Instant Pot Dirty Rice Casserole—an easy dinner dish with rice, andouille sausage, chicken and lots of flavor from cajun seasoning and fire roasted tomatoes. The whole pot will be gone within minutes! Make it in your Instant Pot or slow cooker.
SLOW COOKER instructions are listed in the recipe card below
Instant Pot Dirty Rice Casserole
My 12-year-old son had 2 friends over at dinnertime and asked if they could eat dinner with us. Sure, why not? I was wondering if they would like this dirty rice casserole or not. Some kids are picky, you know. One of the friends, Kaden, could not stop talking about it and he was so sad when the whole pot was gone. I told him to tell his parents the recipe would be on my website tomorrow 😜.
Authentic dirty rice is a Cajun white rice dish that gets its dirty color from chicken livers and ground beef or pork. This is a casserole spin off that does not use chicken livers but something most people have right now at home, chicken breasts. It also uses Cajun-style andouille sausage to give it that Cajun flare. It’s so tasty, it was bursting with flavor! I think you’ll love it.
Is it spicy? Mine was not spicy. The andouille sausage has a little kick to it and depending on what Cajun seasoning you use that could be spicy. I just used the Kroger store brand of Cajun seasoning and it’s not spicy at all. You can also make your own Cajun seasoning.
Can I use another type of rice? I used brown rice. However you definitely can use other types of rice. Just follow the cooking times in the green chart below. For this particular recipe you may want to decrease the liquid just a tad. The chicken puts off liquid and the tomatoes have liquid as well. You can print the green chart here.
Where do you find andouille sausage? Look next to the smoked sausages and deli meats in the refrigerated section at your grocery store. I used the Chef Bruce Aidells brand.
Try these other recipes…
Instant Pot Chicken And Sausage Gumbo
Instant Pot Cajun Chicken Pasta
Instant Pot Cajun Sausage And Shrimp Pasta
Instant Pot Dirty Rice Casserole
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 22 minutes (plus 10 minute NPR)
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 6 servings 1x
Description
An easy dinner dish with rice, andouille sausage, chicken and lots of flavor from cajun seasoning and fire roasted tomatoes. The whole pot will be gone within minutes! Make it in your Instant Pot or slow cooker.
Ingredients
- 1 Tbsp olive,vegetable or canola oil (or bacon grease)
- 1 cup diced onions
- 1/2 cup diced celery
- 1 3/4 cups chicken broth
- 1 1/2 cups raw brown rice
- 1 green pepper, cored and diced
- 1 1/2 – 2 tsp cajun seasoning
- 1 tsp paprika
- 6 oz fully cooked andouille sausage links, sliced into quarter inch slices
- 12 oz boneless, skinless chicken breasts or thighs (frozen is okay)
- 1 (14.5 oz) can fire roasted tomatoes
Instructions
- Turn Instant Pot to saute setting. When the display says HOT add in the oil and swirl around. Add in the onions and saute for 3 minutes. Add in the celery and saute for 2 more minutes.
- Pour in the broth and deglaze the pot. Turn off Instant Pot. Add in the rice, green pepper, cajun seasoning, paprika, sausage, chicken and tomatoes.
- Cover the Instant Pot and secure the lid. Make sure valve is set to sealing. Set the manual/pressure cook button to 22 minutes. When the time is up let the pot sit for 10 minutes and then move the valve to venting.
- Remove the lid. Shred or chop the chicken. Stir and serve.
Notes
Slow Cooker Instructions: Saute onion in oil over medium heat and add to slow cooker. Boil chicken broth and add to slow cooker. Add rest of ingredients into slow cooker. Cover and cook on high for 2-3 hours or on low for 4-6 hours. Stir and serve.
Can I use another type of rice? I used brown rice. However you definitely can use other types of rice. Just follow the cooking times in the green chart above. For this particular recipe you may want to decrease the liquid just a tad instead of keeping the normal ratios of water to rice. The chicken puts off liquid and the tomatoes have liquid as well. If you use a rice that takes less than 10 minutes cut up the chicken into pieces so that it can cook at the same rate as the rice.
I used my 6 quart Instant Pot Duo 60 7 in 1*. Make in the 8 or 3 quart pot with no changes.
- Category: Chicken
- Method: Instant Pot
*Karen Petersen is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.
