“Not For Company” Crock Pot Chicken – $10 or Less Meal

I got this recipe from my friend Sarah, who admittedly, is not the most enthusiastic cook. Before Sarah was married and had children, her typical dinners consisted of a bowl of cereal or a pan of Tuna Helper. Sarah and her husband take turns cooking dinner and believe me, when her turn comes, she’s racking her brain for something easy, inexpensive, but still tasty. So when she called, with pure excitement in her voice, raving about how easy this recipe was and how much her husband and oldest son loved it, well, I just had to try it.

This is perfect for busy moms or for anyone who wants a delicious, hearty meal that literally takes less than 5 minutes to toss together and is full of flavor. You use frozen chicken breasts, which is great for those days you forgot to defrost something, and cook it in the crock pot so there’s very little hands-on time involved. And there’s so many different ways you can serve this, the leftovers won’t even seem like leftovers. And when it comes to toppings you can add, well, I felt like Bubba Gump as I thought; you can add jalapeno or onion…cilantro or parsley, avocado or bell peppers, cheese, sour cream or additional salsa, etc. This is simply one of the most versatile dishes I’ve made.

I’ve made this chicken dish twice now, once using boneless, skinless chicken breasts and once with bone-in breasts. There’s a significant difference in pricing, depending on sales between the bone-in and boneless breasts. The boneless breasts were obviously easier to shred but after cooking for 8 hours in the crock pot, it was also very simple to  pull the bone off and then shred the chicken with the bone-in breasts and only took a couple of extra minutes.

Let me just add, the recipe is called “Not For Company Chicken” because it’s not that pretty of a dish. Don’t let that throw you because it is simply delicious! (And depending on if you want to garnish, you can “pretty it up” a bit.) Most of the ingredients are items you probably already have on hand too. I priced this recipe to serve 4 VERY LARGE servings but it could actually feed 6 to 8 people easily. We had enough left over that we tried out several more ways to dish this up. (And we still had some left.)

Thanks Sarah for this recipe…I know you were thrilled to share a recipe with me that I hadn’t made before. (And that tasted so good!)

“NOT FOR COMPANY CROCK POT CHICKEN” –

Prep Time: 5 minutes   Cook Time: 8 to 8 1/2 hours (in crock pot)    Serves: 4 for approx. $9.67

Ingredients:

1 can corn (15-16 oz. can)

1 can black beans (15-16 oz. can)

1 jar of salsa, your choice (16 oz.)

1 1.25 oz. package taco seasoning

3 to 4 chicken breasts, frozen*

1 package cream cheese, softened (8 oz.)

Directions:

Add corn, black beans, salsa, taco seasoning, and chicken to crock pot and cover. Cook on low for 8 hours. Shred chicken and add softened cream cheese. Cook for 30 more minutes and stir well.

*You could use defrosted chicken too.

You can serve this as is or over a bed of rice, pasta, or corn chips.

The morning after I made this, we tried it for breakfast in a hash-like skillet meal. I fried up some diced potatoes, added the chicken, and topped it with an egg. My husband loved it!

You can top a baked potato with the chicken for a quick lunch.

Another way to use up any leftover chicken is to fill up flour tortillas with the chicken mix, add some enchilada sauce and you have some super easy, full-of-flavor enchiladas.

You could also serve this over grits or polenta, mashed potatoes, biscuits, or use on nachos.

PRICING…

Everything I used in this recipe was on sale (I don’t use coupons when pricing because I know not everyone uses them.) I used boneless chicken breasts that were on sale for $1.99 a pound and then bone-in, at 99 cents a pound the second time. The can of corn was 50 cents, beans 79 cents, and the packet of taco seasoning was 25 cents. (This month is a good time to stock up on pantry goods.) The jar of salsa was $1.99 and the cream cheese was also $1.99. Even if you don’t find some of these sale prices, this meal should come in at an affordable price because it really does make more than 4 servings.