Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili

by Sabrina Snyder

Last Update:

38 Comments

4.89 from 9 votes
6 Servings
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 4 hours
Total Time 4 hours
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Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili is the perfect, easy chili of your dreams. This warm, hearty 1-bowl meal is great by itself or with a side.

Most people stick to the more classic beans and peppers when making chili. Yes, this chicken chili has white beans and canned diced green chilis, but the super simple addition of the canned hominy is a game changer for this recipe.

White chili in slow cooker

Sabrina’s Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili

I first tried Slow-Cooker White Chicken Chili from a friend many years ago (full disclosure: she didn’t use the slow cooker). She was the first person I had ever seen add hominy to her White Chicken Chili, and the flavor was AMAZING. You’ll be so glad you tried it!

Recipe Card

Dinner, then Dessert

Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili Recipe

Slow Cooker White Chicken Chili is the perfect, easy chili of your dreams. This warm, hearty 1-bowl meal is great by itself or with a side.
Yield 6 Servings
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 4 hours
Total Time 4 hours
Course Main Course, Soup
Cuisine American
Author Sabrina Snyder
PrintRate

Ingredients
 

  • 4 chicken thighs , boneless, skinless
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
  • 4 cups chicken stock
  • 2 tablespoons chicken base (totally optional but delicious!)
  • 2 cloves garlic , minced
  • 1 yellow onion , diced
  • 25 ounces hominy , canned, drained
  • 14 ounces white beans , canned, drained
  • 4 ounces diced green chilis , canned, not drained
  • 2 teaspoons ground cumin
  • 1 teaspoon chili powder
  • 1 teaspoon dried oregano
  • 8 ounces cream cheese (optional)

Instructions

  • Add all the ingredients to your 4-quart slow cooker.
  • Cook on low for 7-8 hours or on high for 3-4 hours.
  • Remove and shred chicken, then return to slow cooker.
  • Optional: To make creamy add 1 package (8 ounces) of cream cheese in the last hour of cooking, then whisk well.
  • Top with freshly minced jalapeños, cilantro, chips, avocados, or cheese.

Notes

Note: Nutritional facts are calculated without cream cheese. With cream cheese the recipe is 583 calories per serving. This recipe makes 6 servings.

Nutrition

Calories: 450kcal | Carbohydrates: 41g | Protein: 27g | Fat: 20g | Saturated Fat: 5g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 4g | Monounsaturated Fat: 8g | Trans Fat: 0.1g | Cholesterol: 99mg | Sodium: 1509mg | Potassium: 773mg | Fiber: 7g | Sugar: 6g | Vitamin A: 218IU | Vitamin C: 4mg | Calcium: 101mg | Iron: 5mg

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Table of Contents

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Kitchen Tools and Ingredients

  • 3 Qt. Slow Cooker: The perfect size for side dishes for 10-12 people, your slow cooker can be an absolute bargain and a workhorse.
  • Chicken Base: I rarely buy boxes of broth because I keep the beef, chicken, and vegetable versions of Better Than Bouillon. It works great and takes up less space in your refrigerator.
  • Hominy: This flavor really sets the chili apart. You can use corn instead, but the flavors of the hominy are creamy, earthy, and not overly sweet like corn.
  • Diced Green Chiles: Green chilies are the perfect, easy addition. They add a lot of flavor, and you won’t want to leave them out.

Cooking Tips

  • I use chicken thighs because they hold up better in slow cooker cooking. You can certainly use white meat as well if you’d prefer.
  • If you are not using a chicken base in the recipe, use chicken stock instead of broth. Buy unsalted to control the salt levels of your soup.
  • Make this into a slow cooker creamy white chicken chili by adding cream cheese and sour cream.
  • Top with minced fresh jalapeños for extra brightness and fresh flavors.

More Delicious Chilis

Crock Pot white chicken chili with hardly any prep time at all!

