Crock Pot Chicken Nachos w/ Lime Marinade

Course: Appetizer, lunch

Cuisine: Mexican

Prep Time: 15

Cook Time: 4 7

Total Time: 4 22

Servings: people

Calories: 525kcal

Author: Aleka Shunk

These crock pot chicken nachos are easy, cheesy, and perfect for game day or lazy weeknights. Tender shredded chicken, melty cheese, and a zesty lime crema come together for the ultimate no-fuss nacho recipe.

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Ingredients

2 lbs chicken breasts
1 cup chicken stock
1 bag tortilla chips
1-2 cups Mexican cheese blend
1 jalapeno, sliced
⅔ cup pico de gallo

Lime Marinade

2 tablespoon lime juice, freshly squeezed
3 tablespoon honey
2-3 large garlic cloves, minced
1½ onion powder
1½ teaspoon chili powder
2 teaspoon salt
¾ black pepper
2 tablespoon oil
⅓ cup tequila *optional

Lime Crema

8 oz sour cream
1-2 tablespoon lime juice *see note
1-2 small garlic cloves, minced
salt to taste
1 tablespoon fresh cilantro, chopped finely *optional
1 tablespoon tequila *optional

Instructions

Let's Marinate!
Add your chicken breasts, lime juice, honey, garlic, onion powder, chili powder, oil, salt and pepper to a large bowl or freezer bag and let marinate for at least an hour, no more than 4 hours.
(This step is optional but tenderizes your chicken while adding more flavor.) If you want to speed things up, add all the marinade ingredients directly to your crock pot and move to the next step!)
Cooking Your Chicken:
Dump your marinated chicken into a crock pot along with 1 cup chicken stock. Set to high for 4 hours or low for 8 hours.
Add all the ingredients for the lime crema in a small bowl and mix. Chill until ready to use. (Place in a squeeze bottle or Ziploc baggie to easily squeeze onto the nachos.)
Shredding Your Chicken:
Remove your chicken from the crock pot and either on a cutting board or plate, shred your chicken using two forks. (It should shred very easily!) Add shredded chicken back to the juices in the crock pot until ready to assemble nachos.
Assembling Nachos:
Preheat oven to 375℉. Add a sheet of parchment paper down on a baking sheet. (This will help with transferring them later). Add a hefty amount of nachos to the baking sheet along with 2-3 cups of shredded chicken and 1-2 cups of cheese. Use as much or as little as you desire.
Bake the nachos for 5-7 minutes or until the cheese is fully melted and bubbly.
Transfer the nachos to another serving dish by pulling the parchment and sliding them off carefully. Finish your nachos with your pico de gallo, jalapeno slices, lime crema and more cilantro if desired.
Enjoy!

Notes

Make In Advance

To make these crock pot chicken nachos in advance, marinate, cook and shred your chicken the day before. Transfer the chicken with juices to a tupperware container and store in the fridge until ready to use. Then assemble and enjoy!

Assembling and serving your nachos should take less than 10 minutes! 90% of the time goes into the prep which is why this recipe is great to make ahead of time.

Variations:

Feel free to use any kind of cheese you wish. I recommend sticking with cheddar, monterey jack and colby cheese since they melt the best.

If you don't like cilantro, swap it with parsley.

*I prefer topping nachos with pico de gallo since it already contains pre-diced: tomatoes, onions, peppers, lime juice and cilantro. A big time saver!

Nutrition