pot, deglaze it. Close the lid with vent in sealing position.
- Change the instant pot setting to MANUAL or pressure cook mode for 4 minutes at high pressure.
- When the instant pot beeps, do a 10 minute NPR. This means let the pressure release naturally for 10 minutes, then release the pressure manually.
- Fluff the rice gently. Vegetable Pilaf is ready. Enjoy with homemade yogurt or raita.
- Note: Remove the insert from the instant pot, so the lower layer of rice does not overcook from the hot base.
Video
Notes
- Adding whole spices is optional. You can enjoy this vegetable pilaf even if you don't have all the whole spices in your pantry.
- To reduce spice, skip the cayenne.
- Stovetop Variation: If you don't have an instant pot, you could also prepare this beet pulao in the stovetop pressure cooker. I suggest one whistle for the rice, and let the pressure release naturally.
- Vegan Variation: Use your favorite vegetable oil to make this pilaf.
- This recipe was created in a 6qt Instant Pot DUO60 Multi-use Pressure Cooker.
Note: Nutrition values are my best estimates. If you rely on them for your diet, use your preferred nutrition calculator.
Nutrition
Check out other Instant Pot Rice recipes you might enjoy:
I’ve made this twice and got burn notice twice. Everything has been perfectly measured. What could be the problem? ☹️
Same thing happened to me, I'm really confused since it worked in my pressure king pro but not the instant pot
Hi Maaria - Sorry to hear. I have heard that some newer versions of instant pot are much more sensitive to burn message. I would suggest to try with 1.5 cup water to 1 cup rice ratio and make sure to deglaze the bottom of the pot before pressure cooking. I would love to hear if it works out.
Hi Shreya - So sorry to hear you got the burn message. I am not sure why that happened. It is possible that the new versions of instant pot are more sensitive. You can add more liquid (1.5 cups for 1 cup of rice) and make sure to deglaze the pot well by scraping off anything stuck to the bottom before pressure cooking. Please let me know how it works if you try again.
Everything is just a large put of mush 😔
Hi Hannah - Can you please share more details of what kind of rice you used? This recipe has been tested 100's of times and has been made successfully by so many readers. I would love to troubleshoot what went wrong.
Tried it, turned out fantastic! Thanks again!
Hi Smita - So good to hear that. Thank you for sharing. 🙂
If I want to double the amount of rice, what would be the cooking time in Instant pot? Thank you!
Hi Leah - Even if you double the quantity of rice, the cooking time will remain the same. Hope you enjoy the pulao!
4 minutes for dry brown rice?
Hi Joysan - I would not use brown rice in this pulao recipe. The reason is that brown rice takes much longer to cook (about 20 minutes), and in that much time, the veggies will turn to a mush. To cook with brown rice, make the brown rice in the instant pot (you can use pot-in-pot method). Saute the veggies separately and mix the brown rice with the veggies.
I made this recipe with brown rice, with cook time of 22 minutes and it turned out wonderful and delicious!!
Hi SD - yay so good to hear that. Thanks for sharing!
Thank You so much for the receipe. My instant pot just came yesterday and I bought it for the first time..
I was looking for perfect receipe with water measurements. At very first I tried you veg pulao receipe and it's came out perfect and Yumm😋😋.
Keep Posting more veg indian receieps.
Thank You 😊