This is how to cook a whole frozen chicken in an Instant Pot! From frozen to tender and juicy in 1 hour you’ll always be able to get dinner done. You can use any pressure cooker too like a Ninja Foodi the same way too.
Need to know how to cook a frozen whole chicken to tender quickly?? We’ve got it! This is just one of our Instant Pot recipes that people are amazed by. I was too until we made it a few times, shredded to make tacos, and my kids didn’t know the difference between this one and using a fresh bird.
We started this journey by making a frozen whole chicken in a Crockpot. That turned out well but of course took all day so this method was next. It was a total game changer. Now I use it weekly to shred and make tacos for Tuesday or when guests come over.
If this is kinda’ blowing your mind, we wouldn’t share anything that wasn’t a hit for us. Maybe you have made our Instant Pot frozen roast so you are kinda’ thinking this would work too. It will!! As a Ninja Foodi recipe use the lid that is not attached, or make in a Crockpot Express.
How Long Does it Take to Cook a Frozen Chicken in Instant Pot?
This will take about 1 hour which is a fraction of the time of roasting frozen whole chicken in oven and it came out so good. The biggest difference between the two is the texture of the skin, which you could change at the end. Pressure cooked will keep it from getting crispy. If you broil for a few minutes with oil when done you can “fix that” though.
What size chicken will fit inside a pressure cooker?
6 pounds is the max that will fit in a 6 quart I found. Of course you can fit a larger one if it were thawed because it is pliable to get inside there snugly. In this case it is firm so smaller it is.
Cage free chickens have less fat on them overall. This means you can get a smaller chicken with the same amount of meat as a much larger non organic chicken, and size matters when it comes to fitting a whole chicken inside your pot.
The meat is more tender Of course it depends on a lot of factors but I’ve purchased a lot of whole chickens of various varieties and will say that cage free are the best That’s my two cents sort a speak, take it or leave it really but thought I’d share my findings. This chicken I bought fresh, then stuck it in the freezer until it was rock hard, and cooked it about a week after purchasing it.
Do all whole chickens have a giblet bag?
Some do not have a giblet bag inside, so no worries (this one had no bag). Others contain a bag that is paper which wouldn’t do you harm if cooked inside accidentally. If yours has a plastic bag inside and it is cooked you should discard everything as it is not healthy to eat anything that has come into contact with cooked/heated plastic. Look at the bag when you buy it, it will usually say. Choose one without it.
How to Crisp the Skin
I will tell you that you can crisp it a bit like our air fryer whole chicken, but not to that extent. Since yours would already be cooked you’d only need 5 or so minutes. It will gets yours just like the rotisserie version you buy at the store but better. You can add lots of seasonings with some olive oil when it is cooked.
Then pop it into your Cosori, AirWave or Foodi for a few minutes and all of those flavors (or just use salt and pepper) will flavor the skin. Crispy crunchy outside is what you’ll get after just a few minutes.
If you’re just going to shred Instant Pot whole chicken it for tacos though you may not bother with these steps as you may just discard the skin anyway. I only do it if I’m serving it as is, cut up into pieces. If I am making sliders or throwing it on top of rice it doesn’t matter. I rip the skin off beforehand in those cases so why bother.
How to Thicken Drippings to Make Gravy
Also when your chicken is fall apart done and you remove it DON’T throw away the delicious broth at the bottom. You can use it to make pressure cooker gravy to pour on top of your chicken if you want.
This method allows you to purchase many whole chickens when they’re on sale and freeze them all, making them immediately ready to cook using this method whenever you want. We do this often since we have a deep freeze in the garage. It saves me money and trips to the store so it’s a win win.
I will tell you, I was surprised at how tender and flavorful it was….and like I said, the drippings made for some great gravy to serve on the side. The next time we made this I followed the same recipe but after putting it under the broiler (below photo) I shredded the meat and we made chicken soft tacos.
Frozen Whole Chicken Instant Pot Recipe
Equipment
- 1 trivet
Ingredients
- 4.5 pound chicken , frozen, mine was 4.4 lbs. so timing is appropriate for that size
- 1 cup chicken broth, or water
- 1 small onion, sliced
- 1 tsp seasoned salt
- 1 tsp garlic salt
Instructions
- Pour chicken broth or water into your pressure cooker followed by your sliced onions.
- Place your trivet on top of that (if it rests on the onions that is okay).
- Unwrap your frozen chicken and place it on top of your trivet.
- Close your lid and steam valve and set to high pressure for 60 minutes.
- Allow to naturally release steam for 15 minutes.
- Carefully remove chicken (it will want to fall apart), and put it into an 8×8 dish. Then you can make gravy from chicken drippings if you like.
- Sprinkle the top with seasoning salt, and/or whatever you usually add on top of your whole chicken when you bake it.
