Quick And Easy Instant Pot Venison Stew

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This quick and easy Instant Pot Venison Stew is the perfect comforting and filling dinner that requires minimal prep. This rich venison stew is full of gorgeous flavors and a secret ingredient that makes it all come together.

Suitable for Gluten-free and Paleo diets. Post includes Weight Watchers points.

A bowl of instant pot venison stew garnished with herbs

As the cold weather digs in and the colorful leaves fall off the trees, cue plenty of fun family moments of leaf catching, I crave plenty of cozy, warm, and filling soups and stews.

And if you love venison and wild game, this Instant Pot Venison Stew certainly ticks all the boxes. It is a flavorful stew the whole family will love.

Nothing gets me more excited than bringing you simple seasonal recipes that are easy to cook too. Less time cooking and more time enjoying all those fall moments.

And this Instant Pot Venison Stew, filled with tender chunks of venison meat, is all about simple quality ingredients with minimal prep that pretty much cook themselves, aka a dump and start recipe.

Just as easy as this hearty Instant Pot Beef Stew or easy stove top Venison Stew. and family favorite Instant Pot Goulash Stew.

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The secret to this delicious venison stew is the caraway seeds. They add a distinctive and aromatic punch to your stews and are worth it. But if you don’t have any or prefer not to, then simply omit them or swap them out for something else.

This hearty meal is very adaptable and is all about the flavors that you like. If you like venison, then check out this easy Venison Burger Recipe.

A bowl of pressure cooker venison stew with herb garnish

Why Make This Recipe

Here are just some of the reasons this Venison Stew Instant Pot is so awesome;

  • Easy – This Instant Pot stew is super easy to make (more about this below).
  • Delicious – Pressure cooking venison makes it so tender.
  • Affordable – It needs only 11 ingredients, all of which you already have in your pantry.
  • Great for Gatherings – It is great for feeding a crowd. Simply double or triple the recipe, and you are good.
  • Meal Prep – Leftovers freeze very well, so that is a few weeknight suppers sorted.
  • Fun – This gives you another reason to use your magic Instant Pot, right?!
Instant pot quick start guide image

Ingredient Notes

  • Venison – this recipe calls for venison cut into 2-inch cubes bite sized pieces
  • Vegetables – bulk up your stew with sweet potatoes, carrots, and celery.
  • Broth – feel free to use beef broth or beef stock. But vegetable broth or chicken broth works well too.
  • Seasoning – this flavor is from Italian seasoning (or french spice blend => Herbs de Provence), my secret ingredient, caraway seed, and salt
  • Umami – yes, add some umami by adding in some chopped anchovies. Add more or less to your taste.
  • Sweetener – a little bit of honey adds some sweetness. Feel free to use maple syrup instead.
  • Tomato sauce – you can use sieved tomatoes or tomato sauce. Just make sure these have no extra seasoning attached.

Ready to make this Instant Pot Venison Stew recipe? Gather your ingredients, and let me show you…

Handy Tip: Use Good Kitchen Tools!

For the best tools to help make your recipe even easier and more successful, check out my collection of the Best Instant Pot Tools on Amazon.

How To Make Instant Pot Venison Stew

Get complete ingredients list and instructions from the recipe card below.

Let me tell you a little secret here. Making venison stew in your pressure cooker is so easy. Seriously.

Option 1 –  DUMP & START aka the super eeeeeeeeeeeeasy way.

  1. Layer the ingredients starting with the cubed venison, sweet potatoes, carrots, celery, beef broth, Italian seasoning, caraway seeds, anchovies, honey, and salt.
  2. Place the tomato sauce at the top but do not mix.
  3. Close the Instant Pot lid, and turn the valve to the sealing position. Press the stew button, and wait until done, then dig right in.

Option 2Brown the venison first, aka the slightly less easy way.

  1. Using the sauté function, heat the olive oil or avocado oil in your Instant Pot and brown venison stew meat in batches. Remove meat from the Insert pan and set aside.
  2. Deglaze the insert with a splash of broth. 
  3. Add all the ingredients (minus the tomato), including the browned meat, into the Instant Pot insert and stir to combine.
  4. Then add the tomato on top. Do not mix in.
  5. Close the lid, turn the valve to the sealing position, choose the stew setting and allow to cook until done.
  6. Let the pressure release naturally about 10-15 minutes before opening.

So this only adds about 7 minutes of cooking time to your stew, but the browning of the meat adds such an amazing extra depth of flavor, so do it if you have time.

instant pot venison stew ingredients in the instant pot

Tips for Making the Best Instant Venison Stew

  • Please cut the sweet potato and carrots into large cubes. Otherwise, they will turn to mush.
  • If you want to thicken the soup, then you can mash some of the sweet potatoes after cooking.
  • Add an extra half a cup of beef stock for a thinner stew.
  • This Venison Stew tastes sooo good served with steamed broccoli. See my ‘What to Serve with Instant Pot Venison Stew’ section below for more ideas.
  • Don’t overcook the venison if you are doing the browning option.

