Cheesy Chicken Chili (Instant Pot)

This Cheesy Chicken Chili is creamy spicy comfort food that no one can resist. Even better, it’s made in an Instant Pot so you will be serving it up in less than 30 minutes.



Years ago, before my mom retired, one of her co-workers, a lovely lady named Esther, shared a recipe she and her husband loved. Of course, my mom forwarded it on to me. It was called white chili, I suppose to differentiate it from typical Texas chili which is red.

This dish is different from typical Texas chili in at least two other ways: It has beans in it and chicken instead of beef. Texas chili does not have beans! If you’d like to hear a funny story at my expense, check out my Texas chili post.

Esther’s recipe also called for two cups of cream and eight ounces of sour cream but I like to make it with cream cheese, also adding tomatoes, green pepper and corn. It occurs to me that Esther probably wouldn’t recognize my version but that’s okay. It’s delicious and my name is way more descriptive. I am grateful for the inspiration!

Cheesy Chicken Chili (Instant Pot)

A word about the bell pepper/capiscum. If I’m honest, I must confess that I am not a fan of green peppers. I do like the background flavor they add when well cooked at the beginning of a dish, like with gumbo or étouffée but I always make a point to chop them finely so I don’t get a big bite of bell pepper. If you are a fan, do chop yours bigger. They add color to the dish.

Ingredients
2 lbs or 900g boneless skinless chicken breasts
1/2 teaspoon salt
freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1 yellow onion, diced
1 green bell pepper/capsicum, chopped finely
2 tablespoon olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1 can (15.5oz or 439g) white beans, drained and rinsed
1 can (15.5oz or 439g) chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 can (15oz or 425g) can whole kernel corn, drained
1 can (10 oz or 283g) diced tomatoes with peppers (like Ro-Tel)
1 1/2 cups or 355ml chicken broth
8 oz or 225g cream cheese, at room temperature
2 tablespoons cornstarch
Salt to taste, if necessary

Topping ideas:
sliced jalapenos
sliced avocados
dollop of sour cream
minced fresh cilantro
fried tortilla strips
shredded Monterey Jack, cheddar or Mexican queso fresco

Method
Cut the trimmed of excess fat chicken breasts into large chunks. Season them with a light sprinkle of salt, black pepper and ground cayenne.

Use your Instant Pot’s sauté function on low to sweat the onion and bell pepper in the olive oil for a few minutes, until they are translucent and softened. Add in the minced garlic and give it a quick stir.

 Turn the Instant Pot off.

Add the chicken to the pot.

Top it with the cumin, chili powder, beans, chick peas, tomatoes (with juice), corn and chicken broth. Do not stir. We want to make sure the chicken stays covered.

Pressure cook for 15 minutes. Leave to pressure release naturally for 15 minutes, then vent and remove the lid.

Use tongs to fish out the chicken breast pieces and put them on a plate. Shred the chicken with a couple of forks.

Make a slurry of 2 tablespoons cornstarch and 2 tablespoons cold water in a measuring cup, stirring until the cornstarch is completely dissolved.

Cut the cream cheese into chunks and add them to the Instant Pot along with the cornstarch slurry.

Stir well. Sauté on low for a few minutes or until the cream cheese is melted and the chili thickens a bit. Return chicken to the Instant Pot. Add salt as needed to taste.

Stir well and serve with desired toppings.

Enjoy!

It's Multicooker Monday and our host is Sue from Palatable Pastime. Check out all the great recipes we are sharing that can be made with your small appliances.

• Crockpot Lo Mein from Veggies First Then Dessert
• Cheesy Chicken Chili - Instant Pot from Food Lust People Love
• Instant Pot Pasta and Cheese with Cauliflower from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Instant Pot Minestrone Soup from Making Miracles
• Potato & Dal Khichdi - Pressure Cooker from Sneha's Recipe
• Slow Cooker Lechon Asado from Palatable Pastime
• Toaster Oven Roasted Salted Almonds from Sid's Sea Palm Cooking
• Zucchini Chips from A Day in the Life on the Farm

Multicooker Monday is a blogger group created by Sue of Palatable Pastime for all of us who need encouragement to make better use of our small appliances like slow cookers, Instant Pots, Air Fryers, rice cookers and sous vide machines. We get together every third Monday of the month to share our recipes. If you are a food blogger who would like to post with us, please request to join our Facebook group.

Pin this Cheesy Chicken Chili! 