- Turn your broiler on and put your chicken in for 3-4 minutes or until skin crisps up as much as you’d like.
- Serve!! (we love shredding it from there and making soft chicken tacos)
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
After cooking a frozen chicken here are a few other frozen meat and easy Instant Pot chicken recipes to try. Use your Ninja Foodi too or other brand of electric pressure cooker:
Wow this looks amazing!! This is going to make dinner SO easy tonight. Can’t wait to take out my instant pot for this.
Haven’t made it yet , but it’s currently in the ninja foodi pressure cooking . I just have one question . After the hour of pressure cooking you say to do a quick release and then put the crisper lid on . Do I remove the liquid in the bottom . I had to use the deluxe rack because when I froze the chicken it got a little flattened so it wouldn’t fit in the crisper basket . Also , do I need to transfer it to the crisper basket before air frying it ? Still trying to get use to it and understand . Your answers to these questions would be greatly appreciated. I did a frozen chicken in my IP a few years back and I remembered it was good but not crunchy obviously, but it’s air crisping that fairly new to me
I used the rack instead of the basket from the start and used it the whole time it was crisping up. I also took out the drippings for use in other meals before crisping and it came out great. This is one of my new go-to meal makers!
I made this today exactly how you instructed and it turned out fabulous! I have an IP and used a frozen chicken that had no neck and giblets. It was moist and perfectly cooked. I put seasoning on it and under the broiler and at 4 minutes it was crispy and delicious. Thank you!
Love using my Foodie and was inspired by your recipe. Came out beautifully! Thank you for the info. Your recipe was great, spot on. Don’t worry about the naysayers. Some people wouldn’t be happy even if you showed up and cooked it for them. If you can own an electric pressure cooker, you know there is a ‘Come up to pressure and pressure release time’. An awful lot of recipes out there don’t add them in to the cook time, but you are a functioning adult. Use your common sense, after all, you didn’t expect her to tell you to plug the pressure cooker in!
Thank you Justine for a great Foodie recipe.
LOL…thanks hon 😉
I was wondering is it the same if I pressure cook for 45 minutes and let slow natural release for 15 minutes? Thank you!
Whoops. I thought I read 1 hour and quick release. You said 1 hr and slow release.
Slow release for me is just moving steam valve just slightly so steam comes out very slowly.
I don’t/want an IP! I have used my handy dandy MirrorMatic pressure cooker for everything under the sun for many, many years and see no need to switch to IP A whole 4 lb chicken will be done at 10 lb pressure in 25 minutes…..faster than IP!
I only have one comment/question. In the video it looks like you put the breast side down in the Instant Pot. Doesn’t the breast side always go up?
up/down, makes no difference!
I tried this today. I don’t have an IP, but the recipe seemed to use “pressure cooker” as a different thing so I tried it in my Clipso pressure cooker. I added three times the amount of chicken broth and two two largish onions. After 50 min, the broth had boiled away and the onions were burnt. I put it under the broiler, but the skin on top burnt a bit before the sun on the sides became crispy. The chicken was ok, very juicy but with a bit more pink in the middle than I would like. I’ll keep it for a curry.
I think that it might be better with an IP rather than a stove-top pressure cooker.
Pretty much every recipe you’re going to find online these days is meant for an electric pressure cooker, any brand. The issue with one that isn’t electric is the temp. is not going to stay as steady if it’s on the stovetop in order to follow the timing I, or any other recipe creator, recommends.
apparently you did not read the instructions how to cook chicken in the pressure cooker. what lb pressure did you set it? as long as you cooked it (50 min) the meat would have fallen off the bones which would have also been very soft; it’s a wonder you didn’t have the pot blow up since all the liquid had evaporated. Pressure cookers are nothing to mess around with. Always follow the directions to a ‘t’,,,that is what they are for.
Actually once the liquid boils away there will be no steam to stay at pressure so the pot won’t blow up. It will burn and warp but not blow up.
Tried this today for my very first IP meal. The chicken came up to the max line when I was sautéing it so I just used the driver under the chicken. It came out great. Then cooked the potatoes using the steam mode on high for 10 min & then made gravy. Successful first run!
Your cook time and total times are really misleading. With 60 minutes at pressure and a 15 minute natural release that’s an hour and 15 minutes not even taking into account the time to come to pressure. Once you add time to come to pressure you’re looking at bare minimum an hour and half for the whole recipe not an hour and five minutes.
This may be a silly question, but do you put the whole chicken in the freezer in the same packaging it came from in the store? If so what about the thingys inside the chicken? Are they cooked along with everything else inside the chicken? Or do you take them out and repackage the chicken before freezing? I’m anxious to try this recipe.
I added an explanation above to this for you and others.