Instant Pot Split Pea Soup with Ham
This Instant Pot Split Pea Soup, made with a leftover ham bone (or any other ham), is a game-changer. The pressure cooker cuts the cooking time in half and imparts the flavor of the ham into every scrumptious bite. It’s so simple, but SO delicious. And it’s ridiculously easy to make!
What are split peas?
Dried split peas are part of a food group known as pulses, which include beans, chickpeas, peas, and lentils. I love cooking pulses in my pressure cooker because it takes such a short amount of time, meaning you can start it on a weeknight and have it ready in less than an hour for dinner. My last pressure cooker pulse creation was this Instant Pot Chili, made with dried kidney beans and ground beef.
I love cooking with split peas because they have many of the same health benefits as other pulses, but take a shorter time to cook and don’t require pre-soaking. And they are just so tasty!
And my favorite part about pulses: you get a lot of nutritional bang for your buck. They are one of the cheapest and healthiest foods out there- a whole 1lb. bag of split peas cost me only $0.89 when I made this recipe.
How to make split pea soup with a ham bone
If you’re planning on having ham this holiday season, do NOT throw out the bone! And don’t let the person hosting throw it out either. I fully plan on being “that person” who asks to take the turkey carcass home after Thanksgiving at my in-laws so I can make homemade turkey stock. I don’t care, I am who I am :-)
Adding a ham bone to split pea soup elevates it to a whole new level. There is a ton of flavor in the bone itself, as well as marrow and gelatin, which infuses into the soup as it cooks (which both thickens it and gives it many of the same health benefits as bone broth). And there’s also still likely a lot of meat left on the bone, which will easily come off after letting it simmer in the soup for so long.
Confession: I actually bought a whole ham JUST so I would have the bone to make this soup. Such is the life of a food blogger.
What to do if you don’t have a ham bone
You don’t have to be like me and buy a whole ham just for the bone! If you don’t have a ham bone – since it’s not very often in life that we come across them, is it? – you can definitely just use thick-cut diced ham, or a ham hock.
You can use a smoked turkey leg if you want a pork-free version.
And you can even make this soup vegetarian or vegan by omitting the ham and making a few other changes (see notes in recipe below).
What kind of pressure cooker to use
I made my Instant Pot split pea soup in (you guessed it!) an Instant Pot. It’s a very popular and high-quality pressure cooker, and I’ve been LOVING it.
You can even replace it for your slow cooker (it has a slow cooker setting as well). Pressure cookers not only cut the cooking time of things like pulses and tough cuts of meat wayyyyy down, but I find it also tends to cook things with better flavor than a slow cooker. It also has a sauté function, so you can cook up the mirepoix (that’s the fancy word for the celery, carrots, and onions) right in the pot.
Keep an eye out for black Friday sales- I got my six quart Instant Pot for only around $60 last year (what a deal!).
Don’t have a pressure cooker or instant pot? Just look at the recipe notes below for how to make this on your stovetop or in your slow cooker.
Other Easy Instant Pot Recipes
- Instant Pot Chicken, Broccoli, and Quinoa with Cheese
- Instant Pot Pot Roast
- Instant Pot Turkey Breast with Lemon and Thyme
- Instant Pot Pulled Pork
- Instant Pot Fish Stew
Here’s a link to all of my pressure cooker/instant pot recipes! For a plant-based version, try this vegetarian split pea soup with potatoes, lemon, and dill.
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Instant Pot Split Pea Soup with Ham
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Equipment
- Instant Pot 6 qt. minimum size, see recipe notes for more info.
Ingredients
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 1 onion diced
- 2 ribs celery diced
- 2 carrots diced
- 1 ham bone a smoked ham hock or 6 oz. diced deli ham can also be used
- 1 lb. dry split peas sorted through and rinsed
- 6 cups low sodium chicken stock/broth or veggie stock, water, or a mixture
- 2 bay leaves
- kosher salt and black pepper (see notes)
- chopped fresh parsley for garnish, optional
Instructions
- Turn pressure cooker to the "sauté" setting. Melt butter (3 tablespoons) and sauté onion, celery, and carrots for about 5 minutes, until softened.
- Add the split peas, chicken stock (6 cups), ham bone (or hock or 6 oz. diced cooked ham), and the 2 bay leaves. Turn off the "sauté" function.
- Cover pressure cooker, make sure valve is on "sealing," and set to manual, high pressure for 15 minutes.
- Allow the pressure to naturally release for 10-15 minutes. Then, quick release the pressure valve.
- If you used a ham bone or hock: remove the it from the soup and remove the ham meat that’s still attached to it. Add the ham meat back into the soup.
