Cheesy Chicken Air Fryer Taquitos

In search of a recipe to use up leftover shredded chicken? You’re in the right place. These air fryer taquitos transform 4 ingredients into a crispy, cheesy snack in about 20 minutes.

They’re also lower carb and highly customizable. I’ll run through everything you’ll need and give a few tips and tricks along the way. You’ll find the full printable recipe card at the bottom of the post.  

How to Make Taquitos in the Air Fryer

You’ll only need 4 ingredients: 

1. extra thin corn tortillas
2. shredded cheese 
3. cooked and shredded chicken 
4. cooking spray or oil 

If you’ve made my cheesy beef baked tacos, you’re familiar with the extra thin corn tortillas. They crisp up beautifully, and each tortilla has just 40 calories. Though if you have trouble finding them, any corn tortilla will do the trick. My air fried chicken quesadillas call for a corn and flour blend, which I really love.

Shredded Mexican Chicken 

I used my Mexican shredded chicken to fill these air fryer taquitos. It’s one of my favorite chicken recipes on this blog. Here’s a quick video on how to make it. 

If you’d rather swap it for shredded rotisserie chicken, I wouldn’t fault you for that. Though you might want to add a bit of seasoning if you go that route. You can also check out my baked chicken tacos recipe where I suggest more chicken options like my crispy carnitas style chicken, chicken al pastor and Traeger grilled chicken breast.

You could even swap the chicken for pork with my pork tenderloin carnitas or beef with my Ninja Foodi barbacoa beef and shredded Mexican beef.

Or if you’re having a Meatless Monday, check out my air fryer veggie enchiladas.

The Cheese

To keep these on the lower calorie end of the spectrum, each taquito has just 1/2 an ounce of shredded cheese. If you have some calories to spare or use a chicken that’s a bit lower in fat than my Mexican shredded chicken, you could bump the cheese to a full ounce (or more). 

Important Tip: Don’t skip the microwave step or your tortillas will crack when you try to roll them. If you don’t have a microwave, you can warm them in a skillet.

Air Fryer Notes

I used a 6.5-quart Ninja Foodi for air frying, hence the 7 taquitos perfectly nestled in the photo above. If you’re using a larger air fryer, you can extrapolate the chicken and cheese out to fill more tortillas. The cook time may change between different air fryers, especially different sizes of air fryers. 

Check on your chicken taquitos early and often if it’s your first time making these in a different air fryer. They can go from golden brown to burned pretty quickly. Also, the taquitos will continue to crisp up once you pull them out of the air fryer. 

How should I reheat these taquitos?

I air fried from refrigerated at 300ºF for 8-10 minutes. Using a low temperature should bring them back to life and restore the crispness without burning your taquitos. 

And because it’s always a question, I’m sure you can freeze these chicken taquitos. While I’ve not tested a reheat time, I’d use the same method of a lower temperature to thaw and reheat. 

Can I make these air fryer taquitos without an air fryer?

You bet. I would do everything the same and place the taquitos seal-side-down on a baking sheet. Spray or brush them with oil all the same and bake for 20+ minutes at 400ºF. My beef and cheese baked taquitos recipe makes 16 taquitos and takes about 30 minutes at 400ºF. The time may vary based on how many taquitos you make, the size of your baking sheet, and all that good stuff. It may take a little testing to get them just right. 

Serving Your Air Fryer Taquitos

I bet you can guess what I’ll suggest as a dip. That’s right, fat free Greek yogurt or yogurt + salsa. Guacamole works great as well. You could even do something like Greek yogurt + guacamole salsa like I used for my low carb chicken enchiladas, or my creamy jalapeño yogurt dip.

For the corn salsa you see in the photos, I cheated and went with store bought (Central Market has great stuff, okay?). Here’s a great corn salsa recipe if you wanted to make your own.

And that about covers it. If you have a recipe question I missed, hit the comments section at the bottom of this post. Enjoy your air fryer taquitos otherwise!