This Slow Cooker Chicken Fajita and Quinoa Soup is the perfect weeknight meal that is healthy, easy to make and packed with flavors your family will love!
Truth be told I am such a sucker for slow cooking meals. Â Whether it be on a Sunday for football games and weekly meal prep or even during the weekdays when I can easily dump everything into my crock pot before work in the morning and have a delicious healthy meal waiting for us when we get home! Â Crock pots are seriously such LIFESAVERS and since Fall is practically upon us I wanted to kick the season off right with a new favorite recipe!
You guys this chicken fajita and quinoa soup is NO joke.  After my baked chicken fajita roll-ups turned out to be such a hit, I wanted to share something that would not only be easy and delicious, but perfect for families during the week too!  The flavors in this soup are incredible and I love that the chicken literally marinates in everything all day.  This recipe is also a great way to sneak in that quinoa for, you know, kids and hubbies who sadly tend to turn their noses up to my favorite ingredient.  Confession: my husband refuses to eat quinoa.  I really don’t know why?!  I guess he’s just more of a rice and potato kind of person (I mean aren’t we all…), but let me just tell you that he completely DEVOURED this soup.  In like 5 minutes flat.  He topped his with a little shredded cheese, some chopped cilantro and then proceeded to ask me (um more like demand) why I had never made this for him before.
YAY I finally made him a quinoa believer!
HOW TO MAKE CHICKEN FAJITA SOUP
Now I don’t think you understand how ridiculously quick and EASY this recipe is to make.  The “hardest” part is chopping up the bell peppers and onions, but once you do that you basically just dump everything into your crock pot, cover and turn on.  Once everything is done cooking, simply remove the chicken and shred it using two forks, add the chicken back into the soup and it’s ready to go!  If you wanted to add cheese you could do so at this point which makes a thicker, creamier soup.  Also feel free to taste your soup and adjust your salt and/or seasonings as needed – slow cooking tends to require a little extra seasoning, but our soup turned out delicious without any adjustments needed!
I also want to note that this soup freezes great too! Â This is such a huge help for me during the week to have meals I can either freeze or prep for lunches for the week. Â I actually brought a whole pot of this into my office the day after I made it and my co-workers all loved it too! Â In fact a few of them are anxiously waiting for me to post this so they can print the recipe off.
If you love chicken fajitas or really any kind of Mexican food then I promise you will love this! Â I mean with ingredients like chicken, tomatoes, black beans, corn, bell peppers all seasoned with chili powder, cumin and paprika, what’s not to love?? Â Feel free to add more spice too as necessary. Â Next time I may add some chopped jalapeno or a little more cayenne pepper just to bring out the heat since my husband loves a lot of spice. Â This isn’t for everyone though so go all out and make this your own! Â The great thing about this is one whole serving is packed with tons of fiber and protein with little fat which makes a perfect healthy recipe for weekly meals!
I really hope you all enjoy this soup as much as we did and if you do end up making this for you and your family, don’t forget to share your delicious photos on Instagram or Twitter and hashtag #eatyourselfskinnyrecipe so I can see what you all are eating!
Slow Cooker Chicken Fajita & Quinoa Soup
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts
- 1 cup uncooked quinoa, rinsed
- 3 bell peppers, chopped
- 1 medium onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
- Juice of 1 lime
- 1 (15 oz) can diced tomatoes
- 1 (4.5 oz) can green chiles
- 1 (15 oz) can black beans, drained and rinsed
- 1 cup frozen corn
- 1 1/2 Tbsp chili powder
- 1 Tbsp cumin
- 2 tsp. paprika
- 2 tsp. salt
- Toppings, optional: Cilantro, avocado, shredded cheese
Instructions
- In a 6-quart slow cooker, add chicken and the rest of ingredients, cover and place on high for 3 to 4 hours or low 6 to 8 hours.
- Remove chicken and shred with two forks then add back into the slow cooker. Season with additional salt and seasonings if needed.
- Spoon soup into bowls and top with favorite toppings, enjoy!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Hi there! Looks amazing! Can I use frozen chicken breasts? If so, can I do it on high for 6 hours?
Hi Lindsay! Personally I strongly advise against putting frozen chicken in the slow cooker because I’ve read that it’s really unsafe, but if you do use frozen chicken I would just leave them in the crock pot for the full 8 hours on low 🙂
How would this total out container wise?
Would this work for pressure cooker?
I personally haven’t tried that, but I’m sure it would! 🙂
I have made this several times in my Instant Pot. I did 15 minutes and waited 10 minutes before releasing the steam. I used cooked shredded chicken instead of the whole chicken breast. The only difference I found is that the liquid is pretty much gone. I’m assuming the quinoa soaked it all up. I plan on upping the broth to 6 cups the next time I make it.
Our family loves this recipe and it is now in my monthly rotation of high protein, low calorie soups.
I made this soup and it is the most delicious soup ever. It is so easy. I substituted the tin of green chilles for 3 fresh green chilies. It is delicious and has a real mexican taste to it.
So glad you enjoyed this Joanne! 🙂
Hi. This recipe sounds lovely. Thank you. Curious what you mean by a tin of green chilies. I don’t think we can buy a tin of green chilies in UK and not sure I want to substitute with a tin’s worth of fresh green chilies (HOT !)
These are just a small can of green chiles – I’m not sure if the UK has them, but you can find them here on Amazon! http://amzn.to/2dKe4gu
What on your thoughts on subbing brown rice for the quinoa? Do you think it would soak up all of the broth? Not sure my little ones would be down with the quinoa.
Yes brown rice would be a great substitute! Just substitute one cup rice for the one cup quinoa 🙂
Do you add the chicken breast whole?
Yep! Then once it’s done cooking you can shred the chicken 🙂
I made the dish yesterday for my girlfriends and they loved it! Didn’t have low sodium chicken broth so I used beef broth and it was really flavorful. I added some hot peppers in mine to give it some heat. Thanks for a great new recipe I can easily roll into our go-to meals!
I want to try but with out chicken. How long would it cook for if I don’t add the chicken?
Same amount of time! 🙂
Would this recipe work for a 3 to 4 quarts slow cooker? It’s my first time using one and I’m estimating its size.
Hmm a 3 to 4 quart slow cooker might be a bit too small for this recipe unfortunately, but you could always adjust the ingredients! When I put this together in my 6 quart slow cooker it was filled close to the top.
This filled my 4 quart crock pot. I did not add the corn because I am not a big fan of corn and there was not enough space. My peppers and onions were large, which also made this bustling. I hope that it cooks through well even though it is filled to the brim!
I’m sure it will cook just fine! Enjoy! 🙂
This looks so warm and comforting! Perfect bowl of stew!