These photos were used in previous versions of this post:

White chili in crock pot
ingredients for white chicken chili

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.

Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.

She is also the author of the cookbook Dinner, then Dessert – Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients, published by Harper Collins.

She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.

As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.

Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.

As a member of the community of food website creators Sabrina Snyder has spoken at many conferences regarding her experiences as a food writer including the Indulge Food Conference, Everything Food Conference, Haven Food Conference and IACP Annual Food Professionals Conference.

Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.

See more posts by Sabrina

Dinner, then Dessert, Inc. owns the copyright on all images and text and does not allow for its original recipes and pictures to be reproduced anywhere other than at this site unless authorization is given. Read my disclosure and copyright policy. This post may contain affiliate links.

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Comments

  2. Made this for the first time today as my go-to recipe went MIA( Son was ESRD and it was something he could eat and it had hominy in it which made us fans) . Itt was fabulous esp since i went a little hog wild with the chili and added poblano peppers. The cream cheese coooled things off a bit so others could eat it( i don’t mind the heat). And a big plus since i made it before work! Thanks

    Reply

  3. Loved it. Other recipes say a serving of white chicken chile has about 39 grams of protein per serving which sounds correct. Yours says 3.

    Reply

    1. This site has plug in that automatically calculates the nutritional information. If you’re on a specific diet, I would encourage you to calculate the information using your own tool to ensure accuracy. I will let my designer know that it something that needs to be looked into though. Thanks for letting me know.

      Reply

    2. I cook for my local American Legion and made this recently. It was my soup of the day and sold out with people calling the next day to see if there were any left. I will be making this again

      Reply

  5. Be better to start with two (2) cups broth and add more as needed. Mine came out a little more liquid that I like. Excellent recipe.

    Reply

    1. I’ve not tested it but I’m sure you could. I would recommend looking online for a recipe with similar ingredients and following that as a guide.

      Reply

  7. I made this for my daughter and husband for dinner tonight and they loved it! The only changes I made was to add an additional can of cannelini beans and a can of butter beans. I also added the cream cheese. The sauce was a little soupy so I was trying to thicken it up a little more. My daughter told me to make sure I make it again.

    Reply

    1. That sounds very delicious! I love the cream cheese add! If you need to thicken soups, you can always add a cornstarch slurry too. 🙂

      Reply

  8. I accidentally bought regular chicken stock with that and the added salt I’m afraid it will be too salty. What can I do to lighten it a bit without ruining the flavor?

    Reply

    1. Oh no, you can always add a raw potato to help add starch to dilute the saltiness. I hope you were still able to enjoy it!

      Reply

  10. This recipe is delicious and super easy! This weekend we had a cold snap and I wanted white chicken chili, but didn’t have a recipe in my collection, so I found this one. We only had 3 thighs, but I also wanted to put some bell pepper in, so I just considered the 2 small bell peppers I added as my 4th thigh, haha. SO GOOD!

    My husband likes spicy, so he thought it needed a little something extra, like crushed red pepper, but I was thinking maybe cayenne would go well. I’ll try a little of that the next time I make it. I, however, liked it as is! I topped mine with some shredded monterey jack cheese, and a handful of fritos! I’m having leftovers today for lunch, and I can’t wait! 🙂 Thanks for the recipe!

    Reply

  11. Confused, ingredients does not list 8 ounces of cream cheese but the instructions does. To be added?
    I will make over the weekend.

    Reply

  13. Very good but don’t need to salt the chicken if you use the chicken base with your broth. Also used morebeans and added diced jalapeños wild cooking. Added sour cream at the end for a bit of creaminess. 

    Reply

  18. I am somewhat confused about the Slow Cooker White Chicken recipe. Do you use the chicken base in place of the chicken broth, or both?

    Thank you.

    Reply

    1. You’ll want to use both the broth and the chicken base for this recipe. Use the base to make the broth and then add extra base to pump in more flavor. Hope this clears up any confusion. Enjoy!

      Reply