Basic Shredded Chicken

You know how every recipe calls for basic cooked or shredded chicken? I never remember that until I’m mid-recipe and then it’s like “WHAT? NOW I HAVE TO COOK THE CHICKEN?!” and then we eat dinner at midnight because I didn’t plan ahead.

Don’t get me wrong, a rotisserie chicken can absoLUTEly suffice, but I usually don’t have that on hand either.

So, I did some tweaking and found a way to cook loads of chicken at once in a crockpot.

I shred and freeze this in 1lb portions since that’s what most recipes call for. You could also cube it instead.

Here we go.

Put your raw, thawed chicken in the crockpot (you could maybe do this frozen but I doubt it would be as tender and it would definitely take longer).

You can typically do 2-3lbs at a time. For me, since I use Omaha Steaks chicken, it takes 6+ but the mega chicken breasts from the store would take less.

Add 1 tsp Salt, 1/2 tsp pepper, 1/2 tsp garlic powder and 1 TBL minced onion

You can cover the whole thing with water or chicken broth or do half and half which is what I do. I use this stuff because I can’t be trusted to keep a carton of half used chicken broth in my fridge without it spoiling immediately. #wasteful

Cover chicken with 1 inch of liquid, this was 4 cups for me. May vary by chicken quantity.So here are your options. You can do low for 6 hours, or low for 2, high for 2 or high for 4. Whatever cooks your chicken *ifyaknowwhatImean* (and I feel like I’m being fairly obvious)This is what it will look like when it’s done. YUM.
Take the chicken out of the pot, leaving the liquid and put into a bowl.I like to shred it immediately because it’s a lot easier to do when the chicken is warm. Just use 2 forks and go to town.

You can freeze in Ziplocs as I mentioned before.

BUT KAILEY, WHAT ABOUT THE CHICKEN BROTH YOU DIDN’T WANT TO WASTE?!

Perfect, glad you asked. I strained it and cooked rice in it for dinner that night as well as to be reused in recipes over the next week. Haven’t tried freezing cooked rice yet because it seems too easy to cook for me to try to make it even easier…it seems suspicious and I’m sure I would mess it up.

So enjoy your shredded chicken, let me know what recipes you use it for!