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This delicious Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga is a convenient take on a traditional Mexican recipe. Loaded with smoky flavor and savory spice. Adjust the heat level for a dish the whole family will love.
Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga – A Convenient Take On A Mexican Favorite
When my family and I moved to Mexico back in 1995, an adventure that lasted almost five years, I’d never heard of chicken tinga. But it didn’t take long for me to learn to love it because chicken tinga is a staple of Mexican cuisine.
Chicken tinga is tender shredded chicken simmered in a rich, delicious, flavorful sauce of tomato, chipotle chiles, and spices. It’s used as a filling or base for all kinds of traditional Mexican dishes, including tostadas, tacos, gorditas, and enchiladas.
Because traditional preparation for tinga involves boiling and simmering, adapting it to the slow cooker makes a lot of sense. Cooking the chicken and sauce at a low heat for a few hours not only allows for a deep infusion of flavor, it’s also incredibly convenient for busy cooks.
Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga – Not Quite Fix And Forget, But Close
Many slow cooker recipes fall into the “fix it and forget it” category.
There’s something to be said for being able to dump a bunch of ingredients into the slow cooker and walk away. However, it tends to be more about convenience than taste, which is why slow cooking has gotten a bad rap in some circles.
I love slow cooking! It’s my go-to dinner solution for busy days (you can find more of my slow cooker recipes here). But over the years, I’ve learned that adding a step or two in the preparation can give me a dish that tasty as well as convenient.
Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga is one of those dishes. A little extra prep makes a big difference.
Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga – Method and Making It Your Own
This recipe starts off with a sauce of sauteed onions and garlic, fire-roasted canned tomatoes, chipotle chilies in adobo sauce, and spices, briefly simmered on the stovetop.
Slow cooking can lessen the flavor profile of spices. My recipe offsets that by calling for generous amounts of cumin and oregano.
However, the heat in the recipe comes from adding canned chipotle chilies in adobo sauce. Depending on your preference, you may want to adjust the number of chiles or the amount of adobo sauce up or down.
For a higher heat level, use three chiles and two tablespoons of adobo. If your family really loves hot and spicy food, you could even consider adding an additional chile and spoonful of sauce.
Those who like just a little heat will should use only two chiles and one tablespoon of adobo sauce. Even if heat isn’t your thing, I don’t recommend leaving the chipotle and adobo out entirely. Doing so will result in a very bland sauce.
Once the sauce ingredients have finished simmering on the stove, you’ll use an immersion or countertop blender to create a thick, delicious puree.
The sauce is poured into the slow cooker over seasoned chicken breasts and cooked for three to four hours.
After cooking, you’ll take the chicken breasts from the cooker and shred the meat. Pulling two forks across the chicken breast is opposite directions will shred the meat easily and keep you from burning your fingers.
The last step is to return the shredded chicken to the slow cooker, stirring it into the sauce. Allowing the meat to simmer in the sauce for an additional thirty minutes will infuse every bite with wonderful flavor.
Once that’s done, your slow-cooker chicken tinga is ready to serve!
How To Serve Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga?
My recipe calls for three pounds of chicken breast. With so many ways to serve chicken tinga, you should have no trouble using it up.
Fillings for Mexican-inspired dishes like tostadas, tacos, and enchiladas are just the beginning of what you can do with chicken tinga.
A couple of scoops of chicken tinga make a terrific addition to your favorite salad. It’s also a great filling for wraps or omelets.
My favorite way to use chicken tinja is in bowls.
This week, I piled some on top of a bowl filled with brown rice, oven-roasted sweet potatoes, avocado, chopped cabbage, cilantro, and diced avocado. It was a quick and easy, terrific-tasting dinner.
Slow-cooker chicken tinga can be stored in the freezer for up to three months. If you’re not able to use it all right away, just let it cool completely, then place in plastic freezer bags or containers. Be sure to write the date on the containers.
Print
Slow Cooker Chicken Tinga
- Yield: 3 pounds 1x
Ingredients
- 3 lbs chicken breast
- 1 tsp kosher salt, divided
- ½ tsp fresh ground pepper, divided
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 2 large cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
- 2 T olive oil
- 2 tsp cumin
- 1 tsp oregano
- 1 15 oz can diced fire-roasted tomatoes
- 2–3 canned chipotle chiles in adobo sauce (depending on heat preference), chopped
- 1–2 T adobo sauce (depending on heat preference)
- ¾ cup low salt chicken broth
Instructions
- Rinse chicken breasts with water, then pat dry with a paper towel. Sprinkle chicken breasts all over with half the salt and half the pepper. Place in slow cooker.
- Cook onions and garlic in olive oil in a pot on the stove over medium heat for 4-5 minutes, until soft and translucent. Add cumin and oregano. Cook onions and spices for an additional minute, stirring.
- Add canned tomatoes, chopped chipotle chiles, adobo sauce, chicken broth, and remaining salt and pepper to the cooked onions and spices. Bring to a boil, then lower heat and simmer sauce for 5 minutes.
- Puree sauce with an immersion blender or in regular blender. (Take care as the sauce will be hot.) Pour pureed sauce over the chicken breasts in the slow cooker. Cook on low setting for 3-4 hours.
- Remove cooked chicken from slow cooker and place on cutting board. Shred chicken into small pieces, using two forks. Return shredded chicken back to slow cooker, stirring it into the sauce. Cook an additional 30 minutes before serving. Unused chicken tinga can be cooled completely, then stored in closed containers in the freezer for up to three months.
