Instant Pot Butter Paneer + Video
Oct 19, 2017, Updated Jan 02, 2018
Easy Instant Pot Butter Paneer! Make restaurant style butter paneer at home in no time using your Instant Pot and enjoy with naan or rice!
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Wish you all a very happy and prosperous Diwali. I decided to not share another sweet recipe and in stead share this easy Instant Pot Butter Paneer with you guys on Diwali! This has to be the easiest and also the tastiest butter paneer (restaurant style!) that you can make in no time. So excited to be sharing this recipe with you guys because it took me some time to perfect it and I couldn’t be more pleased with the final results!
If you love all the Instant Pot vegetarian/vegan recipes that I share on the blog, please join me on this Facebook Group – Instant Pot Vegetarian Recipes. The group would feature vegetarian instant pot recipes from all around the web!
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A paneer dish is almost certain on every Diwali menu in India. I mean whether you are a vegetarian or not is immaterial – you are an Indian and it’s Diwali so there has to be some paneer on the menu. I remember we always had butter paneer or matar paneer or paneer pulao for every Diwali meal. So if you are still looking for some last minute Diwali recipe, look no further. This butter paneer will be just the perfect addition to your Diwali menu, and the best part is that you can make it in less than 30 minutes in your Instant pot.
You guys know I love my Instant Pot, these days I hardly use any other pan or cooker. It’s always the Instant Pot, love the convenience of it and the fact that I don’t have to clean too many dishes when I cook in it. Yeah I hate those piles of dishes, so the lesser the better it is for my sanity! For this recipe, we pressure cook tomatoes, blend them and then finish it off with some cream and butter. It really can’t get easier than this, even if you are a beginner in the kitchen, you will get this one right and I promise you that. The creamy curry gets its flavors from cardamom, garam masala, butter, cream and a touch of honey.
This Instant Pot Butter Paneer
✓ tastes just like the one at your favorite restaurant!
✓ is super easy to make and gets done in less than 30 minutes
✓ has a creamy, buttery sauce and you might want to drink it straight out of the bowl 😉
It took me some time get this recipe right. I wanted it to taste like the one you get in restaurants but without much efforts or prep work. What made a lot of difference to the final result was the addition of tomato paste and kasuri methi. For those who don’t know kasuri methi is dried fenugreek leaves and often used to impart a nice aroma to Indian dishes. Tomato paste is also very important, it makes the tomato flavor so much more pronounced (since it’s concentrated), I highly recommend not skipping it. By the way, I always used to buy those cans of tomato paste and then after using 1-2 tablespoon, it would eventually go waste. Well not anymore! Now, I buy these tubes of tomato paste and use them as and when needed. You can get one HERE.
Hope you guys enjoy this Instant Pot Butter Paneer recipe as much as we did! If you want to keep this vegan, use tofu in place of paneer, vegan butter in place of regular butter and replace cream with coconut milk. Enjoy!
Method
To the inner pot of your instant pot, add diced tomatoes.
Then add chopped ginger, garlic and green chili.
Add in the cashews and crushed green cardamoms.
Add the spices- red chili powder, garam masala, salt along with 1/2 cup water.
Close the lid of the IP and set valve to sealing. Press the manual/pressure cook button and cook on high pressure for 5 minutes. Quick release the pressure.
Open the IP and puree the contents using an immersion blender or using your regular blender. Press the saute button.
Add butter, tomato paste and heavy cream.
Also add in more garam masala, honey, kashmiri red chili powder and salt (as required). Mix to combine everything together.
Stir in the paneer cubes. Add chopped cilantro and kasuri methi and let the curry simmer for 2 more minutes.
Serve instant pot butter paneer with naan or any bread of choice!
* You may strain the sauce to make it completely smooth – I did not do it.
Instant Pot Butter Paneer
Ingredients
To pressure cook
- 4 large tomatoes [500 grams] roughly chopped
- 4-5 garlic cloves [12 grams] roughly chopped
- 1 inch ginger [12 grams] roughly chopped
- 1 green chili [1 gram] or adjust to taste chopped
- 8 cashews
- 4 green cardamom crushed
- 1/4 teaspoon red chili powder or to taste
- 1/4 teaspoon garam masala
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup water
To finish
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- 2.5 tablespoons heavy cream
- 1/4 teaspoon garam masala
- 1.5 teaspoons honey
- 1/2 teaspoon kashmiri red chili powder for color
- 1/2 teaspoon salt or to taste
- 225 grams paneer cut into cubes [around 1.5 cups paneer cubes]
- 1 tablespoon chopped cilantro
- 1 teaspoon crushed kasuri methi also known as dried fenugreek leaves
Instructions
- To the inner pot of your instant pot, add diced tomatoes, chopped ginger, garlic and green chili.
- Add in the cashews and crushed green cardamoms. Add the spices- red chili powder, garam masala, salt along with 1/2 cup water.
- Close the lid of the IP and set valve to sealing.
- Press the manual/pressure cook button and cook on high pressure for 5 minutes. Quick release the pressure.
- Open the IP and puree the contents using an immersion blender or using your regular blender.
- Press the saute button.
- Add butter, tomato paste, heavy cream.along with more garam masala, honey, kashmiri red chili powder and salt (as required). Mix to combine everything together.
- Stir in the paneer cubes. Add chopped cilantro and kasuri methi and let the curry simmer for 2 more minutes.