Delicious Variations

  • Add various other spices to your taste if you prefer. I like garlic powder, red pepper flakes, fresh rosemary or fresh thyme, etc.
  • You can swap the sweet potatoes for regular potatoes if you prefer.
  • You can swap the tender venison for other meats like stewing beef or elk instead.
  • Should you want to get a slightly thicker deer stew, then mash some of the carrots or sweet potatoes to thicken.
  • Add a dash of Worcestershire sauce, red wine vinegar, or tomato paste for extra flavor.
cooked Instant Pot Venison Stew in the Instant Pot

FAQs

Do You Need To Brown The Venison?

No, you can totally skip the browning and the sautéing steps and just add everything straight in.  

But peeps, I really must tell you that the browning really adds a richer depth of flavor to this deer meat stew, so if you have time, you should try and do it.

How To Remove The Gamy Taste From Venison

If you are worried about the gamey taste of this game meat, then soak it in a liquid like buttermilk, milk, saltwater, etc first, then rinse well before cooking.

Can I Double This Recipe?

Yes, you can. You can double this as long as you make it in one of the bigger pots like the 8qt. Just make sure to not fill it past the fill line.

What is Venison?

Venison is deer meat, but I find there is a bit of confusion about what is venison exactly. A particular part of the deer? A particular cut of deer meat?

Venison is ANY part of the deer that can be consumed. Even deer liver would be considered venison. But for this venison stew recipe, you’ll use venison shoulder or venison leg cubes.

I love cooking with venison because it’s leaner than beef and also has more vitamins and minerals. 

(Ticking off all the ‘healthy eating’ boxes right there.) It also can’t be intensively farmed, and most deer have lived a natural life until just before you get it from the butcher.

Lots of people talk about eating ‘pasture-raised’ (not factory-farmed) meat these days, and most venison is that way naturally.

Serving Suggestions

This is a great recipe to serve with so many sides.

More Venison Recipes

For more tasty Venison Stew recipes, try these options:

Horizontal image of cooked instant pot stew

Weight Watchers Points

There are just 4 Blue Plan SmartPoints in a serving of Instant Pot Venison Stew.

Thank you for reading my Pressure Cooker Venison Stew recipe post. And please come visit again as I continue to slice, dice and dream up affordable Air Fryer recipes, Instant Pot Recipes, Southern Recipes and more. Thanks for supporting Recipes from a Pantry, food blog.

Instant Pot Venison Stew Video

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A bowl of instant pot venison stew garnished with herbs
Print Recipe
4.66 from 26 votes

Instant Pot Venison Stew

Instant Pot Venison Stew
Prep Time5 minutes
Cook Time35 minutes
Total Time40 minutes
Course: Main
Cuisine: American, Western
Servings: 6
Calories: 267kcal
Author: Bintu Hardy

Ingredients

  • 2 lb (900g) venison cut into 2-inch cubes
  • 2 sweet potatoes cubed
  • 4 carrots cut into thick rounds
  • 2 celery stalks sliced
  • 1 cup (250ml) beef stock hot
  • 1 teaspoon dried Herbs de Provence
  • 1 teaspoon caraway seeds
  • 4 chopped anchovies
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • Salt to taste
  • 1 cup (250ml) sieved tomatoes or tomato sauce

Instructions

Dump and Start Method

  • Add all the ingredients to the Instant Pot insert starting with the Venison and ending with the sieved tomatoes. Do not mix in the tomatoes.
  • Place the lid on, turn the valve to sealing, choose the stew setting, and allow to cook until done.
  • Let the steam release naturally about 10-15 minutes before opening.
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Video

Notes

  • Please cut the sweet potato and carrots into large cubes. Otherwise, they will turn to mush.
  • If you want to thicken the soup, then you can mash some of the sweet potatoes after cooking.
  • Add an extra half a cup of beef stock for a thinner stew.
  • This Venison Stew tastes so good served with steamed broccoli. See my ‘What to Serve with Instant Pot Venison Stew’ section below for more ideas.
  • Don’t overcook the venison if you are doing the browning option.
  • Storage – keep in an airtight container inside the fridge for up to 5 days.
  • There are 4 WW Blue Plan SmartPoints in one serving of this.

Nutrition

Calories: 267kcal | Carbohydrates: 18g | Protein: 37g | Fat: 4g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 130mg | Sodium: 435mg | Potassium: 1011mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 8g | Vitamin A: 13180IU | Vitamin C: 6.7mg | Calcium: 54mg | Iron: 6.2mg

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Recipe Rating




46 Comments

  1. With the chilly weather rolling in, nothing beats a comforting bowl of stew, and this one is a winner. What I love most is its simplicity – minimal prep and maximum flavor.
    Regards,
    James from Y9 Games

  2. 5 stars
    I can’t thank you enough for this recipe. It’s a fantastic solution for those Buckshot Roulette days when I crave a comforting stew but don’t have hours to spend in the kitchen.

  3. 4 stars
    Not one rating on here comes from someone who has tried this. It’s about a blog. I never understand how someone can rate a recipe without trying it.

    1. 1 star
      Geez, it accidentally gave it 4 stars without ever pressing a star amount. So is that automatic or something? See my previous question about finding reviews from those who have actually made it. ‍♀️

  4. Quick and Easy Instant Pot Venison Stew is a mouthwatering and convenient dish that combines the rich flavors of venison with hearty vegetables, creating a comforting meal in no time. You need to visit here https://ssstiktok.link/ and learn more steps for downloading. This recipe takes advantage of the Instant Pot’s pressure cooking capabilities, allowing for tender and succulent venison in a fraction of the time.