- Taste and season with salt and pepper if necessary (see notes). Serve immediately, or store in your refrigerator for up to 1 week or freezer in an airtight container for up to 6 months.
Notes
- A note about salt: if you use salty chicken broth, you may not need to add any salt at all since ham is also usually very salty.
- The peas may take longer to cook depending on their age – the older dried legumes are, the longer they take to cook. This can vary based on brand, how long they’ve sat on grocery store shelves, or how long they’ve been in your pantry.
- If you want to use a frozen ham bone, you shouldn’t need to adjust the cooking time, since ham bones are technically already cooked, you’re just reheating it! Keep in mind though, the colder your ingredients are, the longer it will take to come to pressure.
- For a vegetarian version, omit the ham, use more salt and pepper, and make sure to use vegetable stock or water instead of chicken. For a vegan version, use olive oil instead of butter.
- If you don’t eat pork, you can substitute the ham bone for a smoked turkey leg.
- To make this in your slow cooker, sauté the veggies in a skillet in the butter, then transfer them and add all other ingredients to slow cooker and cook on low for 8 hours or high for 4 hours, or until split peas are cooked to desired tenderness.
- To make this on your stovetop, sauté veggies as instructed in a large pot. After adding the remaining ingredients, bring to a boil, cover, and simmer for approximately one hour (or until split peas are cooked to desired tenderness).
- Ham usually comes cured/smoked, which means it’s cooked and ready to eat. However, sometimes stores sell “fresh ham,” which means it’s uncooked. Do NOT use fresh ham for this recipe- use already cooked, smoked, and/or cured ham.
- This soup will likely thicken once it cools and is refrigerated, especially if you use a ham bone to make it because of the gelatin. Thin out with water and adjust seasonings as necessary.
- I made this recipe in my 6 qt. Instant pot. It should work the same in an 8 qt., but you may need to cut the ingredients in half for a 3 qt. mini. You should also be able to double the batch in an 8 quart pressure cooker.
- The provided nutrition information does not include any added sodium from seasoning to taste, any optional ingredients, and it does not take brands into account. Feel free to calculate it yourself using this calculator or by adding the recipe to Yummly.
Nutrition
Nutrition Information Disclaimer
The provided nutrition information is my best estimate and reflects one serving of the recipe (total servings indicated at top of recipe card). It does not include any added sodium from seasoning to taste, any optional ingredients, and it does not take brands into account. I use an automatic API to calculate this information. Feel free to calculate it yourself using one of these tools:
This was a great recipe! Really easy! I thought it needed a little more flavor so I added some ham flavor Better Than Bouillon base. But it’s great to be able to have split pea soup on a weeknight that tastes like it cooked for hours.
So happy you liked it!
This soup was really good. I made it tonight with leftover ham from Christmas dinner and followed the recipe as stated. My 7 year old asked for seconds – two thumbs up!! 👍 👍
So happy you and your kiddo liked it! Thanks so much :-)
I’m doing it tonight with the Christmas ham leftover. I’m sure it will come out great. Side of buttered toasts. I’ll post the results later on.
Hope it worked out for you! :-)
My mom used to make this on the stove top and we could NEVER find soup as good as mom used to make UNTIL NOW!!! I seriously had my doubts because it was the first thing I ever made in the instapot but let me tell you it was AMAZING!!!!
The consistency, the flavor, the LOW COST all has my head spinning a little. I just had a bowl and I am trying to be good and not overdue it but I feel a celebration is in order so i’m going to get seconds :) THANK YOU for the detailed instructions I had no problem at all!
Oh wow, thanks so much for this amazing comment! I totally agree- every time I make this recipe I immediately add the ingredients to my grocery list for the next week because its sooooo good and cheap. So glad you liked it!
DELISH!!!! And so simple! I made it this evening and used leftover ham I cubed and froze from this past Thanksgiving. I also used a bag of frozen Mirepoix (diced onions, celery, and carrots) by Cascadian Farm Organic. It came out amazing thick and smelled great. My son loves it! I do prefer my carrots and celery to be larger chunks so I will probably go the fresh produce route next time, but this way is great! Especially on a very cold Chicago night!
SO glad you liked it! The celery and carrots do tend to disintegrate into the soup a bit, even if you use fresh, due to the high heat of the pressure cooker, so make sure you cut them into bigger chunks if you want them to hold up :-)
What is the serving size? I plan on making this today!
It’s approximately 1.5 cups! Keep in mind, my nutrition and serving info is my best estimate. I added it to the recipe card. Hope that helps and hope you liked it!
