Take yourself back to childhood with instant pot liver and onions. Served with instant pot mashed potatoes, this old fashioned liver and onions with gravy recipe will become a firm favourite.
You will love how easy liver and onions is in the instant pot and you can then rinse and repeat.
This instant pot liver and onions recipe is an updated post originally shared with you when we first started sharing instant pot recipes in early 2017.
Table of Contents
Liver And Onions Recipe
Growing up my Grandad would make the most amazing old fashioned recipes for me.
My parents would roll their eyes if I went home and asked for recipes that they didn’t like.
There was black pudding, beef tongue and of course liver.
Liver and onions were amazing, and I would love to watch my grandad cook them.
Then he would serve the liver and onions recipe with a big portion of mashed potatoes and of course the liver and onions had plenty of gravy.
Fast forward to the popularity of the instant pot and they are so much easier to cook and just as tender.
Though look away now if you are one of those that hates liver and onion, as I am sure there is a team of haters!
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Can You Cook Liver In The Instant Pot?
Yes, you can cook liver in the instant pot. But its not just about instant pot liver, its about the whole meal. Because unlike when we all had liver and onions as a kid, in the instant pot you can do the whole meal in one instant pot.
The liver, the onions, add bacon if you want to, the gravy and of course the delicious mashed potatoes.
You can also cook different types of liver in the instant pot, but we much prefer instant pot beef livers.
How Do I Cook Liver So It’s Not Rubbery?
To stop liver from being rubbery when you cook it, we recommend cooking liver in the instant pot.
Instant Pot beef liver is delicious and like most instant pot tougher meats, it requires a 45 minute cook time.
Just like you would if cooking instant pot beef stew and dumplings or an instant pot frozen beef roast.
Why Do You Soak Liver In Milk Before Cooking?
It is recommended to soak liver in milk before cooking and the reason why is because it will remove the bitter flavour from the liver and help to make the liver more tender as it cooks.
I have tried beef liver and lambs liver that has not been soaked in milk first and I have found it to taste pretty awful and be rather tough too.
Can You Cook Liver From Frozen?
Technically you could cook liver from frozen ONLY if you used the instant pot. Just because its dangerous to slow cook liver from frozen.
BUT when you do it makes it harder to fully soak the milk and its not as nice.
There are other meats cooked from frozen in the instant pot that are much better such as instant pot frozen pork tenderloin, instant pot frozen whole chicken and of course at Christmas an instant pot frozen turkey breast.
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Liver And Onions Instant Pot Ingredients
Liver – Lets start with the hero ingredient and that is plenty of beef livers or calf livers are even better. Though note, when buying livers from the butchers they often leak everywhere so double bag them especially if freezing.
Onion – Because its all about liver AND onion, we are adding plenty of white onion. We used four onions, but you can increase this if you like a lot of onion.
Milk. Then because its essential that you soak liver in onion before pressure cooking you will need plenty of milk.
Potatoes – Of course, liver and onions and gravy, is not the same without plenty of mashed potatoes and we suggest adding a layer of potatoes over the liver as it cooks so that you can do it all in one pot.
Stock – We also recommend having some beef stock in the instant pot for this liver recipe. What we do that works for a lot of our instant pot beef recipes is to make instant pot beef stock cubes and then freeze them for later.
Plus, you will also need some garlic and tomato puree to add extra flavour and a few other ingredients such as butter for your mashed potatoes.
Then for the kitchen gadgets that we have used in this beef liver in instant pot it has just been our Instant Pot. We have this one and it’s my favourite and great for a lot of different instant pot beef recipes.
Plus, we recommend you head over to our instant pot recipes category as we have many electric pressure cooker recipes and have been using instant pots for 5 years.
How To Cook Liver And Onions?
- Soak. Before cooking liver, we recommend that you soak the livers in milk. This takes 2 hours, so we recommend you get this going as soon as possible.
- Sauté. Then just before you are ready to get cooking, peel and slice and then saute your onions with some olive oil.
