Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut

Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut with potatoes and green beans is a simple and comforting one-pot meal for a busy night. Affordable and with minimal prep. Easy and delicious.

This post contains amazon affiliate links which means if you make a purchase after clicking one of those links, I will receive a small commission.

Sausage and Sauerkraut with potatoes was a very common dinner when I was growing up. We usually had homemade sauerkraut that my grandma made. And we ate it all with a big slice of dark rye bread. To this day, smoked sausages are one of my favourite comfort foods and I could eat them every day for dinner.

My husband’s background has some Dutch roots and early in our relationship he introduced me to one of his childhood favourites. It had some very specific smoked sausage and boiled potatoes.

It’s funny how two very different backgrounds and cultures have similar meals.

I made this Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut meal for my in-laws a few weeks ago and they loved it. This dinner is simple and comforting and easy to make. It is also quite affordable and can be adapted to suite different tastes.

Ingredients to make Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut 

The ingredients for this Sausage and Sauerkraut with Potatoes and Green Beans meal are very simple. Basically just 4 main ingredients and a few extras that could be omitted or changed up to your taste.

• Smoked sausages (the already cooked kind)
• Sauerkraut
• Small potatoes
• Green beans
• Onion
• Seasonings (I used mustard powder, garlic powder, and onion powder)

How to make Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut with Potatoes and Green Beans

This is a great one-pot, no prep meal. It’s one of those “dump and start” recipes, so it’s great for a busy evening.

1. Add the small potatoes to the Instant Pot along with a half cup of water.
2. Add the drained sauerkraut, sliced onion, and seasonings to an insert and place right on top of the potatoes.
3. Arrange the sausages on top of the sauerkraut and place a bundle of foil-wrapped green beans on top.
4. Cook at High Pressure for 4 minutes and then do a quick release. Enjoy!

Why use an insert to cook sauerkraut

I have tried cooking Sausages and Sauerkraut with potatoes right inside my Instant Pot. The meal tasted great but it was a bit messy.

Sauerkraut and potatoes got mixed together and it was difficult to separate them. I do like the components of this meal to be distinctly separate. Also the half cup of water for cooking the potatoes got mixed up with the sauerkraut juices, so it got a bit watery and I needed to strain everything.

Also, using no insert meant that the sausages were exposed to the heat of the pressure cooker without any barrier and that resulted in every sausage splitting. 

Using an insert helps with the following things:

1. It keeps the sauerkraut juices separate from the potatoes.
2. It adds a slight barrier between the heat and the sausages so that they don’t all split (although as you can see in the photos, they split occasionally).

Here’s the insert that I use. I love this particular brand as it is the widest insert available for a 6 quart Instant Pot. The brand also donates a lot of proceeds to charities and they are delightful people!

This is the particular model of Instant Pot that I used to test out this recipe. Different models may require different cooking times for potatoes. If your model comes to pressure very quickly, then you might need to add an extra 1-2 minutes of pressure cooking.

TIP 1: If you omit the green beans, then you should be able to add the lid to the insert (or a foil cover) which will further prevent the sausages from splitting. 

TIP 2: Make a foil sling to be able to easily remove the insert from Instant Pot. Foil sling is just a long piece of foil folded to make a “foil ribbon”, you just use it as a way to remove the insert easily.

Why cook green beans in foil in Instant Pot

Cooking green beans in Instant Pot without foil for 4 minutes will result in very mushy and soft beans. I am going to be honest here, I actually like soft beans a lot! So, if you like that then you could totally omit the foil wrap.

Making a foil bundle for Green Beans adds an extra layer of protection against the heat. It will make sure that after 4 minutes of cooking the green beans are still tender-crisp and not soft.

How long it actually takes to cook Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut

Prep time would be about 5 minutes which includes measuring all the ingredients and slicing the onion. Depending on your particular model of Instant Pot, it could take between 12-15 minutes to come to pressure (some models would take less time). It takes so long because Instant Pot is so full and there’s an insert. If you cook everything together without any insert then it would take about 9 minutes.

After Instant Pot comes to pressure, there’s 4 minutes cooking time and then about another 4 minutes of pressure release. So, in total 5+15+4+4=28 minutes.

Can you make Sausage and Sauerkraut with Potatoes and Green Beans without Instant Pot?

You sure can, it just requires a little bit more effort and more pots and pans.

Cook the potatoes in a large pot. About 5 minutes before potatoes are done, add the sausages to the pot, so that they heat through. About 2 minutes before the potatoes are done, add the green beans to the pot so that they cook slightly. Drain everything.

If you don’t like the idea of potatoes and sausages to be cooked together, then you could cook the sausages in a separate pot with water or even on a pan.

While the potatoes, sausages, and green beans are cooking, heat up a bit of oil in a pan, add the sliced onions and cook until soft and translucent, add the drained sauerkraut and spices. Cook on low heat for about 10-15 minutes until soft.

Ingredients and variations for Instant Pot Sausage and Sauerkraut

• Potatoes
  • I’ve never made this with regular potatoes, only small ones because I like the convenience.
  • If you use regular potatoes, they’d need to be cut up into smaller pieces. Timing might also need to be adjusted.
  • Small whole potatoes do not need to be cut as 4 minutes cooking time for cut up potatoes is a bit too much.
  • I purposefully only use water to cook the potatoes as I want them to be plain. I like plain potatoes with sauerkraut and sausages.
  • If you prefer your potatoes to have more seasonings, then feel free to either use broth to cook them or add salt and pepper to the water.
• Sauerkraut
  • I used different brands of store-bought wine sauerkraut. All worked the same. I haven’t tried it with homemade sauerkraut.
  • You would want to drain it as much as you can but no need to go overboard.
• Sausages
  • You want the smoked cooked sausages that are relatively thick. 
  • I have not tried with thinner sausages but I’m afraid they would get split during cooking.

• Green beans
  • Green beans could be omitted.
  • If you omit the green beans, try adding a lid or cover the insert with foil.
• Onions
  • I like the flavour and texture of the thin sliced onions with the sauerkraut.
  • However, onions could totally be omitted if you aren’t a fan or just don’t want to deal with slicing them.
• Seasonings
  • I used mustard powder, garlic powder, and onion powder. 
  • You could omit, adjust, or use different spices.
  • Fennel seeds or juniper berries would work wonderfully with sauerkraut. Even mustard seeds also.

More Complete Meal Instant Pot Recipes:

• Instant Pot Meatballs and Mashed Potatoes
• Instant Pot Creamy Pasta and Meatballs
• Instant Pot Shepherd’s Pie
• Instant Pot Nicoise Salad

Bonus Sauerkraut recipe: Pork Loin with Sauerkraut and Apples

DO YOU WANT MORE INSTANT POT RECIPES?

Join my Real Ingredients Instant Pot Recipes Facebook Group!!! It’s a fun and safe place to share your own Instant Pot recipes made with Real Ingredients.