Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese

Name: Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 30 min
Yield: 8 servings
Ingredients: 2 tbsp butter; 4 cups water; 1 tsp salt; 1 lb macaroni spirals (sometimes call scoobi do); 1 cup 2% milk; 4 cups white cheddar cheese, grated; 1/2 head broccoli, finely chopped

2/19/18

This Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese with broccoli and white cheddar is a creamy, delicious comfort food favourite that comes together with less than 10 ingredients and in one pot!

GUYS!

Have I ever got a killer recipe idea for you today. And it's superrrrrrrr easy.

I'm talking Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese. With white cheddar and broccoli.

OMG I'm dying this stuff is so good. And it's not bad for you either!

And I think it's pretty evident that I'm a HUGE mac and cheese fan. I'm talking Truffle Mac and Cheese, Butternut Squash Mac and Cheese and even a BUILD YOUR OWN Mac and Cheese Bar! I'm obsessed.

It's also an almost 5-ingredient recipe too, and no fail. Dump some butter, water, salt and macaroni spirals into your Instant Pot. Cook on high pressure for 2 minutes. Remove the lid, dump in your milk and cheese and stir. Add you broccoli and stir. Close the lid and wait another 2 minutes.

Then boom, dinner is ready. I can't get over how easy and delicious this is.

Now, I should warn you that this Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese is more like a Kraft Dinner style mac and cheese as opposed to one you make with a roux using flour.

It's still pretty creamy and cheesy but it's definitely more liquidly than mac and cheeses that have a thicker sauce. The sauce is thinner, but it makes this dish feel lighter and it also takes way less time and is more hands off. I don't know about you but honestly sometimes I just want to dump everything into one pot, set it and forget it.

This is the mac and cheese for that!

The broccoli adds a little bit of colour and adds the health factor to this mac and cheese so you can rest easy knowing that you've made yourself at least a bit more of a well-rounded meal. Add in some extra greens like spinach or chard and you are practically eating a green goddess version of mac and cheese.

LOL I know, the irony of those two titles together.

If there's anything else you should know about this Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese is that I also find that using the macaroni spirals (sometimes called Scooby Do at the grocery store) hold up a bit better because they're a bigger pasta shape. I wouldn't recommend you use the smaller macaroni pasta or even the shells but it's up to you.

Plus, spirals are just more fun anyway.

Let's also talk about white cheddar for a second and how amazing it is.

I really feel like you need to splurge and go all out on the cheese with this Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese – I bought a $12 block of Balderston aged white cheddar (the one with the turquoise-green label and NO they didn't pay me to write about how much I love them lol!) and it was almost just enough cheese for the job.

I do recommend 4 cups of cheese for that extra gooey-ness but you can certainly use less (3 cups will do) so one block is usually enough. If you really wanna get fancy you can also use some grated parmesan or pizza mozzarella, or Swiss cheese would be nice too.

Even if you wanna do orange cheddar, it all works pretty well. I've just got a soft spot for white cheddar these days…

Will you be making this Healthy Instant Pot Mac and Cheese?

Anything white cheddar has my heart for as long as it's still acceptable to consume tons of comfort food! BRB while I go back to eating piles of this.

If you try any of my recipes be sure to let me know on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or in the comments – I’d love to see what you come up with!

The Instant Pot DUO Plus 60 is the version I use in this recipe.

Grab some Glass meal prep bowls if you plan on packing this up for lunch!

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3.9 from 10 votes