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Instant Pot Shahi Paneer

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Instant Pot Shahi Paneer - This restaurant style exotic curry with cottage cheese is not only exotic but one of the easiest Indian curries to ever make at home. The smooth, silky curry dunk with soft and tender paneer cubes is rich, creamy and super yummy when paired with Naan or Basmati Jeera Rice. Perfect for special occasions, parties and potlucks. Try it, might just become your new favorite curry. Gluten-Free. Vegan & Stove-top option included. Video Recipe.

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shahi paneer recipe

What is Shahi Paneer

Shahi mean royal.

Paneer is the soft and tender Indian cottage cheese.

Shahi Paneer is an exotic curry made with onions, tomatoes, nuts and cream. It's typically not a spicy curry. It's packed with mild fragrant flavors with Paneer cubes dunk in it. It's delicious when paired with Naan, roti/chapatti or Basmati Jeera Rice.

Why you will love this Shahi Paneer Recipe

  • I cannot emphasize enough how easy it is to make Shahi Paneer in your pressure cookers. You literally just throw in the ingredients and let the pressure cooker do the work for you without any baby sitting.
  • You will fall in love with how delicious this easy curry tastes. 
  • The thick creamy sauce is perfect to dunk cheese cubes and relish it with Naan, roti/chapatti or Basmati Jeera Rice.
  • Great for parties & potlucks.  It's a restaurant style curry but it's so easy to make it at home. 
  • It's gluten-free and can be made vegan too. 
  • The sauce is freezer friendly and you can meal prep this recipe ahead of time. I freeze the sauce and when I am crunched on time, just thaw the sauce and throw in some fresh paneer and serve. 

paneer for shahi paneer recipe

Instant Pot Shahi Paneer Ingredients

Here is just a gist of the ingredients involved in the recipe you can find the measurements in the recipe card below. 

  • Paneer or Tofu - You can use homemade paneer or you can find it at any Indian grocery store in the frozen section. If you are looking for a vegan substitute to Paneer you could add Tofu instead.
  • For the sauce - onions, tomatoes, cashews or almonds, ginger, garlic, salt, water, table cream or coconut cream for vegan option.
  • Spices - bay leaves, turmeric powder, kashmiri red chilli powder, garam masala, dried fenugreek leaves, green cardamom.  For a delicious aromatic sauce, try not to skip the dried fenugreek leaves and cardamom as they add a lot of flavor and aroma to this curry.

instant pot shahi paneer recipe

How to make Shahi Paneer in Instant Pot : Step by step instructions

Here is just a gist of the steps involved in the recipe you can find the measurements in the recipe card below. 

  • Step 1 - Prepare the ingredients. If making paneer at home, check out our homemade paneer recipe. Wash, peel and cut the tomatoes and onions into halves. Peel the ginger and garlic. Cut the paneer or tofu into cubes. Keep the spices ready.Soak cashews for 30 minutes in milk or water.

step by step instructions to make shahi paneer

  • Step 2 - Saute. Using the saute function, heat oil in the inner pot. Once the oil is hot, throw in the bay leaves, green cardamom and stir until you smell an aroma. Then add in the rest of the spices, turmeric power, kashmiri red chilli powder, dried fenugreek leaves &  garam masala. give it a stir. Next, wait for 30 seconds and add the onions, tomatoes, cashews or almonds, salt and water.
  • Step 3 - Pressure Cook. Cover the lid, seal the vent and pressure cook for 8 minutes on high. Manually release the pressure. 
  • Step 4 - Prepare the sauce.  Using a spoon remove the bay leaves and cardamom. Next using a hand or table blender, blend the pressure cooked ingredients into a smooth runny sauce. You can gradually add water to water down the sauce. Ofcourse keep in mind you will also be adding cream to the sauce so you can adjust the water based on how thick  you want you sauce to be. As long as the sauce is smooth and is able to coat the cheese cubes it's good.
  • Step 5 - Add table cream or coconut milk or vegan unsweetened cream,  cheese cubes and dried fenugreek leaves and saute for 3-5 minutes.
  • Step 6 - Garnish with cilantro and serve with Naan or Basmati Jeera Rice

instant pot shahi paneer recipe

How to make Shahi Paneer on Stove Top

Don't own an Instant Pot yet? We highly recommend getting one as it's made our lives a lot more simple. You can read all about why we love our Instant Pots and if it's worth it here.

The quickest way to make this sauce on the stove top is using a stove top pressure cooker

You will follow the same instructions as for Instant Pot Recipe until Step 4. Pressure cook on slow heat for 20 minutes and then follow step 5 and 6 of the Instant Pot instructions.

how to make shahi paneer in instant pot

Can I make Shahi Paneer Vegan

You can use Tofu instead of Paneer and replace the cream with either coconut milk to thicken the sauce or even vegan unsweetened cream.

