Oh good grief.
I have been making slow cooker shredded chicken for years. And I have been making homemade salsa for years and years and years. But it was not until this year that the lightbulb finally decided to click on, I realized that chicken and salsa were a ridiculously obvious match made in crockpot heaven.
Brilliant or obvious? You decide.
Either way, if you love Mexican shredded chicken, this one falls in the must-try category. Why?
It only requires 2 ingredients. It takes less than 2 minutes to prep. And then once your slow cooker has worked its magic, it takes less than 2 minutes to shred. And then this wonderfully seasoned, simple, juicy, flavorful chicken is yours “2” enjoy on countless dishes. (Couldn’t resist.)
Here’s the how “2”. (Ok, somebody help me.)
Sorry, I still can’t get over the fact that it took me until I was 30 to think of this. Moving on…
To make this salsa chicken, just pop some raw chicken in a slow cooker. (I didn’t want to mess with bones, so went with chicken breasts for easy shredding.) Then cover it with lots of your favorite salsa. (I used the restaurant-style salsa that I posted yesterday.) Season it with some extra salt and pepper, give it a stir, and then let your slow cooker do its thing.
After about 4 hours (or all day long while you’re at work), pop off that lid, and the chicken should fall apart into shredded, juicy, salsa-y perfection.
I popped half of mine into some tortillas along with avocado to make these simple chicken soft tacos. But the salsa chicken would work perfectly on just about any other Mexican chicken dish you can imagine — quesadillas, taquitos, salads, chimichangas, you name it.
The key is just to use really good salsa, since the seasonings in the salsa are obviously what will flavor the chicken. Remember, too, that the chicken will release plenty of its own juices during cooking. So don’t be afraid to use some salsa with an extra “kick”, since the intensity of its flavor will get watered down slightly while cooking. I also recommend seasoning the meat with extra salt and pepper before cooking. (And if you like heat, feel free to throw in an extra jalapeno too.)
I mean seriously. Shredded Mexi chicken could not get any easier. You’ve gotta try it.
2-Ingredient Slow Cooker Salsa Chicken
Ingredients
- 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 2 lbs total)*
- 2 cups favorite salsa
- salt and pepper
- (optional: fresh lime wedges for serving)
Instructions
- Place chicken breasts in a slow cooker and cover with salsa. Toss until the chicken is covered.
- Cover and cook on high for 4 hours (or low for 6-8 hours), or until the chicken shreds easily with a fork. Shred the chicken in the slow cooker and toss with the remaining salsa and juices until well-mixed. Serve immediately, or refrigerate in an airtight container for up to 5 days. (This chicken also freezes well.)
- *You can really use just about any cut of chicken for this recipe. For easy shredding though (so that you don’t have to mess with bones), I recommend boneless chicken breasts or thighs. This should be about 2 lbs of chicken total.
Did you make this?Let me know how it turned out in the comments below!
Hi there! I would love to make this and be able to log it in the calorie counting app that I use. Would you happen to have an estimate of how many calories would be in, say, a 1 cup size serving?
Hi Mary! We’re sorry but we are unsure of the nutrition facts/amount of calories in this recipe. We currently are not publishing nutrition facts on the site, as the nutrition calculators available are not 100% accurate, and we never want to publish anything that might be misleading. However, a lot of our readers love the My Fitness Pal nutrition calculator, so feel free to try that for an estimate. We hope that helps!
This sounds delicious – I wonder if it could be used with other meats? Like pork?
Thanks Alyssa, we hope you enjoy! And we think you could definitely try this with pork butt/shoulder!
This was awesome! You were correct about adding salt and pepper, I’m trying to go easy on sodium so only added plenty of fresh ground pepper and had to add salt at the end. I used fresh chunky medium salsa and added some red pepper flakes, it was not too spicy for us. This recipe will be used all year, made tacos last night and will be great for sandwiches or adding to salads. Thanks for the simplest most delish thing ever!
Thank you Linda — we’re so happy you enjoyed them! :D
So simple, it’s even delicious to keep the chicken breast un-shredded and served over Mexican rice. :)
We’re glad you enjoyed this Brittany, and that’s a great sounding idea! :)
I love this recipe and make it all the time! One thing I add is a packet of taco seasoning. It gives it great flavor!
Thanks for sharing Maureen — we’re glad to hear you enjoy this! :)
I love this recipe and use it all the time! One thing I add to make it 3 ingredients is a packet of taco seasoning. It gives it great flavor.
Hi . . can you tell me how many pounds for the 4 chicken breasts…. Just completely new to cooking to would like some advice ..many thanks
Hi Mike! We call each portion a boneless skinless chicken breast, but we use chicken breast halves in this recipe. So just use 4 chicken breast halves (should be around 2 lbs). We hope you enjoy the recipe!
I haven´t a slow cooker. How can I cook this ?
Hi Magda! Unfortunately this recipe was written for a slow cooker!
Hello MN-
You can most definitely make anything that requires a slow cooker in your oven. Just follow the instructions on the recipe and rather than putting it in a slow cooker, put it in like a duth oven pot with a cover… A pot that is oven safe with a oven safe lid. Then follow the instructions on the recipe to cook it on LOW by cooking it in your oven at 250 degrees.
Hope that helps!
I used 1 can diced tomatoes and I can diced tomatoes with green chilies instead of fire roasted. I picked the wrong kind of canned tomatoes
Salsa seems very spicy
Should I have used fire roasted tomatoes instead?
It is still cooking in crock pot
I hope it will turn out not too hot.
Any idea what to add to make it less spicy?
Hi Susi! Hmmm, we use salsa in this, not a can of diced tomatoes and green chiles. But we wonder if the diced tomatoes with green chiles you got were the really hot kind? We usually get mild when we use those. We don’t feel like fire-roasted tomatoes are spicy (they just have awesome flavor)! We recommend making this with salsa, and if you don’t like much heat, we would just go with mild or medium.
I love making this so much! Do you think you can do frozen chicken breasts?
We’re glad to hear that Kelly! We wouldn’t advise using frozen chicken breasts for this though. We’ve learned that putting frozen ingredients in a slow cooker (especially frozen meats) isn’t the safest thing to do. Slow cookers often can’t get frozen meats up to a safe temperature in time, which means your meat will spend too long in the “danger zone” – 40-140 degrees). This While we’ve tried using frozen meats before and been fine (it does work), it’s just too risky, as it raises the likelihood of unsafe bacteria forming, and the possibility of food borne-illnesses.
Can I use grilled chicken from Safeway already grilled in the slow cooker & salsa??? Then shred per your recipe???