Thanks for your earlier responses, Karen! Btw, in the numbered action photos, the tomatoes seem to have been omitted.
★★★★★
Yep I totally forgot them when I took the picture
I would so do that too! Maybe a little box could go in there without a photo saying when to add them since some people may look just at those numbered photos? The little video is extremely fast so a bit hard to follow.
I’m so excited to make this tonight! I’m sorry if I missed this, but at what point do I add the tomatoes?
It’s in the written instructions (not the photos), above:
“Pour in the broth and deglaze the pot. Turn off Instant Pot. Add in the rice, green pepper, cajun seasoning, paprika, sausage, chicken and tomatoes.”
: )
Thank you Beth! I knew I shouldn’t have asked that question early in the morning before coffee. 😉 Thanks again for your help!
Hi Karen. This recipe intrigued me, I love “real” dirty rice. So, I made it tonight, it turned out wonderful, I used converted rice. But, being originally from New Orleans this is not dirty rice. It is more like jambalaya. Nonetheless, a great recipe. Thanks.
Glad you enjoyed it Phyllis!
I forgot to ask – do you stir at any point or after adding the tomatoes? When I add tomatoes or tomato sauce I don’t stir in order to avoid a burn error. So after adding the rice I didn’t stir. Thanks!
I didn’t stir after adding the tomatoes!
I just tried making this, but with white rice…set time for 10 minutes per instructions and got a burn notice. Rice is caked in the bottom of the pan. What should I have done differently?
Karen will surely have a better answer, but early on I read/learned from a number of articles/books that if using tomatoes or tomato sauce, to not stir it in, but instead let it sit on the top, since the sugar in tomatoes can cause a burn notice if it’s at the bottom of the IP. Same for spaghetti – the sauce is poured on top of the pasta and no stirring. I don’t know if this will help for the future, but I’m so sorry your rice burned.
★★★★★
I’m sorry this happened! Did you stir or just layer the ingredients?
I also used white rice and got the burn signal. I got it before it even reached pressure. I didn’t stir so I’m not sure what I did wrong. I did two cups broth with the 1.5 cups rice. I put in everything in order as specified. I did rinse the rice. I dunno. I ended up finishing in a pot because of the burn notice. Still good but I was disappointed.
★★★★
Hi Karen – I messed up and hit 2X so inadvertently doubled the recipe for just two of us! And I kept thinking, “Three cups of rice? Six servings?!” LOL and yikes! So the big question is whether you think it would freeze well. It’s coming to pressure now. I hope I don’t get an error for putting too much in my 6-quart Duo Evo Plus. I ended up leaving out a chicken breast in order not to to piled chicken on top of chicken, so have three equaling about 18 oz of chicken. The only change I made was to use red bell pepper since one of us can’t handle green. Thanks in advance!
BTW, 5 stars! That was despite my only using half the onion, celery and (red) pepper, because I hit the 2X after chopping those. I might sauté more tomorrow and just stir them in, but it really was terrific despite my brain glitch.
★★★★★
oh shoot!!! I bet it would freeze well!
Hi Karen!
Do you have to use chicken AND sausage? Could you just use the sausage?
That’s what I want to know also
Yep that would be fine with just sausage!!
If I want to add shrimp, should I leave out the chicken? Or add to the chicken and sausage?
If I wanted to add frozen shrimp to this, when would I?
I’d add it in after it has pressure cooked and turn to saute and it will cook fairly fast.
If I am making in a crock pot, can I still use frozen chicken or does it have to be thawed?
It can be frozen, might take an hour or so longer to cook though.
I see a lot of recipes, such as this one, that say: “When the time is up let the pot sit for 10 minutes and then move the valve to venting.”
Question: Does this mean to turn the pot OFF after 10 minutes and let it set; OR, to leave the pot ON and let it set for 10 minutes? I believe that leaving it ON will keep the pot in the warm mode, while turning the pot OFF turns off all the heating.
Thank you from a cooking Dummy 🙂
Hi Dan, I always just let it stay on warm. “Keep Warm” is not a pressure program so it won’t actually kick-in until after the cooker has lost pressure. Even though the program light turns on right after pressure cooking, the heating element isn’t actually heating the food until after the pressure cooker has cooled enough to lose pressure.
Do you have a crock pot version of this recipe?
★★★★
Hi Karl, the instructions for the crockpot are in the notes section of the recipe card.