Creamy White Bean and Chicken Chili

This thick and creamy chili is filled with chicken and white beans, and the added spice will help keep you warm on cool nights.  Cook it up in your Instant Pot, then top it with some grated cheese and serve with some warm and crusty rolls for a perfect dinner. 

It’s soup weather, y’all.

The weather here in Rhode Island is a fickle mistress.  Just a few weeks ago, our weather was still mostly summery.  We had all the windows open in the house, and fans running.  We didn’t really want to use the oven.  A week or two ago it was still warm enough to keep the windows open, even if we’d put away the fans.

This week?  It may as well be November.  The Tart is bundling herself up in blankets and bathrobes and, most telling, wearing socks around the house.

Warms the Heart

Soup is one of the most perfect comfort foods.  Eating tomato soup with grilled cheese brings us back to those rare snow days we would get.  We’d spend the morning playing in the snow (but not in the front yard where I’d ruin the snow, according to my grandfather – Tart).  We’d come in for a lunch of hot soup with a sandwich or saltines with butter, served on a Dukes of Hazzard TV tray, then spend the afternoon watching game shows and soaps and Dialing for Dollars, while our snowsuits and boots dripped puddles by the backdoor.  These days, we take comfort in a hot soup, eaten on the couch, holding a hot ceramic crock in our hands while watching prime time legal dramas and reality television.  Even as grownups, there’s nothing better.

So with the dip in temperatures we’ve seen lately, we wanted to make something to bring back that comforting warmth, but wasn’t the same old chili we normally make.  Typically, our chili is dumping a pound or so of ground meat and a couple of cans of beans into the crockpot with a pre-made spice packet from the prepared foods aisle at the grocery store.  You know the one, it comes in a little bag that’s been languishing on a shelf somewhere between the instant mashed potatoes and the boxed fajita kits.  While those chili kits are easy enough, they never seem to have as much seasoning and spice as we want.  I’m not talking about the heat from the chili powder, I’m talking about the overall flavor.  If you’re looking for a chili where the dominant flavors are salt and stale cayenne pepper, by all means, buy a kit. It’s fast, and edible, but nothing beats homemade.

Lots of Loving Spoonfuls

This time around we wanted to make something that would let us (and you!) control everything that went into the meal and bring out those flavors.  Firstly, we wanted a good, thick chicken chili.  If we wanted broth, we’d make a soup, ok?  Next, we wanted plenty of flavor, with seasoning that isn’t tailored to the lowest common denominator.  Lastly, we wanted to make a big batch in a relatively short amount of time.

Our chicken chili has all of that.  The shredded chicken has all the moisture you would expect from pressure-cooked chicken, and the white beans help to thicken things up, along with a generous amount of milk.  We topped our with grated cheese and some red pepper flakes, and served it with some hot dinner rolls.  

This recipe makes enough for at least six bowls of it, which is three meals in our house.   We did ours in the Instant Pot, but it would probably work just as well if you dumped the beans and chilies, broth, spices, and chicken into a slow cooker, then adding the rest at the end.  Additionally, by adding more broth and milk, you can easily modify the recipe to spread it out even more.  You could also forego the chicken, add more beans or chickpeas, and use vegetable broth if you want to make it vegetarian.  

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Creamy White Bean and Chicken Chili

This thick and creamy chili is filled with chicken and white beans, and the added spice will help keep you warm on cool nights. Cook it up in your Instant Pot, then top it with some grated cheese and serve with some warm and crusty rolls for a perfect dinner. 

Course Dinner, Lunch

Cuisine American

Keyword beans, chicken, chili, creamy, spicy

Prep Time 5 minutes

Cook Time 30 minutes

Total Time 35 minutes

Servings 6 servings

Ingredients

• 3 chicken breasts boneless and skinless
• 1 small yellow onion finely diced
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 2 14oz cans cannellini beans drained and rinsed
• 2 cups low sodium chicken broth
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• 1 tbsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 4oz cans chopped green chiles
• 1/4 cup butter
• 2 cups milk warmed
• 6 tbsps flour
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• dried red pepper flakes optional
• salt and pepper to taste
• grated cheese, Monterrey jack or a Mexican blend to garnish

Instructions

1. With your Instant Pot on the saute setting, heat your oil.  When it’s hot and shimmery in the bottom of the pot, add the onions and saute until softened (about 3 minutes if you’ve diced them small, or a minute or so if you’ve done them in a food processor).  Add in the garlic and saute for 30 seconds, then turn off the saute setting.

2. Add in the beans, chicken broth, chili powder, cumin, pepper, 1 tsp salt and green chilies. Stir to combine.

3. Add the chicken breasts to the pot.  Cover the Instant Pot and secure the lid, making sure valve is sealed.  Set the manual button or pressure cook button to 20 minutes.  Turn off the pot after 20 minutes, letting the pot naturally release for 10-15 minutes. Release any remaining pressure.

4. Remove the chicken and place on a cutting board. Shred it and return it to the pot.
   

5. Add the flour to the warm milk and whisk together until you’ve made a smooth slurry.  Return the pot to the saute setting and drop in the butter, stirring until it has melted into the chili.  Gradually stir in the milk and flour slurry, letting mixture thicken the chili, about 5 minutes. 

6. Add sour cream to the chili, and stir until it has melted into the mixture and is completely combined.  Season with more salt and pepper to taste.  Serve with red pepper flakes and grated cheese, if desired.
   

Recipe Notes

Modified from 365 Days of Slowcooking’s recipe for white chicken chili.

Have you given this recipe a try, or do you have an idea of what could be improved?  Leave us a comment below!  We’d love to hear from you!

– Tart & Beard

The Tart

The Tart likes to eat, cook, and bake things.  She eats to work out, and she works out to be able to eat.