Slow-cooked Mexican Chicken

I love themed meals.  Much like the luau night I had with my husband, I also had a fiesta a couple months back with some gal pals.  While the luau night was just random fun, this fiesta was a celebration.  My girlfriends and I have been watching different TV shows together.  We’ll pick a show and a weekly meeting time and make our way through the seasons.  Then when we get to the big series finale viewing we’ll throw a feast!  We did a luau for Lost and as for this fiesta, we were bidding adios to Ugly Betty!

We had quite the menu with chips, salsa and queso dip (which I keep meaning to get the recipe for!) for starters.  Then for the main course we did a taco bar complete with soft and hard tortillas, shredded lettuce, cheese, sour cream and two meats – beef and yep, you guessed it, shredded chicken!  For sides we had some yummy Spanish rice and Sweet Corn Cake!  When it came time for dessert we were going to attempt homemade churros but were so stuffed (and with none of us having made them before weren’t too sure about the undertaking) that we passed on them.

I took on the Sweet Corn Cake (obviously) and the chicken.  I’ve always made seasoned ground beef for tacos.  I loved the idea of shredded chicken.  But that meant I didn’t have a go-to recipe so I searched my cookbooks and hit the internet.  I found a number of contenders but determined a crockpot recipe was ideal so that was the tie breaker.  And with this recipe* from the Celiac Family** looking super quick and easy and sounding delicious it was the big winner!

This slow-cooked Mexican chicken recipe was a hit at the fiesta!  So much so that one of the gals just asked me for this recipe the other day!  It shredded nicely and had a light, mild flavoring.  I also strained the picante sauce, like I always do.  I will note though to be sure to use a slotted spoon and give the juices time to drain off before plopping it in your taco.  By the time I filled my plate and sat down to enjoy, my chicken taco was a soggy mess.  A yummy soggy mess, but I will remember to drain it better next time nonetheless.

Sorry for the lack of pictures.  Everything was so good we just dug right in!  But, all-in-all, if you’re ever looking to add some variety to a taco bar, adding this shredded Mexican chicken will not dissappoint!

Now to figure out what TV show should be next on our list.  And most importantly what show would lend itself to a fantastic finale feast?!

UPDATE:  The links to the original recipe post have been removed and are below instead as credit to the poster. Unfortunately, the links result in 404 errors as their site is no longer active. I will be typing up my new version of this recipe and sharing here soon.

*http://celiacfamily.com/slow-cooked-mexican-chicken/

**http://celiacfamily.com/about/