A green chili casserole with chicken makes the ultimate comfort food dinner recipe when you need something quick and easy, with just 5 ingredients and a cook time of 20 minutes, this chile Verde casserole will become a favorite.
Chili Verde Chicken Casserole
The combination of a savory chili Verde sauce, three kinds of cheese, and shredded chicken make for the best chili Verde casserole you will absolutely love. And if you’re on a restricted health plan, you’ll be pleased to know this is keto friendly, low carb, and gluten free too.
I’ve been obsessed with whipping up easy casseroles lately, just last week I made a keto taco casserole that was amazing! And now this week I used the same process and turned it into a green chili casserole with chicken.
If you’re wondering which one tastes better, I’m going to call it a tie! My son devoured the chili Verde casserole and declared it the winner. I’m always in love with anything that has green chilis and white cheese and could it that combo constantly. My husband preferred the keto taco casserole just “slightly” better but said both recipes were winners.
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An updated photo below as of 9/27/20 making the casserole in a cast-iron skillet.
What’s in Green Chili Casserole
This low carb and keto casserole will definitely become one you make over and over. Here’s a list of ingredients you’ll need:
- shredded or ground chicken, cooked
- taco seasoning (homemade no sugar option)
- green salsa
- can diced green chili’s
- cottage cheese (use full-fat low carb brand)
- Colby jack or 3 cheese blend (shredded or sliced)
- Sour cream (optional)
We love to make our own keto taco seasoning recipe and highly recommend it! It’s no sugar and zero carb too, plus it only takes 5 mins to make.
Chicken Keto Casserole Tips
Whether you’re following a low carb or keto diet or not, you’re going to love this keto chicken casserole. I can almost guarantee you’ll make it often once you see how simple it is. Don’t believe me?? Just check out the reviews!!
- You’ll need to start with pre-cooked chicken from the grocery store or pre-cook your chicken at home. Cooking chicken on the stovetop would be the fastest method, I actually used an instant pot to make shredded chicken from frozen for this recipe.
- Instant pot chicken takes about the same time as roasting chicken to use for shredding (if you’re starting with frozen chicken like I did), but what I love about the instant pot is I can put it in and walk away, plus it doesn’t heat up my kitchen as the stovetop and oven do.
- You’ll want 2 lbs of raw chicken for the recipe if you’re cooking the chicken first. If you’re using rotisserie chicken, it’ll lose about 25% of its weight and you’ll want to use 1.5 lb of pre-cooked chicken.
- Some followers have reported the casserole being liquidy..be sure to drain the cottage cheese. Chicken that has a finer shred helps to aborb the liquid in the casserole.
- This is terrific served over cauliflower rice.
Do you want to know a secret about shredding 2 pounds of chicken in ONLY 20 seconds?
Use a stand mixer! You, of course, can also use a hand mixer if you don’t have something like a Kitchen-aid. But either type of mixer is a game-changer when it comes to shredding chicken. No more awkward and tiring fork shredding!
One additional note, if you’re making this a keto chicken casserole, make sure to use full-fat cottage cheese and also sugar-free taco seasoning.
Chili Verde Casserole
This chili Verde casserole is so simple to make and is definitely kid-friendly too, it has tons of flavor but isn’t spicy. If you’re a spice lover like my hubby and son, feel free to add a spicier salsa, add in canned jalapenos, or add hot sauce after it comes out of the oven.
Once you have your chicken cooked and shredded, the next step to make this amazing yet so simple keto casserole is to dump all other ingredients in a bowl and mix them together (other than the chicken and the cheese).
This means you’re adding the taco seasoning, green salsa, drained green chilis, and cottage cheese to the bowl. If you were surprised to see cottage cheese on the ingredient list instead of something like sour cream, it’s because cottage cheese holds its shape and adds a sweeter flavor to the dish.
If we’d used sour cream this would’ve turned into something more like a hearty hot-dip, which still sounds great! Cottage cheese is also our substitute for ricotta when we make lasagne.
Stir until combined.
A little note about the salsa, a chunkier salsa works best but a runnier salsa still works great. We’ve now had it both ways with two different kinds of chili Verde salsa and the runnier salsa left a little liquid in the bottom of the casserole dish after it cooled. But truly, it wasn’t a big deal but we just wanted to make you aware.
In theory, you could technically add the chicken at the same time, but I do it separately since it’s important to make sure the sauce blends evenly.
The next step is to add the chicken and combine the ingredients well by hand.
Spray the pan with a nonstick cooking spray and add the chili Verde casserole mix into the baking pan.
The pan size I used is 1.5 quart, which is equivalent to a 7″x11″ baking dish. You could also use a round casserole but then you won’t have as much surface area for your cheese, and who wants that?
Slice 5 ounces of Colby jack or spread 5 ounces of shredded Mexican or 3 blend cheese and lay over the top of the chili Verde casserole mix.
Bake in a preheated 375 oven for 20 minutes until the cheese is melted and bubbling. Garnish with green onions, chives, or cilantro, if desired.
Serving this with sour cream, avocados, and more salsa is delicious!! I highly recommend adding a dollop of sour cream to each serving of the low carb casserole.
