Instant Pot Oxtail Ho Fun Noodle Soup- Fall-off-the-bone tender oxtail meat cooked in aromatic spices and served with wide rice noodles (ho fun) will brighten up the gloomiest of winter.
Instant Pot Oxtail Ho Fun Noodle Soup
I think almost every summer I tell my husband that I like raising kids here in Minnesota until of course now it’s November and it’s freaking cold out there, I change my mind every winter! EVERY WINTER! you hear me? The sky is pitch black by 5 pm and that’s a bad news for someone like me who depends 99.9% on natural light for photography. So now, needless to say, we spent most of the time indoor and dreaming about soup and stew A LOT!
It used to take 4-6 hours to cook oxtail on slow cooker for me. I didn’t have a pressure cooker before. I used my slow cooker a lot, which now I have retired because of Instant Pot.
Is Instant Pot really that INSTANT?
Yes and No. It took about 15 minutes for Instant Pot to pressurize (sometimes may take longer) and then 1 hour of active cooking time and about 15-20 minutes for natural release. So if you add up the total time is between 1.5-2 hours or a bit longer maybe, from the time they go into Instant Pot. So in this case, I would say the time it takes to get a fall-off-the-bone meat is much shorter than 4-6 hours in a slow cooker. And the nice thing about it is I can use the saute mode to brown the meat there and then pressure cook it in the same pot.
Bok Choy
You can serve this with whatever noodle you prefer, but one of my favorites is wide rice noodles or known as hor fun in Cantonese or kwe tiau in Hokkien. It’s much wider than regular rice noodles. It’s smooth and my daughter is obsessed with this besides somen noodles.
The soup is amazingly flavorful! It’s a pretty clean and rich tasting broth. All I have to do is seasoned it with some salt to taste.
Pulling that meat off the bone was just that little thing in life that makes you feel extremely grateful for what you have in front of you!
*Recipe is written for 6-quart Instant Pot. Cooking time should remain the same for 8-quart size but will take longer to pressurize. For mini duo (3-quart), I recommend to half the recipe and use the same amount of time to cook*
Instant Pot Oxtail Ho Fun Noodle Soup
Ingredients
- 3 -4 lbs of oxtails trim off some excess fat, but not all, you need some for flavor
- 1 Tbsp cooking oil
- 1 large cinnamon stick
- 3 inch knob fresh ginger peeled and slice into 1/4-inch thick
- 1 large onion peeled and halved
- 6 cups water
Seasonings:
- 1 tsp salt or more to taste
- 1 tsp sugar
- 2 Tbsp fish sauce or more to taste
Spices:
- 3 cloves
- 1 star anise
- 1 cinnamon stick
Serve with:
- 1 lb dry ho fun / wide flat rice noodle sticks soak in warm water for 30 minutes
- 2 -3 bundles of fresh bokchoy separated and wash with water
- 2 cups fresh bean sprouts
- Thai chili doused in soy sauce optional
- Few fresh sprigs of cilantro
One of these cooking equipment recommended:
Instructions
Cooking on instant pot:
- Press the saute mode on Instant Pot. When it says hot, add 1 Tbsp of oil. Add oxtail pieces to sear, do this in batches so they sear properly. Flip to the other side to sear, about 3 minutes each side. Once all the oxtails are done searing, remove from Instant pot. In the same pot, add the spices and ginger. Saute for about 2 minutes. Pour the water in and it will sizzle. Scrape the bottom of the pot to deglaze and to get the extra flavor from searing the oxtail earlier. Add the oxtail pieces back in along with the onion. Add seasonings and stir to mix. Turn off the saute mode and close the lid and press the pressure cooker button and set to high pressure. Set the time to 45 minutes. Make sure steam release handle is sealed
- It will take about 10 minutes or so for Instant Pot to pressurize and then the timer will start after that
- Once the cooking time is done, do natural release. Let the float valve comes down on its own, which may take 20 minutes or so. Once the valve is down, open the lid. Remove from Instant Pot. Scoop up any visible scums if you spot any. The soup isn't as cloudy as I thought it would be. Discard the spice packet and cinnamon stick. Scoop up any extra visible fat on top
- Have a taste and add more seasoning to your taste if needed and keep warm for however long you need it to before serving.
