Instant Pot Beef Tongue

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I saw that my local Costco was selling beef tongue and a wave of nostalgia hit me. My mom used to make this for us often, cooking it for several hours in a soy sauce based star anise broth. The resulting meat was tender, but still had a nice bounce, and was absolutely delicious. I have not had beef tongue in over 30 years.


So excitedly, I picked up two tongues, one for my mom and one for myself. When I gave it to my mom, she also said she had not had beef tongue in over 30 years!

Oh!

So she only made it for us kids? And then after we left the house she never made it again?!

Anyways, I looked up various recipes and ultimately decided on using the instant pot method. Most instant pot methods said to cook it under high pressure for 90 minutes. Thankfully, I did not, and only cooked it for 55 minutes. Even at 55 minutes it was a bit too soft for me. So next time, to retain the nice bounce texture characteristic of beef tongue, I will just cook it for 40 minutes in the instant pot with a 10 minute natural release.

Here's step by step what I did:

Thoroughly wash the tongue by running under water and roughly scrubbing with hands
The tongue is roughly 3 pounds
Place in instant pot and add enough water such that it is about half an inch below the tongue. Add ginger, scallion and salt
Cook high pressure 40 minutes, natural release 10 minutes
Remove the tongue. Save the broth for soup
Peel the white skin off and discard. It should peel easily
Slice and enjoy hot dipping in soy sauce or slice thinly and enjoy cold in sandwiches

Yields 6 servings

Ingredients:

  • 1 beef tongue (about 3 lbs)
  • 2 t salt
  • 1 large bunch of scallions
  • 5 to 6 pieces fresh ginger

Procedures:

1. Thoroughly wash the beef tongue under wash by roughly scrubbing with your hands.

2. Place the beef tongue in the instant pot and pour in enough water such that the water level is just under the top of the tongue (about 0.5 to 1 inch below the tongue level. See photo).

3. Add scallions and ginger and salt

4. Close lid to IP, and place vent to seal. Set the IP to pressure cook for 40 min. If your beef tongue is larger than 3 lbs then add more time, but for a 3 lb tongue, 40 minutes is enough. 55 minutes was way too soft and lost some of that nice bounce texture characteristic of beef tongue.

5. After timer is up, wait 10 min and then Quick release. Carefully open lid and take out the tongue and place on a cutting board.

6. Peel off the white skin of the tongue and discard. You can’t eat the white skin because it’s a bit tough. The skin peels off very easily if the tongue is still hot or warm. The skin is more difficult to peel if the tongue is cold.

7.Slice tongue and enjoy hot dipped in soy sauce, or slice thinly and enjoy in sandwiches.