Can I meal prep Instant Pot Shahi Paneer

This is a perfect recipe for meal prep. You can prepare the sauce until step 4 a day before, a week before or make a large batch and freeze it. All you need to do before consuming is reaheat the follow step 5 and garnish.

I do it all the time and it's such a time saver specially on the day you are entertaining or preparing for a potluck. Infact there are times I have pulled out the sauce even on weeknights just out of mere convenience. 

ingredients for shahi paneer

Can I freeze the Shahi Paneer Sauce

Yes this sauce is freezer friendly. Just make sure that if you are freezing this sauce you don't add cream and paneer cubes to the sauce. Follow steps 1 to 4 mentioned above and then Step 5 and garnishing just when you are ready to serve. Store the sauce in a freezer friendly container and it's good for upto 3 months.

Serving Ideas

Shahi Paneer pairs really well with naans, roti/chapatti, parathas or even basmati jeera rice. I like to throw in some cucumbers or a salad on the side too.

shahi paneer with jeera rice

You can find more Indian Recipes

Hope you try making this Instant Pot Shahi Paneer recipe and relish it too. Don’t forget to come back and leave us a comment. If you know of someone who will love this recipe or Indian curries, share this with recipe with them on your social media. 

instant pot shahi paneer recipe

Instant Pot Shahi Paneer Recipe

Yield: 4 servings
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 8 minutes
Additional Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 28 minutes

Instant Pot Shahi Paneer - This restaurant style exotic curry with cottage cheese is not only exotic but one of the easiest Indian curries to ever make at home. The smooth, silky curry dunk with soft and tender paneer cubes is rich, creamy and super yummy when paired with Naan or Basmati Jeera Rice. Perfect for special occasions, parties and potlucks. Try it, might just become your new favorite curry. Gluten-Free. Vegan & Stove-top option included. Video Recipe.

Instructions


Prepare the ingredients.

For homemade paneer recipe, click here.

Wash, peel and cut the tomatoes and onions into halves. Peel the ginger and garlic. Cut the paneer or tofu into cubes. Keep the spices ready.Soak cashews for 30 minutes in milk or water.

Instant Pot Shahi Paneer Recipe

  1. Using the saute function, heat oil in the inner pot. Once the oil is hot, throw in the bay leaves, cardamom and stir until you smell an aroma.
  2. Next add in the rest of the spices, turmeric power, kashmiri red chili powder, kasuri methi, garam masala, coriander powder. Give it a stir.
  3. Next, wait for 30 seconds and add the onions, tomatoes, soaked cashews or almonds, salt and water.
  4. Cover the lid, seal the vent and pressure cook for 8 minutes followed by a manual release of pressure once the time beeps after the pressure cooking cycle.
  5. Using a spoon remove the bay leaves and cardamom.
  6. Next Using a hand or table blender, blend the pressure cooked ingredients into a smooth runny sauce. You can gradually add water to water down the sauce. Ofcourse keep in mind you will also be adding cream to the sauce so you can adjust the water based on how thick you want the sauce to be. as long as the sauce is smooth and is able to coat the cheese cubes it's good.
  7. Add table cream or coconut milk or vegan cream, cheese cubes and dried fenugreek leaves and saute for 3-5 minutes.
  8. Garnish with cilantro and serve with Naan or Basmati Jeera Rice


Stove Stop Pressure Cooker Shahi Paneer Recipe

  1. Follow Instant Pot recipe instructions 1 to 4 on your stove top pressure cooker.
  2. Once you cover the lid of your stove top pressure cooker, pressure cook on medium heat for about 20 mins.
  3. Next Instant Pot recipe instructions 5 and garnish and serve.

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Patricia

Wednesday 12th of April 2023

Deliciously creamy, and my (picky!) daughter loves it. She noticed the fragrant taste of the cardamom right away. It's wonderful with tofu, and I used curry leaves instead of bay leaves. Thank you (^_^)

TheBellyRulesTheMind

Wednesday 12th of April 2023

Patricia, Thanks for the feedback. Glad to hear this recipe was relished by a picky eater. Always happy to hear when you make a recipe your own

Century Foods

Thursday 15th of September 2022

Delicious and easy. I warmed it up in the morning and had a great breakfast!

Kim

Friday 12th of March 2021

When do the garlic and ginger get added? You say to add the fenugreek with the spices but then you say to add it at the end? In the instructions you say to add the coriander powder but none is listed in the spice list.

Anvita

Saturday 13th of March 2021

Kim the fenugreek you add twice once with the spices when sautéing and second time in the end for garnish.

Simmie

Sunday 5th of July 2020

so when do you add ginger garlic?

Andrea

Sunday 14th of March 2021

@Simmie, just had the same question. would add them with the onions.

Si3

Sunday 5th of July 2020

I tried your recipe for shahi paneer today....sumptuous! Was not sure if it'll come out that good. Thank you!

Anvita

Tuesday 7th of July 2020

Glad you liked it.

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