Making apple pie filling has never been this easy (or tasty). With your Instant Pot, you can make wonderful Instant Pot Apple Pie Filling in minutes and have dessert ready in an hour.
Recipe: $7.30 | Per Serving: $0.91 | Servings: 8
Made with fresh, crisp apples, warm spices, and a touch of sweetness, it captures the essence of a classic apple pie. Whether you want to fill pies and tarts, or simply enjoy it over ice cream, pancakes, or oatmeal, this apple pie filling is a convenient and delicious option.
The Instant Pot allows you to whip up a batch of this apple pie filling in no time, preserving the fruit's natural texture and flavor. The results are tender, lightly caramelized apples bathed in a rich, cinnamon-spiced sauce.
As an added bonus, you'll get a warm and comforting aroma that fills your kitchen as it cooks, making this filling a delightful treat for the senses.
For more apple recipes be sure to try our Apple Pie Bites, Applesauce Custard Pie, and Apple Cider Cupcakes with Caramel Frosting.
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🍯 Why This Recipe Works
- It's easy to make. Get perfectly cooked apples with less work than you'd expect, thanks to your Instant Pot! And if you like this recipe be sure to try our Apple Pie with Graham Cracker Crust.
- It's versatile. Use homemade apple pie filling for your favorite turnovers, over ice cream, in a pie crust, and so much more.
- It's easy to use in a pie. In fact, down below, in the recipe card, I have included the steps needed to make this into a one crust pie with a nice crumble topping. Yum!
🥘 Ingredients
Apples- Use your favorite baking variety of apples. I like to use Pink Lady, Granny Smith, Jonagold, and Fuji, but feel free to use your favorites or make a combination of them for added flavor depth.
Lemon Juice- This is what helps the apples and filling to stay fresh tasting.
Sugars- You will need both brown sugar and granulated sugar for this recipe.
Water- You'll need some water for the base of the filling as this is what becomes the gel-like consistency holding the apples together as they cook.
Cornstarch- We use cornstarch as our pie filling thickener. (By using cornstarch instead of flour, we can keep the filling gluten free.)
For specific ingredients and measurements, please see the recipe card below.
🔪 Instructions for Instant Pot Apple Pie Filling
Step 1: Peel your apples (Image 1), then core, slice and chop them. I like to cut into quarters, remove the core, and then slice each quarter into quarters. (Image 2).
Step 2: Toss your apples in a bowl with lemon juice and set aside. (Image 3).
Step 3: Set your Instant Pot to Saute Mode and melt the butter. (Image 4).
Step 4: Add the brown sugar, white sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and salt. (Image 5). Whisk together and pour in the water. (Image 6).
Step 5: Add in the apple pieces. (Image 7). Stir evenly to coat.
Step 6: Close the lid of the Instant Pot, seal the valve and set it to High Pressure for 0 minutes. (Image 8). The apples will cook as it comes up to pressure.
Step 7: When the pressure has been reached and the timer goes off, do a Quick Pressure Release to remove the pressure.
Step 8: Open the lid of the Instant Pot (Image 9), and remove ½ cup to 1 cup of liquid from inside.
Step 9: Quickly stir the cornstarch into the liquid mixture. (Image 10).
Step 10: Stir the cornstarch slurry into the apple mixture (Image 11), and stir to combine. Continue stirring until thickened. (Image 12). Note: If your apple pie filling isn't thickening while on the "Keep Warm" setting, change it to "Saute" and stir constantly. It will thicken quickly as the temperature rises.
Step 11: Once thickened turn off the Instant Pot and your apple pie filling is ready to use as needed.
NOTE: Recipe Card includes steps for turning filling into a pie with a nice crumble topping, but you can also use this filling in our Cinnamon Roll Apple Cobbler.
🍴 Recipe Tips
- Apple Slice Size- The thickness of your apple slices significantly impacts the texture of the pie filling. Thinner slices yield a more applesauce-like consistency, while larger slices retain more of their original texture.
- Peeling Preference- Whether to peel the apples is optional and based on personal preference.
- Canning NOT recommended- See notes in the FAQ section and on the recipe card to see why I do NOT recommend canning this recipe.
- You can use this filling for pretty much everything from delicious pies like Apple Pie with Graham Cracker Crust or Cinnamon Roll Apple Cobbler.
💭 Recipe FAQs
This cooked apple pie filling is great for the freezer or fridge. To store it in the fridge, place it in an airtight container for up to a week. For the freezer, store in the same manner but for up to 6 months. Thaw before use.
As someone who enjoys canning foods SAFELY, I must say that this recipe is NOT safe for water bath canning as it contains cornstarch. Cornstarch is no longer approved in any canning recipe because of its density which may cause proper heating issues and result in unsafe results.
There are a lot of unsafe canning recipes still out there on the internet, and recipes claiming to be safe, that aren't. For tested and approved canning recipes, check out the National Center for Home Preservation.
Alternatives to cornstarch include all purpose flour and even tapioca pearls. While tapioca pearls are great for freezing apple pie filling for later, I personally prefer flour or cornstarch when I plan on using the filling right then and there. You will need twice as much flour or replace cornstarch 1:1 for tapioca.
❤️ More Delicious Instant Pot Recipes
If you tried this Instant Pot Apple Pie Filling, please leave a ⭐️ star rating and share your feedback in the 📝 comments section below. I would truly appreciate it!
📖 Recipe
Instant Pot Apple Pie Filling
Ingredients
- 6-8 cups apples, peeled and sliced ($6.16)
- 2 Tablespoons lemon juice ($0.11)
- 2 Tablespoons butter ($0.25)
- ½ cup brown sugar ($0.22)
- ½ cup granulated sugar ($0.18)
- 2 teaspoon ground cinnamon ($0.16)
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg ($0.04)
- 1 pinch ground cloves ($0.01)
- ¼ teaspoon salt ($0.01)
- 2 cups water ($0.00)
- ¼ cup cornstarch ($0.16)
Instructions
- Peel your apples, then core, slice and chop them. I like to cut into quarters, remove the core, and then slice each quarter into quarters.
- Toss apple slices with lemon juice in a bowl, set aside.
- Set Instant Pot to saute and melt butter.
- Add the brown sugar, white sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and salt. Whisk together and pour in the water.
- Add in the apple/lemon juice mixture and stir until nicely coated.
- Close the lid of the Instant Pot and seal the valve.
- Set to High Pressure for 0 minutes. The apples will cook as it comes up to pressure and releases pressure.
- When the timer goes off, do a Quick Pressure Release. Note it could get messy depending on apple of choice as some will make extra moisture and cause it to spray out. So do this carefully. Leave the Instant Pot on Warm mode, do NOT turn off!
- Open the lid and remove ½ cup-1 cup of the liquid from inside. Whisk together with the cornstarch, but be fast as it will thicken and become gloop.
- Stir the cornstarch slurry into the apple mixture, and stir to combine. Continue stirring until thickened. Note: If your apple pie filling isn't thickening while on the "Keep Warm" setting, change it to "Saute" and stir constantly. It will thicken quickly as the temperature rises.
- Once thickened, turn off the Instant Pot and your apple pie filling can be removed and placed into a prebaked shell or used as desired.
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