Chicken Fajita Casserole

With six ingredients and a ten-minute prep time, this is likely the easiest fajita chicken casserole recipe you’ll come across. And in case you’re not sold on simplicity alone, each serving of this one pan meal has 30 grams of protein, 8 grams of fiber, and only 335 calories. Boom.

The Six Ingredients & Their Alternatives

As you’d expect, chicken and fajita veggies are the two major components. The recipe calls for pulled rotisserie chicken, but you’re welcome to use any cooked chicken. (I have a solid Crockpot Mexican chicken recipe that works great for bulk protein prep to use in recipes like this.)

To save time, the recipe calls for frozen fajita veggies. Costco sells a great bulk option in PuraVida’s flame grilled fajitas rajas, and I’ve used Trader Joe’s fire roasted peppers and onions in recipes like my turkey enchilada skillet. If you want to use fresh veggies, you can toss them in the skillet with a bit of olive oil and sauté them before adding all the other ingredients.

That leaves black beans, enchilada sauce, corn tortillas, and cheese. I wanted to make this chicken casserole a 5-ingredient recipe, but the beans really add something. Highly recommend the beans.

I used a jar of red enchilada sauce from Siete. Green enchilada sauce or really any type of Mexican or Tex-Mex sauce would work great in this casserole. I recently used Good & Gather birria sauce to make a bunch of ground beef birria creations, and I have another rotisserie chicken recipe with a jar of mole sauce (enmoladas casserole).

While you can swap corn tortillas for high protein and/or high fiber tortillas, the flavor of corn tortillas works perfectly here. I don’t think the carbs saved or protein gained are worth the swap.

And finally, the cheese. Keen-eyed home cooks will notice the cheese in the photo above looks awfully similar to pre-shredded cheese from a bag. Forgive my ingredient procurer (my wife), she forgot we always use freshly grated cheese for best results. You should do the same.

Garnishes and Pairings

Your typical Tex-Mex and Mexican garnishes like a squeeze of lime juice, fresh cilantro, and salsa or hot sauce are about all you need. I also like a drizzle of Mexican crema (or lower calorie nonfat Greek yogurt mixed with a tiny bit of water), cotija cheese, and a little salsa macha or sprinkle of chipotle chile flakes.

As crunch-addicts and textural eaters, we served this casserole as a stand-alone meal on its own with a few tortilla chips. Other options might include a bit of Mexican rice or Mexican cauliflower rice, fresh greens with a lime vinaigrette, or fresh slices of jicama.

However you end up serving this chicken fajita bake, I hope you enjoy it. Be sure to let me know if you do in a recipe review on the recipe card below. Good luck and have fun!