- Brown. Then brown the liver, add beef stock to deglaze the instant pot and add in the other liver ingredients. Then add a steamer with prepped potatoes on top and place the lid on the instant pot.
- Cook. Then pressure cook the liver in the instant pot for 45 minutes.
- Beeps. When the instant pot beeps do a 15 minute natural pressure release, mash the potatoes and serve.
And I am sure you can see now how simple and easy this recipe for liver and onions is and why you should be doing the same.
How To Cook Liver And Onions With Gravy?
If you want a liver and onions with gravy recipe, then there is a very quick way to make this happen.
When you have removed the liver from the instant pot and you are left with the beef stock, liver juices and the onions, simply place the instant pot on sauté, and stir in some of your just mashed potatoes.
This will then create a very quick liver gravy for you to enjoy with your liver and onions.
How Long To Cook Beef Liver In Instant Pot?
This beef liver instant pot recipe takes JUST 45 minutes to pressure cook. Though you also need to do a 15 minute natural pressure release afterwards and take into account the time taken to sauté the onion and brown the beef livers.
Though this liver and onion recipe, is still much quicker than slow cooking.
Can You Freeze Cooked Liver And Onions In Gravy
Yes, you can freeze cooked liver and onions in gravy. Simply find some pyrex that is freezer friendly and load it into a pyrex dish and once completely cold add the lid, and then store in the freezer.
You can then use the microwave to reheat from frozen.
More Old Fashioned Instant Pot Recipes
- Instant Pot Beef Stew & Dumplings
- Instant Pot Beef Shin
- Instant Pot Beef Cheeks
- Instant Pot Beef Tongue
- Instant Pot Sticky Toffee Pudding
- Instant Pot Rice Pudding
Your liver and onions with gravy recipe is below, note you can print it out with or without photos, adjust servings, or click between metric and imperial depending on where you are in the world.
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Instant Pot Liver And Onions
Ingredients
- 4 Large White Onions
- 1 Tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- 800 g Beef Livers
- 1 Litre Whole Milk
- 480 ml Instant Pot Beef Stock
- 3 Garlic Cloves peeled and thinly sliced
- 1 Tbsp Tomato Puree/Paste
- 1 Tbsp Dried Mixed Herbs
- 1 Tbsp Dried Parsley
- 1 kg White Potatoes
- 1 Tbsp Salted Butter
- Salt & Pepper
Kitchen Gadgets
Instructions
- Two hours before cooking load the livers into a bowl with milk and soak. This will help with the taste and texture. Then drain the liver from the milk.
- Peel and thinly slice lengthways the onions and place into the instant pot with olive oil and sauté until the onions have softened.
- Pat dry, the livers to remove excess milk and season generously with salt and pepper. Then trim into strips.
- Add the livers to the onions in the instant pot and brown the liver on all sides. If it’s sticking too much add extra olive oil.
- Once browned, press cancel and deglaze with the beef stock and add in the puree, garlic, and the seasonings. Mix well and make sure the beef livers are covered in stock.
- Add in the tall trivet and the expandable steamer. Peel and dice the potatoes and load into the steamer and season with extra salt and pepper. Place the lid on the instant pot, set the valve to sealing and pressure cook for 45 minutes followed by a 15 minute natural pressure release.
- After releasing the pressure, transfer the potatoes to a bowl and mash with butter and salt and pepper. Remove the beef slice and load into bowls. Then add a little extra mash to the contents of the instant pot, stir and sauté if not hot enough and this will create a thick beef liver gravy.
- Now dish up your liver and onions with gravy recipe.
Notes
Nutrition
Can’t make it now? Then save it for later!
Proper old school food. I love liver and so does my hubby but my children not so sure, they tried it and said it was ok but not sure they would cook it themselves but we loved it and first time we have done liver in the pressure cooker many thanks.
I hate liver and onions! I have never liked it! I followed this recipe at the end I added worstashire to it and a table spoon if cornstarch to thicken it more and it turned out absolutely fantastic!!! I do believe the next round will also get fresh Mushrooms added in. 10 out of 10 a magical recipe!!! My 12 year old had seconds!