This is how to make our Instant Pot frozen chicken and rice recipe in 15 minutes. You can use a Ninja Foodi or other pressure cooker like our Frozen Chicken Thighs Instant Pot but together with white rice and vegetables too.
Instant Pot recipes with frozen chicken are delicious. This one is easy to prep with breasts and carrots cooked together under high pressure. We will explain step by step how to cook frozen meat in a pressure cooker here.
Yes we sure do love making Instant Pot Chicken Thighs and Rice for our family dinners but I don’t always remember to thaw the meat ahead of time so this is our go to. This way you can make the same dish any day of the week. Use bone-in or boneless skinless depending on what you have in the freezer.
We are going to use almost 2 Cups Instant Pot White Rice for this one which means it will feed about 4 people. And notice that I mention it is white, not brown. Unfortunately the darker the color the longer it takes and cooked together will yield overcooked meat so stick with long grain or Jasmine is even better.
We first came up with our most popular Instant Pot Chicken and Rice dish when I first got this “magic pot”. In this one I used the basic same basic ingredients but had to fool with the timing to get it just right.
Ingredient Notes
You are going to start off with medium sized, 4 chicken thighs frozen, we used bone-in skin on. If you wanted to start off with boneless that would be fine it will just fall apart and not be able to stay together.
You are going to add 1.5 c jasmine rice or long grain white rice, do not use brown rice as the timing wouldn’t be correct, just don’t.
Chicken broth is recommended but you could use stock or water. I will say the latter won’t give it nearly as much flavor so that isn’t recommended.
I like to add 2 carrots peeled, cut into thick dials is a great add in but you could just add 1 cup frozen vegetables that are mixed with carrots, peas and green beans
We do share How to Season Frozen Chicken here. It’s a must. Won’t stick as well as if it were thawed but that is okay. Cooked in the same pot the flavors will permeate throughout the dish anyway. Use whatever you normally would if you baked them, we do have suggestions for you below too though.
You can easily just cook Frozen Chicken in the Instant Pot with some broth if you don’t want to add the other ingredients but really? Why wouldn’t you. Throwing everything in not only makes your meal prep that much easier but all the flavors can work together with the seasonings and all.
Tips
Keep in mind that from start to finish this will take about 30 minutes to complete. It does take 10ish minutes to start the timing because the pressure needs to rise at the beginning and that takes some time.
The reason you just don’t do a quick release immediately when cooking this or any of our Instant Pot Chicken Thigh Recipes is that the sudden suck out of steam will suck the moisture out of your meat at the same time too, no good. Allowing at least 5 minutes for it to rest will seal that in and the pressure won’t be as intense when you release it.
Frozen Chicken and Rice Instant Pot Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 4 medium chicken thighs, frozen, we used bone-in skin on, could use 4 small boneless breasts
- 1.5 cup jasmine rice, white rice
- 2 cup chicken broth
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp onion powder
- 2 large carrots, peeled, cut into thick dials
- 1 stalk celery, cut into bite size chunks
Instructions
- In the bottom of the pressure pot, put rice, chicken broth, 1 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp pepper. Stir well. Place frozen chicken thighs on top of the rice. Sprinkle tops with 1 tsp salt, garlic powder, and onion powder.
- Place chopped carrots and celery if adding vegetables around the meat. Set to pressure on HIGH for 11 minutes. Allow pressure to naturally release for 5 minutes before allowing for a quick release.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
And now you know that Cooking Frozen Chicken Thighs is possible!! We have done this all different ways, in the oven, air fryer and now you can see how it is done quickly all together. I know, you still may not believe that it can be wonderfully delicious but take our word for it. When you have a forgetful day it’s a game changer.
Now you may have a few questions on How to Cook Frozen Chicken before you give our recipe below a whirl, I get it.
Can you reheat chicken and rice from frozen?
You could but it is better if you thaw it in the fridge overnight first. You can cover with a paper towel and microwave in 30 second increments breaking up and stirring after each bout if you must do it right out of the freezer though.
Made this twice in insta pot. Got the food burn message both times. End up cooking it in Dutch oven on the stove as family loves the taste. Frustrating I can’t get it to work in the Instapot.
We make this weekly, you canNOT stir the rice or submerge too far down. Make sure chicken covers the bottom, whisk soup and liquid together before adding, gently submerge barely underneath liquid the rice and cook. I HIGHLY recommend you buy a nonstick pot too which will likely fix all your issues.
This should have more reviews – it’s so easy and you can add any sauce to it after it’s cooked. Thank you so much for this!!
yay!
We loved this recipe! I added some cheese on it and it was Devine. Thank you!
so glad
Made this this morning with a couple of changes due to a lack of ingredients listed in the recipe: used onions instead of onion powder, no carrots, chicken drumsticks, and an extra cup of broth (I like really wet rice).
I plan to make this again. Easy, quick, and tasty.