Instant Pot Honey Garlic Chicken

This Instant Pot Honey Garlic Chicken is perfect for a quick week night meal thanks to the pressure cooker. Sticky, sweet, and full of garlic, you can’t beat this flavor profile!

If you want your family to literally lick the plate clean, may I suggest making the chicken dish for them. My family can never get enough of this meal whenever I make it. The sauce that goes over the chicken is crazy, out-of-this-world yummy and every single one of my kids loves it and would drink it if I let them….but I haven’t…yet! 😉 It’s another one of my Instant Pot Recipes that gets a thumbs up every time I make it, and I hope you and your family will enjoy it as much as we do!

To really rock this recipe I highly suggest two things:

Use bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs. I love making this recipe by first searing the chicken in the Instant Pot to get it nice and crispy and that works best with the skin on. As for the bone, this dish reminds me of ribs in that the sauce is nice and thick and sticky…the bone-in chicken thighs make picking up an eating it that much better, pinky swear!
Make sure you thicken up the sauce! The extra 10-15 minutes are worth it…this sauce is seriously delish and you will love how the flavors meld together as it thickens!!!

To make this Instant Pot Honey Garlic Chicken you will need an Instant Pot or other type of pressure cooker. Make sure to follow the directions of your pressure cooker if you are not using an IP! 

Instant Pot Honey Garlic Chicken

Prep time - 15 mins
Cook time - 45 mins
Total time - 1 hour
Recipe type: Main Course
Cuisine: Asian

Ingredients
6-8 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
2 tbsp butter
⅓ cup honey
½ cup soy sauce (or coconut aminos)
½ cup water
5 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp sesame seeds, optional for garnish
salt and pepper

Instructions
1. Season chicken thighs with salt and pepper and set aside.
2. Heat the Instant Potin SAUTE mode, add butter.
3. Arrange chicken in the pot and saute for about 2-3 minutes per side. (usually 4 thighs can saute at one time.)
4. While the chicken is sautéing, in a medium sized mixing bowl add the honey, soy sauce, water, garlic, and apple cider vinegar and mix well.
5. Once all the chicken is sautéed, press CANCEL. Place all chicken back inside the Instant Pot if you sauted it in shifts.
6. Pour the honey mixture over top of chicken.
7. Lock the lid, close the steam valve and press the POULTRY button. Adjust time to 20 minutes.
8. When Instant Pot is done cooking, do a quick steam release by carefully opening the steam valve.
9. Place the chicken in a serving dish to rest and set aside leaving the sauce in the Instant Pot.
10. Press the SAUTE button again to let the sauce thicken, stirring occasionally. This will take 10-15 minutes.
11. While the sauce thickens, toast the sesame seeds in a saute pan over medium heat on your stovetop (optional). Making sure to stir the seeds so they don't burn while they are toasting.
12. Once sauce is thickened, press CANCEL and then pour the sauce over the chicken thighs and garnish with sesame seeds.
13. Enjoy!

Look at all those yummy sautéed chicken thighs!! I always make 7-8 thighs per recipe so I need to sauté them in two shifts as they won’t all fit in one layer in my IP. Once all the chicken is sautéed I then layer the chicken back inside the Instant Pot and our the sauce over top.

When the chicken and sauce are done cooking, remove the chicken to a serving plate and let rest. Then press the SAUTE button and let the sauce thicken up, stirring occasionally…this usually takes 10-15 minutes. While the sauce thickens, I toast my sesame seeds!

And just look at that dish!!! Delish!

We love to serve this over rice or zoodles, soooo good!