My best stovetop white bean chicken chili that will leave you wanting more. With hearty white beans, tender chicken, and a rich, spicy broth, this will become your favorite. Just follow these easy step by step photo instructions.
Introduction
I'm a huge chili fan, who else has 10+ chili recipes on their site. But this one stands out for me. It is just so darn good.
I wanted to use the chicken to make broth for the soup so I needed a new recipe. I want simple and common ingredients. Nothing was just right, but I found a nice inspiration recipe at The Pioneer Woman Cooks. A few simplifications and modifications were all that was needed.
On a heat scale, this is 3/10, but on a taste scale, it's a 10 for us.
My Rating
The mere volume of soup produced almost made me rate it a four. Remember this is cooking for two, but it will freeze well.
🐓Chicken and the Broth
I suggest using skin-on bone-in split chicken breasts here. That is to generate the broth and generally that works great. You can use thighs or even a whole chicken. The model recipe used a whole chicken. I don't want to strip the meat off a cooked whole chicken.
But after frequent cooking this recipe, I find that sometimes there is just not enough chicken taste. You can fix the taste issue in several ways. You could just use chicken broth instead of water. Or add some chicken bouillon of some type.
Skinless boneless chicken breasts could be used but will never generate enough chicken taste, so you will need to use broth instead of water.
You can also use pre-cooked rotisserie chicken. You will need about 4 cups of shredded precooked chicken and use broth instead of water. Obviously, pick up the instructions after the shredding of the chicken.
✔️Tips
Size of the recipe.
This is an older recipe and when I did this, there was a teenage boy and lots of his friends around. This is an easy recipe to cut in half.
To thicken or not?
I used some masa flour to thicken. If you don't have the masa flour, you can use cornmeal or corn starch. Or you can just skip the whole thickening part.
❄️Storage
Like most chili, good refrigerated for 3-4 days. And good frozen for 3-4 months.
📖Chicken Chili Recipes
Ultra Simple Crock Pot White Chicken Chili
Low Fat High Taste Crock Pot White Chicken Chili
Salsa Verde White Chicken Chili a la Crock Pot
Instant Pot White Chicken Chili
This recipe is listed in these categories. See them for more similar recipes.
🖼️Step-by-Step Photo Instructions
Trim the chicken of any trim-able fat then split in half to aid cooking.
Place in a large stockpot and cover with 8 cups of water. Bring to boil then decrease to low to simmer. Cover with lid and cook until internal temp is 160°. About 40 minutes.
Mince five cloves of garlic and chop a large onion. Then prep the jalapeno by splitting it and removing the seeds and veins before mincing.
Remove the chicken and allow to cool for about 20 minutes and then hand shred discarding the skin and bones. Combine all ingredients except the masa flour and simmer for about 2 hours. Stir occasionally.
Optional Thickening (I usually don't): Mix the masa flour in ¼ cup very hot water and mix well. Combine the soup and frequently stir for another 10 minutes then remove from heat.
📖Recipe
White Bean Chicken Chili
Ingredients
- 3 split chicken breast with bone and skin - see options in notes
- 8 cups water
- 1 onion - large chopped
- 1 jalapeno pepper - cleaned and minced
- 5 cloves garlic - minced
- 72 oz Navy beans - precooked, drained
- 8 oz diced green chilles
- 4 teaspoons ground cumin - increase if you want spicy
- ½ teaspoon paprika - increase if you want spicy
- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper - increase if you want spicy
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon white pepper - black is ok if you don't have white
- 4 teaspoons Chicken soup base - or 4 bouillon cubes
- 2 tablespoon masa flour - in ¼ cup hot water
Instructions
- Trim the chicken then split in half to aid cooking.
- Place in a large stockpot and cover with 8 cups of water. Bring to boil the decrease to low to simmer. Cover with lid and cook until internal temp is 160. About 40 minutes.
- Mince five cloves of garlic and chop a large onion. Then prep the jalapeno by splitting it and removing the seeds and veins before mincing.
- Remove the chicken and allow to cool for about 20 minutes and then hand shred discarding the skin and bones. Combine all ingredients except the masa flour and simmer for about 2 hours. Stir occasionally.
- Optional Thickening (I usually don't): Mix the masa flour in ¼ cup very hot water and mix well. Combine the soup and frequently stir for another 10 minutes then remove from heat.
My Private Notes
Recipe Notes
Pro Tips:
- This is an easy recipe to cut in half.
- You need about 2 pounds of chicken after cooking. You may use almost any chicken. A whole chicken or chicken thighs work well.
- If you use skinless chicken or precooked chicken, then use chicken broth instead of water. If pre-cooked then start at step 3.
- Add some chicken bouillon to the broth if needed after cooking the chicken. Taste test it every time.
- You can thicken with Mesa flour, corn starch or corn meal. Or skip thickening entirely.
- This is about 3/10 on my heat scale. You can decrease that by elemimating the jalapeno. Or increase by doubling the jalapeno or adding additional cayenne pepper.
- Good refrigerated for 3-4 days or frozen for 3-4 months.
To adjust the recipe size:
You may adjust the number of servings in this recipe card under servings. This does the math for the ingredients for you. BUT it does NOT adjust the text of the instructions. So you need to do that yourself.
Nutrition Estimate
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Originally Published December 4, 2010. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation.
Sherri Kiefner
Hi Dr. Dan,
This chili sounds fabulous. I just have a question about the beans. Do you use canned beans or cook dry beans for this recipe? If canned, is the 72 oz based on the weight listed on the label (before they are drained)? If dry, what would the dry uncooked weight be?
Thanks,
Sherri
Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan
Hi Sherri,
Welcome to the blog.
The 72 oz is the weight listed on the jar including liquid. About 1/4 to 1/3 of the weight is the liquid. So 72 oz becomes about 48 - 54 oz of cooked beans. Consider jar and can as the same.
1 pound of dry beans will make about 2 pounds when cooked (32 oz). When packed in cans or jars with liquid, It would be about 48 oz.including the liquid.
So 72 oz of packed beans will be about 48 oz when drained. So if using dried beans. You could use 1 1/2 pounds to get that. Always soak your beans (Google that), it will decrease the gas. It takes about 2 hours to cook beans at a simmer - but it always seems to a bit longer for me. So you could presoak your beans then just cook in the chili as it simmers for 2 hours. It should work. It may take a bit longer, just cook to the point that the beans ore done.
A lost note, it's chili, a few more or less beans will be fine.
Hope that helps.
Dan
Shirlene Kenny
This is suppose to be cooking for two, this soup makes enough for 12! I will try it adjusting the ingredients to enough for 4. I don't have kids at home any more there is just my husband and I. When I have tried to adjust your receipes before they didn't come out very good.
Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan
Hi Shirlene,
Welcome to the blog.
Yep, this is one of the big ones but it cuts in half fairly well. I cover that above in the post. Use the adjustment in the number of servings, it will do the math for the ingredients. It will not adjust the text in the instructions, however.
Chili recipes tend to be big due to the ingredients. See https://www.101cookingfortwo.com/recipes-not-two-servings/ for a more complete explanation.
You might want to check the Small crock pot are where there are smaller chili recipes https://www.101cookingfortwo.com/recipes-not-two-servings/ The low fat one is a variation of this recipe.
Dan
Nicole
White Chicken Chili is on the regular rotation at our house. I love the fact that you used masa to thicken it up. My recipe calls for cream, but I would love an alternative. I will try this next time.
Dr Dan
Exactly why I did it. A hot meal with just enough heat and great taste.
Chris
With the cold snowy weather we've had today, this looks so inviting!