Preparing noodles and bok choy:
- Cook the noodles in hot boiling water until it's soft. It shouldn't take long since we've soaked them, about 5 minutes or so. Drain and refresh with running water. Toss with about 1 tsp of oil to prevent sticking together, but this step is optional.
Assembling and serving:
- Portion the hor fun noodles into an individual serving bowl. You can serve the oxtail whole or shred the meat. The meat is so soft anyway it just falls off the bone. Divide the oxtail into individual bowl. Top with some bean sprouts and steamed bok choy and then ladle the soup generously over the noodles. Garnish with fresh cilantro leaves and chili if using. Serve immediately
- Bring a medium pot of water to a boil and then blanch the bok choy until they are soft but still have that crunch and refresh with water to preserve that bright green colors. Set aside
For non-instant pot method, using slow cooker:
- Follow step 1 on the very top until searing the meat and sauteing the spices .Transfer to slow cooker. Add onion and set slow cooker on low for 4 hours, 6 hours if you can if you have large pieces of oxtail. Add seasonings at the end of cooking. Scoop up any visible scums. Proceed to assemble and serving above
You might also like these Instant Pot Recipes:
INSTANT POT THAI COCONUT MANGO STICKY RICE (KHAO NIAO MAMUANG)
INSTANT POT CHINESE STEAMED MATCHA SPONGE CAKE (JI DAN GAO)
CURRY CHICKEN (KARI AYAM)
11 comments
My go to Oxtail soup now. Had made the more than a handful of time and everyone loved it. Just add some Thai Chili and it’s ahhmazing. Thanks again for this.
Hi Giang, So glad you like it. That addition of Thai chili sounds great. Something I would do to add some heat!
Thanks so much for sharing. The recipe is perfect! Only substitute I did was used an apple instead of sugar.
Hi Kylie, what a clever idea for using apple instead of sugar 🙂
I made a version of this last night. I used 5 lbs of oxtail and only 45 minutes of pressure cooking. With natural release, the meat was still super tender and falling off the bone. A delicious recipe, all around! I didn’t have some of the veg so we threw in some baby Swiss chard from a salad mix, some fresh cilantro, and drizzled with some Sichuan chili crisp. So good! Thanks for sharing your recipe. One step I added was to remove a lot of the fat (about 3/4 cups’ worth) from the surface before tasting for seasoning and serving.
Hi Matt, good to know that 45 minutes gave falling off the bone tender. Thank you for letting me know. I love your substitution and addition to the recipe. Sounds so good! Great idea to remove some fat before serving too, it can get pretty oily. Thank you for trying and for your feedback 🙂
Season before pressurizing of afterwards? Its mentioned both in the initial instructions and then again in the two sections for next day or same day. I assume one can always season afterwards to taste.
Also any benefit to first parboiling the ox tail ?
My intention of trying to make it clear actually was more confusing 🙂 I’ve edited recipe. To make a long story short, you add the seasoning before pressurizing and then yes, you can always adjust the seasoning to your taste after it’s done cooking. Parboiling the oxtails first is really a matter of preference. I’ve read some mixed inputs about this. I didn’t parboil. After it’s done cooking, I just scoop up any visible scums. You can always parboil on boiling water for 2-3 minutes before cooking.
Hello! Are there 2 cinnamon sticks total? I see one right under ingredients and then another one in spices. Also, I see in the directions something about a spice packet. Can you please let me know what you mean by that? Are we supposed to create a spice packet? If yes, how? And the cloves, are they cloves of garlic?
Hi Cinderella, No, it’s just 1 cinnamon stick. I rewrote this recipe in the past to group spices and seasonings together and forgot to remove the cinnamon stick. The spice packet is basically just the spices: cloves, cinnamon, star anise. You don’t have to put create any spice packet with it unless you want to put them in a cheesecloth and tie it up and discard it after cooking. The cloves are not garlic, it’s the spice calls cloves. Hope that helps to clarify.
This looks so full of rich flavours, perfect for a chilly evening!