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Spicy Asian Noodle Salad with Lobster

With spicy dressing, juicy lumps of lobster and fragrant bean thread noodles this Spicy Asian Noodle Salad is like a vacation in your mouth.

AKA Vacation in Your Mouth

There’s just something special about lobster but you can also sub tiger prawns or shrimp.

Yes, please to Comfort Food
When someone offers to send you a copy of a cookbook called Adventures in Comfort Food: Incredible, Delicious and New Recipes from a Unique, Small-Town Restaurant, you do not turn them down. You say, “Yes, please!” After all, here we are coming into the cool season and comfort food is what it’s all about. This particular cookbook is full of recipes from chef and owner, Kerry Altiero, of the small town award-winning Maine restaurant Café Miranda, which brings comfort food up a whole bunch of notches, serving favorites like Lobster Mac and Cheese and Brussels Sprouts in Cream and dressed up hot dogs.

As Chef Altiero says in the introduction; “We offer a huge menu that mixes traditional American fare with Italian, Mexican, Middle Eastern, Thai, vegan . . . whatever strikes our fancy. Our motto is “Because We Can.” We serve wonderful, surprising, innovative food that defies expectations and wins over all kinds of eaters. This cookbook will help you do the same at home, whether you are cooking for world-weary sophisticates or picky toddlers. Your kitchen may never be the same.”

And while I am under no obligation to tell you only nice things about this book, I must admit that I have only nice things to say. Most of the recipes have just a handful of ingredients and the simple preparations let the freshness and quality of those ingredients shine through. If that appeals to you as much as it appealed to me, I am pleased to tell you that I also have one copy to give away! Make sure to scroll down to the bottom of this post and enter the drawing.

Vacation in My Mouth
How these cookbook blog tours work is that we are given a list of recipes that can be shared. I was most intrigued by the dish called Vacation in Your Mouth, from the Party Food chapter, so that’s the one I chose. I mean, really. With a title like that, how could I resist?

Years and years ago, when I was living in Brazil, a dear Burmese friend taught me how to make a fresh and refreshing salad with softened bean thread noodles, crispy fried ground pork and dried shrimp, all tossed in a lime vinaigrette with chilies and cilantro. I used to make it all the time in a great big bowl, because it was a family favorite and then, because I struggled to find the dried shrimp, it got out of rotation.

This beautiful dish from the Adventures in Comfort Food cookbook reminded me of what we had been missing, albeit it on a fancier, smaller scale. And I realized that the dried shrimp are not absolutely essential. Lobster works too! Okay, I admit we may not have it with lobster every time, but I will definitely be serving this again, perhaps with shrimp or even crab meat.

I made the recipe pretty much as written, except for substituting a spicy pepper for the poblano, which was one of the chef’s suggestions, and I couldn’t find baby romaine so I bought a local green for scooping up the salad.

Serves 2

Ingredients
For the salad:
4 oz or 113g cooked lobster meat
1 poblano pepper, seeded and minced (Or sub a spicy pepper of your choice.)
2 scallions, green and white parts, sliced on the bias
Juice of 2 limes
2 tablespoons or 30ml extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon or 15ml Thai fish sauce
6 leaves basil, preferably Thai, shredded
4 sprigs cilantro
1⁄4 cup or 44g Thai bean thread or rice vermicelli noodles, soaked and chopped (I about doubled this because I couldn’t for the life of me get the bean thread noodles apart to weigh out only 44g.)

For garnishing:
Pinch kimchi flakes
1 teaspoon black sesame seeds
2 sprigs cilantro
2 thin rounds of lime
10 leaves romaine lettuce

Method
Mix together everything but the garnishes.

Spoon the mixture into martini glasses.

Make sure to include all the good limey, salty juice. Sprinkle with the kimchi flakes, black sesame seeds and cilantro.

Garnish with a lime round on the edge of each glass. Place the glasses on a plate and arrange the romaine leaves around them, attractively.

Fill leaves with mixture—crunch!

The chef’s drink suggestion: A nice Moscato with a little bit of sweet goes well with the spicy flavors. Or perhaps enjoy with a nice simple beer such as a Sebago Saddleback Ale.

Tell me that doesn't look like a Vacation in Your Mouth?! 

Enjoy!

Buy your own copy of Adventures in Comfort Food: Incredible, Delicious and New Recipes from a Unique, Small-Town Restaurant by following this link.

*This post contains affiliate links. I received a copy of the cookbook for review purposes with no other compensation.*