Very delicious and easy!
Thank you! So happy you liked it :-)
Hi,I followed the instructions and after the allowed time I opened up my instant pot ..the soup was cooked through but the ham hock was not .. nowhere near it…I think you should put in the recipe weather it’s a cooked ham hock or not,mine evidently was not cooked. I’ve now had to cook the ham hock separately.
Not impressed.
Regards.
I’m so sorry you had a frustrating experience. The recipe ingredients do specify a SMOKED ham hock as an alternative to a leftover ham bone, but I’m going to make a note in the recipe card for more specific information. I did a little bit of digging on this and learned something new. It was my understanding that ham is ALWAYS cooked (smoked or cured), but apparently that’s not the case. While using the term “ham” is a bit misleading, some stores sell what they call “fresh ham” which is really just a cut of pork and not cured, smoked, or cooked in any way. This is really good to know. Hope that helps, and better luck next time!
It was the best I ever made. So easy. I added curry powder.
Oh wow, love the idea of adding curry powder! We just had this for dinner tonight- one of my faves. So glad you liked it- can’t wait to try adding curry powder next time!
I made the vegan version with lots of carrots and celery and I used water instead of broth to keep it low sodium and low calorie. I added cayenne pepper at the end to give it some zip.
Yum! Love those healthy adjustments!
Going to try this for tomorrow’s dinner! Can’t wait! Thank you!
Hope you like it!!
I made it today…delicious. Added 3 medium diced potatoes and some additional spices (including a big pinch of hot pepper flakes). Very easy to make and in the Instant Pot, the flavors are amazing.
So glad you liked it!
Smoked ham hock worked really well, created a nice undertone for the sweetness of the peas. Except for the carrots, all the veggies cooked down into the porridge, though – is there a way to retain a bit more texture in the soup? Should i cook it a little less, or release the steam a little sooner? Very tasty recipe, thank you for sharing
Good question! It might help to cook it for a little less time- maybe try quick releasing it right away next time. The same thing happened when I cooked it, but I was fine with it. It also may help to cut the onions and celery into larger pieces. Hope that helps!
Just made this soup for dinner and wow, much better than the stove-top version I’ve been making for years! I only added 3 cloves of garlic after sautéing the veggies; everything else exactly as written. Our friends who came for dinner raved about it too; the flavor and consistency was perfect! Thank you, I’ll be making this split pea soup again and again.
So happy you and your guests liked it!!
So fast and easy. I sometime make a ham just for the bone for this soup. Absolutely delicious.
So glad you liked it! If you don’t want to buy a whole ham, I recommend using ham hocks or ham shanks- both have a bone in them so you can get the same result without needing an entire cut of ham! But if you want an excuse to make a whole ham, that’s a different story :-) Thanks for the comment!
This is a fantastic recipe and so easy! My family finally agrees with my love of split pea soup. Used the ham bone from our Thanksgiving celebration. Can’t wait to make it again!
So glad you liked it, and glad you got your family on board with the BEST soup ever haha!
I made this last night in my instapot. The recipe was super simple and it turned out better than I could have hoped. The only addition I made to the recipe is by adding three cloves of freshly diced garlic to the butter and vegetables as they sautéed. I will definitely be using this recipe again. Thank you very much!
I’ve made this soup SO many times. It’s very yummy and easy, which is great, but when it cools it turns to a gel. Is that normal? I just mix in water when I’m ready to eat more (I tend to freeze it down in single serving sizes), and it comes out fine, I’m just curious about the gel-like texture.
Yes, that’s normal! If it seems kind of like jello, it’s because of the collagen from the ham bone (or, if you used homemade chicken stock, that can contribute too). It thins out when it heats up, and you can do exactly what you did which is add a little water to thin it out to help it along. Split peas also notoriously get very thick as they cool. Hope that helps, and glad you like it!
Taking our new Instapot out for a spin right now for the first time with THIS recipe. Cooking now. Will circle back and tell you how it went…..
Hope you liked it! :-)
It was……Amazing!!!!!! Thanks for the recipe. ;)
Simple and tasty!! Love this!
What measurement is the serving size?
So glad you liked it! A serving size is about 1.5 cups (that’s just an estimate). Hope that helps!
This recipe is great. I didn’t even like split pea soup before making it. I use Swiss farmer sausage instead of ham and add a little bit of smoked paprika to give it a little bit of extra umami. This recipe is now in my regular rotation.
Oh I LOVE the idea of adding smoked paprika. Sounds delicious. So glad you like the recipe!
Made this soup. It turned out amazing! It also freezes well. I will absolutely make this again.
So glad you liked it!