There’s just no doubt about it, meal prep fam—Summer is here and in full swing! There are about billion-and-one reasons to love our sunny season, but at MPOF one of our main ones is throwing traditional backyard barbecue parties with the people we love! However, not all barbecue is the same, and in fact, not all of it even requires you to fire up your trusty propane grill! It’s because we’re all about giving you diversity in your barbecue that we’re bringing you today’s meal prep recipe—An oh-so-easy instant pot beef barbacoa!
The word ‘barbacoa’ is actually the Mexican Spanish word for a barbecue! Barbacoa is believed to have originated in the beautiful Caribbean West Antilles during the 1500s, and it eventually spread to Mexico. Cooked traditionally, barbacoa meat is roasted over an open fire. However, this instant pot meal prep recipe does away with primitive cooking methods entirely by using, um, an instant pot (as you’ve surely guessed by now ?)! We love cooking with instant pots because they do a lot of the actual cooking for you while preserving the beneficial vitamins and minerals in the food.
When properly stored, we found this dish to last 3-5 days in the fridge That’s pretty much the perfect time frame for having this instant pot meal prep once a day for almost the entire duration of your work or school week.
While we certainly encourage you to experiment with what works best for your meal prep regimen, freezing this dish may be impractical due to the suggested sides.
Start by setting the instant pot to “sauté” mode, adding 1 tablespoon of avocado oil once it’s warmed up. Add the pot roast and sear 3-5 minutes on each side, looking out for a brown outer crust to form. After removing the pot roast and setting it aside, add another 1 tablespoon of oil to the pot, and sauté garlic for 5 minutes. Next, heat granulated onion, cumin, cloves, and oregano for 1 minute, then stir in and sauté adobo sauce, chipotles, lime juice, and apple cider vinegar for 1 minute. Stir in beef broth, bay leaves, salt, and black pepper, then return the beef to the pot to pressure cook on ‘HIGH’ for 70 minutes, making sure to replace the lid. Manually release pressure, flip the roast, and cook on ‘HIGH’ again, this time for just 5 minutes. Remove beef, shred with forks, and submerge in barbacoa sauce for 5 minutes. Divide meat, sauce, and garnishes into 6 equal parts, and then serve!
We recommend portioning this instant pot meal prep into a 3 compartment bowl-style meal prep container! One compartment for beef, one for the ultra-healthy quinoa, and one for cilantro and other garnishes. You can get more general info about meal prep containers via our Ultimate Guide, or purchase them directly on Amazon!
If you have an awesome experience making this barbacoa and want even more instant pot meal prep recipes for next week, consider our Instant Pot Enchilada Soup or Instant Pot Ranch Chicken!
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