- Serve instant pot butter paneer with naan or any bread of choice!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Instant Pot Butter Paneer
Can I freeze it?
should freeze okay, do not add cream if freezing, add later
Just tried this recipe. The ginger flavor was a bit strong. My wife had to add a little more sugar, milk, Kasuri methi and coriander leaves to balance the strong ginger taste.
sorry it didn’t work for you, thanks for trying. Although it is just 1-inch ginger with 500 grams tomatoes, not sure how that’s too much ginger but I guess to each his own! 🙂
Can I ask why there are no onions in this version but onions in the regular?
Because there’s no right or wrong way of making it! There are all sorts of versions! I wanted the IP version to be super simple so I skipped the onion and boiled the tomatoes and pureed it later.
Thanks! I have really
loved cooking your recipes and you have inspired me to get better at Indian cooking. I bought your book for my dad and I have been making little spice box care packages with all the measured out spices to help friends learn to cook dal tadka (plus dhungar!).
awesome 🙂
Did this just now and it turned out excellent. I did do some substitutions though – did not use honey; did not use Kashmiri chilli since I didn’t have any; did not use tomato paste because I didn’t have that either; used 1/3 cup of fat free half and half instead of heavy cream; added a tablespoon of Parampara brand Paneer Makhani masala. The result is dinner party worthy yum! Thank you for all your instant pot recipes. I’m eager to try out some of the other vegetarian ones 🙂
Hi Manali,
I tried your butter paneer recipe for a potluck and it was super hit. Thank you so much for such a easy and super tasty recipe
glad to know Sneha!
This looks amazing! I’m going to try it in a couple of days! One question: I’m having trouble finding fenugreek leaves. My grocery store has fenugreek seed, but not leaves (and i know the flavor is different). Any suggestions for a substitute? Many thanks, can’t wait to try this one!
I would just skip..or maybe try dried celery ?
Looks delish!!! It would be helpful though if you added instructions for those of us who don’t have an instant pot.
Hi Marie, you can follow this recipe for stove-top version https://www.cookwithmanali.com/paneer-butter-masala-recipe/
Can crushed cardamon be substituted with cardamon powder? If so, how much powder? Thanks.
yes just add at the end, around 1/4 teaspoon!
I just made this, doubled the portion and its turned out lovely.
Didn’t add the honey though
good to know!
I was on the fence about following this recipe to the letter but I did it anyway and it was amazing. I loved it. Great work!
I am glad you did try it! 😀
This comes out so good everytime I make it. Thank you!!
Welcome Sowmya! glad you like it so much..its my favorite 🙂
Fantastic! +++++ Turned out amazing, just like I used to get in this Hindu restaurant in Manchester UK. Thankyou so much Manali:):) I added green frozen peas at the end and let it cook for a while on low. It actually tasted even better the day after as there was a (small) amount left 🙂
I am so glad to hear that Shaun! 🙂 Happy Cooking!
This looks amazing! I just got my instant pot yesterday, and I’m so exicted to try some of these. If I wanted to add some more veggies into this (green pepper, cauliflower, etc), would I just be able to throw those into the pot and cook with everything else in the pressure cooker for the 5 minutes?
Thanks!
Hi Summer! I would not recommend adding cauliflower. 5 minutes on high pressure and it would be too mushy, but even then if you want to add cauliflower make sure the florets are large in size, that way they may still turn out okay. Peppers should be okay, you can add peas, snow peas! hope this helps!
I just made it. It has turned out wonderfully. Very tasty. I left out the nuts as we have an allergy and it still tasted good. It probably would have been thicker with the cashews but it still tasted great. Thanks for a great recipe.
yes cashews makes it thicker, but I am glad to know it worked well even without it 🙂
So delicious and comforting, my friend… I love it!
Thanks Annie!
Hi Malini, I tried your recipe today, and it tasted delicious!!! Thank you so much for sharing. But mine just turned out a tad bit on the tangy side. (I didn’t mind it. It still tasted great!)
I was trying to avoid the cream, and tried to substitute with yogurt. Surely that is what gave it the tangy flavor.
Can you suggest another substitute for heavy cream? Do you think milk would work perhaps?
Hi Amy, thanks for trying the recipe & glad to hear that you liked it! I would replace the cream with either regular milk or coconut cream! Also make sure your tomatoes aren’t very unripe, that also makes the curry tangy. Hope that helps!
Looks delicious! For a nut allergy, what could I replace the cashews with?
Hi Connie, hmm I am not too sure..what about pumpkin/sunflower seeds? Or you could also add some coconut cream (the thick cream not the milk) Hope that helps! But this will be good without the cashews too so I wouldn’t worry too much about it!
🙁
lol.. miss you guys 🙁
If I needed to replace the fresh tomatoes with tomato purée how many cups do you think I would need?
Thanks very much! Love your site! It has really helped me learn how to cook.
Hi Kaity, I would probably use 3/4 to 1 cup tomato puree
I was just talking about Instant Pots with a friend yesterday, and she said she got one but didn’t know what to do with it. I totally sent her over her to check out some of your recipes! This paneer looks amazing, Manali!
This looks so warm and comforting, Manali! I’ve got to get an instant pot, and soon. I would love to dive into this for dinner!
I want to dip some Indian flatbread into that sauce! So yum!