Instant Pot Butter Chicken {Murgh Makhani} hails from the Punjabi Region of India; its rich delicious tomato sauce is comfort Indian Food. Low carb and keto to!

A bowl of Indian butter chicken on a plate with indian flatbread on another plate.

Instant Pot Butter Chicken {Murgh Makhani}

My Instant Pot Butter Chicken recipe is so much easier using an Instant Pot, Ninja Foodi or Pressure Cooker than on the stove.

Many years ago, one of my customers from an old business and I were chatting about Indian recipes.

He told me that authentic Indian Butter Chicken gets its unique “buttery” taste because of cooking in a rich and buttery tomato sauce. He went on to say that said “buttery” tomato sauce is caused by cashew paste, not loads of butter! For a short-cut, some people do use tons of butter, but then the recipe isn’t quite authentic.

Cast of Ingredients for Instant Pot Butter Chicken

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Ingredients for Instant Pot Butter Chicken.

Chicken
Homemade Ghee or Jarred Ghee
Greek Yogurt
Homemade Ginger Garlic Paste – or just mince up some garlic and ginger
Raw Cashews – these give the sauce the rich and buttery flavor.
Tomatoes

When I lived in West LA, I used to go to one of the two neighborhood Indian Buffet restaurants. One was vegetarian and a hole in the wall, literally. The “dining” room was just a plain room with tables and chairs and the cooking area was in the back, behind a half wall.

I learned a lot about Indian cooking and ingredients from those two restaurants. I love that their dishes were not Americanized. The warmness and hospitality of those restaurants were so inviting.

Prepare Butter Chicken Marinade

What Spices are in Butter Chicken?

Chili Powder
Cayenne Pepper
Turmeric Powder
Ground Coriander
Ground Cumin
Garam Masala – make sure to get a proper garam masala. Some blends only include a few spices.
Kasuri Methi (Fenugreek)

What is Garam Masala?

Garam Masala is a ground spice blend made up of 11 spices.
The only spices it should contain are: Coriander, Cumin, Cinnamon, Black Pepper, Cloves, Ginger, Mace, Green Cardamom, Black Cardamom, Nutmeg, Bay Leaves

Instant Pot Butter Chicken is such a great meal to prepare in advance. It is so easy to just mix up the marinade ingredients, add the chicken and seal it up in a Foodsaver for another day. For optimal flavor, chicken tastes better after it has some time to marinate.

Add Sauce Ingredients to Vitamix

If you are cooking the same day or next day, just grab a Ziploc Freezer Bag. You can even let it marinate while you are preparing the tomato sauce. The marinade will tenderize the chicken and it will “cut like Butter.” Get it? Butter Chicken? Well, that is only part of the name. 🙂

How to Make Instant Pot Butter Tomato Sauce

This is the easiest way. I’ve seen some Instant Pot Butter Chicken recipes where everything is added to the pressure cooking pot and cooked all at once. The chicken is removed and shredded and then the sauce is blended and the chicken is returned to the pot. That’s really quite silly. Use a Vitamix or an Immersion Blender to process the sauce the whole tomatoes and other ingredients before cooking. Whole tomatoes are less acidic and since they get blended up anyway, they are a better choice than diced tomatoes.
This way, you don’t have to deal with hot sauce splattering as you are trying to blend.

Both the Vitamix and a Immersion Blender will do a nice job in turning the raw cashews into a paste.

Pro Tip: Nut Allergy Alert – Check the Recipe Card at the bottom of this post. I have written in a substitution.

Another convenience to make this recipe even easier, is to prepare a double batch of tomato sauce and use the FoodSaver Vacuum Sealing System for freezing, so that you can make it again without any preparation.

Heat Pot Fully, add Ghee

Heating a stainless steel pot before adding the fat, will help the pot become non-stick.

Homemade Ghee is a nice high temperature oil, so the chicken will sear without any worry of the oil burning.

The Instant Pot, Ninja Foodi or Pressure Cooker will do a nice job of quickly searing the chicken.

Marinated Chicken is Seared in Ghee

Homemade ghee, store bought gee or olive can be used to sear the chicken. The aroma of the Homemade Ginger Garlic Paste is so wonderful and will fill the kitchen with a nice aroma.

You don’t even need to remove the chicken to deglaze! The chicken broth can be poured right in with the chicken.

While deglazing the pot, bits will loosen from the bottom. This is called “fond.” It adds so much flavor.

Pot in Pot Rice or Cauliflower, Potato, or Both with Butter Chicken

Once combined with the yogurt and chicken in the pot, the sauce will look so creamy and delicious.

Make it a pot in pot meal with Cauliflower and Potatoes or Rice. Just place a Tall Legged Trivet and the Pot in Pot Pan filled with potatoes or rinsed rice.

For low carb and keto followers, add cauliflower and make a cauliflower mash!

That’s it! You are ready to cook.

Finish with a Pinch of Garam Masala and Kasuri Methi

The cook time for Instant Pot Butter Chicken is super short and the chicken will be tender and juicy. The Sauce may be a bit thin (it needs to be in order to reach pressure), so use the Sauté setting and adjust to LOW.

Taste the tomato sauce and adjust seasonings to your liking. Once the Sauce has reduced and you are ready to serve, sprinkle on a touch of Garam Masala and Finish with a Pinch of Garam Masala and Kasuri Methi (Fenugreek).

Garam Masala is often added in right before cooking to enhance the flavor and add the luscious aroma.

If yoru time this right (meaning your Chapati is in the proofing stage, you can be cooking my Yogurt Whey Indian Chapati (a/k/a Roti), while your Instant Pot Butter is cooking.

Instant Pot Indian Butter Chicken with Chapati

For a more substantial rice dish, check out my Instant Pot Seasoned Vegetable Ghee Rice.

Enjoy this Instant Pot Butter Chicken with Yogurt Whey Chapati/Roti or try making some Homemade Naan, so that you can sop up all the delicious tomato sauce.

The flavorful and tender chicken will cut like Butter! 😉

More Instant Pot Indian Recipes to Enjoy!

Kitchen Equipment and Essentials

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