This Mexican chicken instant pot recipe is quick, flavorful, and seriously the easiest way to created delicious shredded chicken! With just a few minutes of prep work, you can create shredded chicken in your Instant Pot perfect for tacos, enchiladas, and a wide variety of Mexican-style chicken dishes. Ready in less than 30-minutes, your dinner just got a whole lot easier and a WHOLE LOTTA YUM!
Instant Pot Mexican Shredded Chicken
Sunday is a meal-prep day in our home. This is when we create a wide variety of foods that are ready to go throughout the week to make meals that fit our time, energy, and budget.
And one of the items that rank high on our list is our Mexican chicken instant pot recipe! With just 5-minutes of prep-time, this dish is ready to pressure cook and be used in a variety of ways.
Plus, pressure cooker Mexican chicken is perfect for low-carb, keto, paleo, gluten-free, and Whole30 eating plans! The chicken by itself is also dairy-free. One note of caution though: to stay within your low-carb lifestyle, be sure to prepare your shredded chicken with salsa that doesn't have added sugar.
What do we use our Mexican chicken instant pot recipe in? It's perfect for a quick chicken taco salad, low-carb chicken enchiladas, or Mexican chicken taco bowl (see below!)
Why You'll Love This Recipe
- Just 3 ingredients! Seriously. I don't think it could get any easier!
- Perfect for meal-prepping. Making a double batch of Mexican shredded chicken in your Instant Pot means you can cook once and eat twice.
- You don't have to spend a lot of time on this recipe. Simply add the ingredients to the Instant Pot, pressure cook, and let it do its thing.
- By pressure cooking the chicken in the salsa you add an element of flavor you can't get by simply adding the salsa to the chicken later.
I have to admit, I love my Instant pot for creating healthy meals that my family loves! If you love using your Instant Pot as much as I do, be sure to check out some of our other pressure cooker recipes including Instant Pot chicken noodle soup, Instant Pot frozen chicken breast, and Instant Pot chicken stew!
On Keto? Grab our FREE keto foods list here OR Snag our Keto Binder HERE
Ingredient Notes
This Mexican shredded chicken only needs just three ingredients, making this one of the easiest Instant Pot meals whether you are feeding 2 or 20.
- chicken breasts
- salsa - chunky, mild, or medium
- taco seasoning - check out our homemade no-carb taco seasoning
***A word of caution: Read the labels to make sure your salsa and taco seasoning doesn't have added sugar if you are trying to follow a low-carb eating plan. You can find taco seasoning that doesn't include a lot of the sugars or artificial ingredients by opting for an organic brand like Simply Organic available at Kroger. Or, you could make your own taco seasoning at home using the link above. One package of store-bought taco season equals 2 tablespoon of the homemade stuff.
Equipment
A Pressure Cooker - This is the Instant Pot model that we used.
Step By Step Instructions
This Mexican chicken instant pot recipe is a quick dump and go recipe, so minimal prep-work is going to be needed on your part.
However, if your chicken breasts are huge (ours were 1 pound each!) you are going to want to cut them up a little. 5-6 pieces, each around the same size, is what we went with.
Prep Ingredients
Cut chicken breasts into equal-size pieces if they are overly large.
Add chicken, taco seasoning, and salsa to the Instant pot. You do not need any additional liquid for cooking - the salsa is plenty!
Add the cover to your pressure cooker and be sure the valve is set to seal.
Pressure Cook
Set your Instant Pot to Manual (or pressure cook on some models) for 10 minutes.
Once your pressure cooker is done, allow the pot to natural release for 5 minutes, then quick release any additional pressure.
Shredding your pressure cooker Mexican chicken is super easy! Either use a hand mixer right in the Instant Pot (including the liquid) or remove the chicken and use your stand mixer. Be sure to grab the liquid! This liquid contains the flavor of the taco seasoning and the salsa, and adds just the right amount of both juiciness and flavor to the final dish.
Use your shredded Mexican chicken in a variety of dishes, including shredded chicken taco bowl recipe listed below.
Recipe Tips
- Our Mexican chicken instant pot recipe instructions are based on using chicken breast that is thawed and not too large.
- Many shredded chicken recipes will recommend overcooking your chicken to make shredding it easier, but we found that 10-minutes of pressure cooking with 5-minutes of natural release cooks the chicken fully and its shreds perfectly.
- For maximum flavor, be sure to shred your Mexican chicken with the liquid from the pressure cooker!
Common Questions
Stored in the fridge, your shredded chicken will be good for 4-5 days.
Yes. You can freeze shredded chicken for 3-4 months.
We love to use Mexican shredded chicken for a variety of dishes including tacos, fajitas, enchiladas, and shredded chicken taco bowls (see below)
Mexican Chicken Taco Bowls
Your Mexican chicken instant pot recipe will help you create shredded chicken that is perfect to use in a variety of ways. Tacos, taco bowls (see that picture!) and enchiladas are a given. You could also top Mexican corn salad with your shredded chicken, or simply wrap it up in either a lettuce leaf or a tortilla and top it with your favorite veggies. It's a great item for when you are serving a large crowd, or need something to bring to a pot luck.
And because the shredded chicken itself is already compliant with most low-carb eating plans, you can easily serve a group of both low-carb eaters and those who don't follow dietary restrictions. Simply be sure you have plenty of low-carb options available.
More Instant Pot Chicken Recipes
Looking for more Instant Pot recipes?
- Pressure Cooker Chicken Noodle Soup
- Instant Pot Chicken Stew
- Instant Pot Chicken Breasts from Frozen
- Instant Pot Chicken Crack Soup
Come connect with us on Instagram! Be sure to tag us (wholelotta.yum) when you make a recipe. You can also find us on Facebook, and Pinterest.
Instant Pot Mexican Shredded Chicken
Easy instant pot Mexican shredded chicken makes dinner quick and easy, and only takes 3 ingredients. Use it for tacos, burritos, salads, and more!
Ingredients
- 2 lb fresh chicken breasts
- 12 oz salsa (chunky mild or medium)
- 1 taco seasoning packet
Instructions
- Cut the chicken into 5-6 oz size pieces.
- Add the chicken breasts, jar of salsa, and taco seasoning to the pressure cooker, no extra liquid is needed.
- Pressure cook on Manual (or Pressure Cook depending on your model) for 10 minutes.
- Natural release 5 minutes
- Add 1 cup of the pot liquid to the chicken before shredding.
- Shred the Mexican chicken with a hand-held mixer right in the pot or transfer it to a stand mixer.
- Great in tacos, taco salad, or as a shredded chicken taco bowl.
- Serves 8.
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Nutrition Information
Yield 8 Serving Size 1Amount Per Serving Calories 211Total Fat 4gSaturated Fat 1gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 2gCholesterol 96mgSodium 638mgCarbohydrates 4gNet Carbohydrates 3gFiber 1gSugar 2gProtein 36g
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C says
Is the trivet used or not? Recipe does not state.