Sorry, I didn’t get a photo of the casserole with toppings, my family devoured it too quickly and didn’t want to wait any longer! 😉
Dig in and enjoy!
Be sure to post your feedback below in the comments! We’d also love to see your chili Verde casserole photos by adding it to a Pinterest pin.
More Chicken Casseroles:
Green Chili Casserole
An easy green chili casserole filled with 3 cheeses, chili verde sauce and shredded chicken. This recipe is also a gluten free, low carb and keto chicken casserole too.
Ingredients
- 2 lb shredded chicken, cooked
- 3 T taco seasoning
- 3/4 cup chili Verde salsa
- 1 4 oz can of mild green chilis, drained
- 16 oz cottage cheese
- 5 oz sliced or shredded Colby jack or Mexican blend cheese
- Sour cream, optional
- Green onions, optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375
- In a medium sized bowl, mix the taco seasoning, salsa, green chilis and cottage cheese
- Mix in the shredded chicken and blend well
- Spray your baking dish with nonstick cooking spreay
- Spoon mixture into an 11x7 baking dish
- Top the casserole with the sliced or shredded cheese
- Bake for 20 minutes or until the cheese is melted and bubbling.
- Garnish with green onions, if desired
- Serve with sour cream and salsa, optional
Notes
We pre-cooked our chicken right before making the casserole, so the chicken was still warm, If you're starting with cold pre-cooked chicken, you may need to cook the casserole a little longer.
Be sure to drain the cottage cheese or it'll make your casserole runny!!
Using regular cottage cheese instead of light is recommended, light cottage cheese will add more liquid to the mixture
Using a chunkier salsa instead of a runnier salsa is also recommended. A salsa with more liquid may leave a little liquid in the bottom of the casserole after cooking.
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Nutrition Information
Yield 8 Serving Size 1Amount Per Serving Calories 399Total Fat 20gSaturated Fat 8gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 9gCholesterol 125mgSodium 859mgCarbohydrates 6gFiber 1gSugar 0gProtein 44g
Kathy Moen says
Made this tonight and it was a hit! My husband even liked it because it was like my chicken tortilla casserole but this was Keto friendly. This is now added to our regular menu items.??
Nikki says
Just made this recipe tonight. Super easy to make and had a great flavor. I’ll be eating on this for days. Thanks !
Debbie says
As far as spicy, would you consider this recipe spicy? I have some fussy eaters when it comes to spicy, they can handle mild but nothing more.
WholeLottaYum says
No, it’s not spicy and is pretty mild
Brandy says
I made this and the flavor is great but mine turned out runny idk if that’s what it’s suppose to be.
WholeLottaYum says
Draining the cottage cheese should keep the casserole from getting runny.
BeckyB says
OMG! LOVED THIS. made with medium verde salsa for a little heat. I took my fresh chicken poured in more like 1.5 C of the verde salsa and the taco seasoning in my pressure cooker. Shredded the chicken. Then finished the recipe as instructed. Big hit.
WholeLottaYum says
Glad you enjoyed this! Clever to cook the chicken seasoned with your pressure cooker! 🙂
Kellie says
I made this tonight. I was worried because my husband is a very picky eater and does not eat cottage cheese. He went back for seconds!!
Laurie says
I’ve made this a few times and loved it! The only thing I did was use my immersion blender to mash the cottage cheese so it had a smooth consistency.
Alisha Ross says
I always not only drain my meat, but rinse it with hot water. This will get all of the grease off. Then I leave it sitting in the collander over couple of paper towels for a few minutes to get as much water off as it can. Then I will bag or freeze it.
And we always do salt, pepper, and garlic in all of our ground beef recipes.
Alexa says
What brand of green salsa do you use?
WholeLottaYum says
Trader Joes
Diane says
Super easy and loaded with flavor. Used a medium spiced salsa verde for a slight kick! Added green onions, cilantro,and chopped tomatoes to the top. Finished with a dollop of sour cream. Was a hit with hubby says he will take leftovers to work for lunch (he’s not a fan of left overs!) and wants the dish again. He couldn’t taste cottage cheese, which he hates!
Dani says
Husband and baby (1) approved! I just made this and it is delicious! I added a few mushrooms just because we love mushrooms but I second the comments above about the cottage cheese. Don’t let that one ingredient scare you away! It’s so good! Thank you for this recipe!
Sue says
My husband loved this recipe! After trying it , he told me to make sure I keep this recipe. I have been trying different keto recipes some turned out good and others bad but this one was definitely a winner with him.
Heather says
I am making this tonight and I am going to try it with ground chicken. Do I use 2lbs ground chicken?
WholeLottaYum says
Yep!
Jana Owens says
Made this tonight for my husband and we LOVED it. Followed the recipe exactly as written and it turned out perfect. We are both having for lunch tomorrow. Thank you for sharing and I will follow you for more delicious Keto recipes.
Jo-anne says
I made this tonight….I read the recipe wrong and only added two cups of chicken not two pounds it was very runny. I am going to try and add some chicken to it and reheat.