Chicken Quesadillas Appetizer

Cheesy Goodness…

Just thinking about chicken quesadillas makes me hungry. The chicken is wrapped in melted cheesy goodness…Yum!!

Easy and Delicious Chicken Quesadilla Recipe

This is a great recipe to take to a party as a perfect appetizer because it is such a great finger food. Who doesn’t love yummy appetizers on game day?

You can serve the cheesy quesadillas with your favorite dipping sauce like sour cream, fresh guacamole, pico de gallo, or taco sauce.

So Many Options!

Don’t forget to add your favorite toppings. Green onion, black beans, refried beans, and green peppers work well with quesadillas. If you want to kick it up a notch you can throw in some jalapeno peppers.

This recipe is also a great way to feed the family. We like it as a quick school night dinner idea. This Mexican dish can be served with a green salad and some white rice for a nice healthy dinner or lunch.

Rotisserie Chicken or Make Your Own Shredded Chicken?

We decided to make our delicious quesadilla recipe using rotisserie chicken. This will decrease the cooking time. You can also use boiled chicken breast, or you can make your chicken in an Instapot. We have prepared this recipe both ways. Each way works. But using your favorite rotisserie chicken is a great hack to make a delicious quesadilla in half of the time.

Sides You Can Make

You can use that extra time to make some of our favorite sides like our Chipotle Pico De Gallo, and our Garlic Jalapeno Guacamole. Add some sour cream and spinach or your favorite lettuce and voila you have the best quesadilla appetizer. 

What Kind of Cheese to Use?

Ideally, the best cheese to use is Mexican cheese like Asadero cheese, Oaxaca, or Chihuahua cheese. These are used in traditional Mexican recipes. They are not always easy to find. However, we found the Tillamook cheddar cheese blend or Mexican blend are a great alternative. 

Other Cheese options

If none of those options are for you, Monterey jack cheese or mozzarella cheese also have a nice mild flavor that works well. If you want to add even more spice add some pepper jack cheese as well.

Butter, Oil, or Cooking Spray

We chose cooking spray to give the wrap a crispier texture. Olive oil is a great option as well for a crispy texture. We do not recommend butter for the pan. Butter contains a bit of water which can lead to a soggy wrap.

My Favorite Part of a Quesadilla Is…

My favorite part of the quesadilla is getting the melted cheese to ooze out of the sides and create a sort of crispy cheese layer around the edges of the tortillas. So good

Ingredients

• Spinach Tortillas or Flour Tortillas
• Rotisserie Chicken
• Shredded Cheese
• Low Sodium Chicken Broth
• Cumin
• Chili Powder
• Onion Powder
• Garlic Powder
• Mrs. Dash
• Paprika
• Salt and Pepper to taste

**Full Recipe details are at the bottom of the post**

Directions

1. Place the whole chicken on a cutting board. You can use your hands and/or a knife to take apart the chicken.

2. Combine chicken. We like to add a little dark meat for flavor, but you can only use the white parts for an even healthier version.

3. In a medium bowl, you can use a fork or stand mixer to shred the chicken. You can also use the cutting board to shred the chicken.

4. Place a large skillet on the stove and turn on the stove to medium heat.

5. Add the cumin, chili powder, onion powder, garlic powder, Mrs. Dash, and Paprika to the pan.

5. Add 2 tablespoons of the low-sodium chicken broth to the skillet and stir all the spices together with the warm chicken broth for 1 minute or so.

6. Once the chicken broth mixture is warm, pour the shredded chicken into the pan.

7. Mix together the chicken broth mixture and the shredded chicken. Add more broth if needed. 

8. Remove chicken from the pan and place in a bowl.

9. Turn the stove on to medium-high heat and spray a large skillet with cooking spray. 

10. Place the tortilla in the pan and warm up for about 30 seconds. Then flip the tortilla.

11. Add the shredded chicken mixture in a single layer to the tortilla. If you want a thicker quesadilla, you can add more chicken. 

12. Add a layer of cheese on top of the chicken mixture. You want to add a second layer of cheese around the quesadilla in order to have some of that cheese melt off the side and that is where you get that crispy cheese. 

13. Lower the heat to medium to prevent the tortilla from burning before the cheese starts to melt. 

14. Fold tortilla wrap over cheese.

15. Check the quesadilla before flipping it to make sure is golden brown.

16. Flip the quesadilla once the cheese has melted and the bottom of the wrap is golden brown. You can remove it from heat into a cutting board. 

17. Cut quesadillas on the cutting board.  

18. Place quesadilla in your favorite dish. We added our favorite sides. Chopped Spinach, Pico de gallo, Garlic jalapeno guacamole, and sour cream.

Notes

• For a more authentic Mexican dish, you can use corn tortillas.
• If you are in the mood for some meat, you can substitute a pound of ground beef instead of chicken.
• Adding 1/2 of a diced red onion or 1/2 of bell peppers or 1/2 cup of fresh mushrooms to the chicken mixture adds a nice flavor or texture. Keep in mind that if you are making this as an appetizer not everyone like onions or peppers so we did not include them in this recipe.
• If you are wondering how to flip properly flip a quesadilla the video at the bottom of the page shows it.