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This Queso Chicken Skillet has the potential to become your families new favorite weeknight dinner. Creamy queso melted together with tender chicken, diced chilis and tomatoes, all mixed into tasty yellow rice create the perfect cheesy dinner.
Skillet meals are the perfect easy addition to your weeknight menu. For more low prep recipes with little cleanup after, try this Creamy Skillet Chicken Cacciatore, Unstuffed Pepper Skillet, or this Italian Orzo and Sausage Skillet and you’ll be guaranteed an easy and delicious evening.
Queso Chicken Skillet
With trying to fit in plenty of pool dates, trips to the beach, and loads of outdoor fun our summer is filled to the top with low-key activities. In the evenings I’m left with as little time to prepare dinner as I have during the school year so I’m always in search of an easy meal. Skillet recipes, such as this perfectly cheesy Queso Chicken Skillet, fall under this category and everyone in my family, myself included, is happy about it.
With so much delicious cheese, one of which is homemade queso, filling your skillet you can easily sneak some healthy vegetables into your dish that will go unnoticed. In this Queso Chicken Skillet are diced tomatoes and green chilis, but don’t stop there! You could easily add in some poblano peppers, bell peppers, or even some riced cauliflower and no one will notice.
How to Make Queso?
Queso dip often knows as “chili con queso” or “queso blanco” dates back more than 100 years and has virtually zero Mexican roots, however, if you’re of Texan decent or a tex-mex connoisseur than those roots run deep. There are also many variations of preparing queso all of which are right, depending on with whom you’re speaking. Most of these recipes also call for only 2 ingredients, which can be the differing factor of right or wrong.
The queso in this Queso Chicken Skillet is made using white American cheese and heavy cream. By melting the cheese together with the cream you end up with a white creamy cheese dip known as queso.
What is Yellow Rice?
Yellow rice is a traditional yellow-colored rice dish of Spanish, Cuban, Peruvian, Carribean, and the list goes on cuisines. Made with spices such as annatto, saffron, and turmeric, which gives it the yellow color. In the rice section of most grocery stores, you easily find yellow rice already packaged with the spices. However, if you’d prefer different rice you can easily swap this version for another kind such as basmati or jasmine.
How to Add More Vegetables
Since I’m always preparing meals for my family adding in vegetables, even if they are covered in cheese, is a goal of mine. Above I mentioned adding in some additional peppers, and even riced cauliflower, but here are some more options (not all listed are vegetables).
- Zucchini
- Yellow Squash
- Corn
- Onions or Shallots
- Artichoke Hearts
- Banana Peppers
- Red Kidney Beans or Black Beans
Craving More Tex-Mex Recipes? Try out these:
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Queso Chicken Skillet
Ingredients
Chicken Skillet
- 1 tbsp Olive Oil
- 2 1/2 cups Chicken Broth
- 1 10-oz bag Yellow Rice with Seasonings
- 2 lbs Boneless, Skinless, Chicken Breast
- 1 14-oz can Diced Tomatoes drained
- 1 4-oz can Diced Green Chilis drained
- 4 ounces Queso Fresco crumbled (Monterey Jack will also work)
- 2 tbsps Fresh Cilantro chopped (optional)
White Queso
- 8 ounces White American Cheese cubed or shredded
- 1/2 cup Heavy Cream
Instructions
- Slice the boneless, skinless, chicken, breast into 1-inch sized pieces and place in an oven-safe large skillet. Add the Olive Oil, Chicken Broth, and Yellow Rice to the skillet and stir to combine. Bring the contents to a boil, cover, and turn to low heat for 25 to 30 minutes.
- While the chicken and rice are cooking prepare the queso by melting the American Cheese and Heavy Cream in a medium-sized saucepan. Once melted completely set the burner to low.
- Remove the skillet from heat and stir in the Diced Tomatoes, Green Chilis, and Queso. Top with crumbled Queso Fresco (or shredded Monterey Jack if using) and place in the oven set to broil for 2 to 3 minutes, until cheese melts. Garnish with fresh chopped Cilantro.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Can I make it without the rice?
Hi Nina, thank you for your question! You could make it without the rice, but you’ll want to reduce the chicken broth to 1 cup. Instead of using the seasoning packet from the yellow rice you will want to season the dish to taste with garlic powder, onion powder, turmeric salt and pepper. I hope this helps! Let me know how it turns out!
Dish had nice flavor, but the rice cooked up smushy.
Delicious! I am watching my sodium, so used no-salt-added tomatoes, low sodium chicken broth, and just a 5 oz. bag of yellow rice with 5 oz. of jasmine. For the tomatoes, I used Rotel with the green chiles already in, and added them in the first step so they cooked with the rice. It was still incredibly flavorful and my son said he liked it a lot!
Excellent flavored meal. The only change I made was to add onion, garlic and the suggested black beans. Made alot and was done and on the table in 25 minutes. Will definitely make again. Thanks for posting.
This was very good, just made it tonight. Easy fix. Definitely needs tortilla chips with it though. Makes a HUGE skillet full, easily enough for four to six people. I followed the recipe, but next time I might use Rotel tomatoes to spice it up a bit. It’s a keeper.
this was a huge hit with my husband. he even said ‘that’s a right tasty dish.’ he never says anything about my cookin unless it is to say ‘i’d justt as soon you never make that again.’ i know it is late but we’re having the left overs of this dish today. would it be better to warm it in the oven or as serving sizes in the microwave. i’m worried about what will happen to the cheese. there are only two of us. thanks so much for sharing this recipe. patti in florida