Instant Pot Chicken Cubes for Easy Keto Meal Prep Recipes & Meal Plans (2024)

One way to stay on track with a low carb diet is keto meal prep and the Instant Pot pressure cooker is a very useful tool. This recipe for Instant Pot chicken cubes will help you make and freeze cooked chicken cubes that you can then use in soups, stews, casseroles and more.This makes meal planning much easier and helps with weeknight dinners.

You might also like this Instant Pot chicken noodle soup recipe.

One of my favorite staples to have on hand is cooked frozen chicken. Sometimes I buy a rotisserie chicken from Costco and freeze the meat so I can make my son’s favorite wedding soup whenever he wants it.

I also like to use pre-cooked chicken in my casseroles, enchiladas, tacos, quesadillas, etc. That’s why today I made these Instant Pot chicken cubes that I could freeze for low carb recipes this fall.

A pressure cooker makes it so easy to make a big batch of delicious cooked chicken cubes which are great for meal prepping.

How to make Instant Pot chicken cubes for keto meal prep.

I found a 5.8 lb tray of boneless skinless chicken breast at Aldi which is why I decided to do this in the first place. It contained 6 boneless chicken breasts. Once I chopped it all up and weighed it, it was 4.7 lbs.

I ended up with 8 individual portions of a little over 1 cup of cubes each and 2 ½ cups chicken broth. The one cup portion works for me but you can make yours any amount that you want.

So here is how you cook boneless chicken breast cubes in the Instant Pot or any electric pressure cooker.

1. Cut up raw chicken breast into even sized pieces or chunks.
2. Season with salt and pepper (or any seasoning you want).
3. Place the cubes in the Instant Pot and then pour in some chicken broth (I used 1 cup of water and 1 teaspoon of Better than Bouillon chicken base).
4. Hit the manual button to pressure cook for 8 minutes.
5. Do a quick pressure release when done and let the chicken cool before freezing in ziplock bags. You want to do a quick releaseinstead of a natural pressure release because you don’t want it to continue cooking.
6. Make sure to drain the cooking liquid before freezing but save it for chicken broth which you can also freeze separately in an airtight container.

By the way, this is the Instant Pot that I use but you can use any kind of pressure cooker for this recipe.

Above you can see what it looks like before cooking and below what it looks like after. The amount is about the same but you get a good amount of broth.

If you don’t like the way the black pepper looks you can always use white pepper. And boneless chicken thighs would work too. Just follow the recipe the same way.

The cooking time was 25 minutes from start to finish in the Instant Pot. That includes the time to get it up to pressure and then cook.

As you can see below I got a big bowl full of chicken from this recipe. I also saved the liquid and used it for soup that day.

How I freeze cooked chicken breast.

How I like to prep chicken after I’ve cooked it is to use ordinary baggies and then place them in the freezer. For this batch I divided the chicken pieces into 8 baggies which held about a cup each.

Then I try to get as much air out of it as I can, press it closed and flatten so I can stack them in the freezer. You should also use a permanent marker and write the date on it but I always forget.

I use these frozen cubes a lot in my keto cooking so they are gone in a couple weeks so I never worry about them going bad.

You can go through a lot of baggies this way but I recently bought a very inexpensive food saver like this that I will be using next time. Since I freeze food alot, I don’t want them to have freezer burn.

This was not a planned post today, but I thought using cooked frozen chicken would be useful for those who are dieting.

I hope this simple recipe was some help to you when meal planning and to make dinner time a little easier.

The nutritional information for 1 serving is:
335 cals / 6.7g fat / 0.2g carbs / 86.8g protein

Keto cubed chicken recipes to try.

So when I make a big batch of Instant Pot chicken breast cubes I like to freeze them for all kinds of low carb healthy recipes like soups, stews, casseroles, crepes, on pizza or even to stuff peppers and chiles with.

Here are some of my best low carb recipes that use cooked chicken.

More keto meal prep recipes to try.

• breakfast bowls with eggs and sausage
• 5 low carb cauliflower salad jars
• western omelets in jars
• tasty low calorie vegetable soup
• 5 keto omelets
• make your own lunch meats
• sausage and egg cups
• whole chicken in slow cooker and bone broth

And if you need something to make with your prepped chicken, try this keto chicken salad recipe!

Instant Pot Chicken Cubes - low carb meal prep

Yield: 8

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Cook Time: 8 minutes

Inactive Time: 5 minutes

Total Time: 18 minutes

One way to stay on track with a low carb diet is meal prep and the Instant Pot pressure coooker is a very useful tool. This recipe for Instant Pot chicken cubes will help you make and freeze cooked chicken cubes for soups, stews, casseroles and more.

Ingredients

• 5 lbs bonesless, skinless fresh chicken breasts, cubed
• 1 cup water
• 1 teaspoon Better than Bouillon chicken base
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon pepper

Instructions

1. Season the cubed chicken with salt and black pepper, then add to the Instant Pot or other pressure cooker.
2. Mix water and Better than Bouillon to make broth and pour in the pot, cover with lid and set the steam release valve to the back. (NOTE you can use 1 cup of broth instead of the water and Better than Bouillon if you want though the BTB gives it more flavor.)
3. Manually cook for 8 minutes. Do a quick press release not a natural release as you don't want it to keep cooking.
4. Take off the lid and let chicken cool before freezing. Save the liquid to make soup with.
5. Divide the chicken into 8 freezer bags. Do not add any liquid. Make sure you get as much air out of the bags as possible. Flatten and write the date on the bag. Stack in the freezer for later use.

Recommended Products

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  Instant Pot Duo 7-in-1 Electric Pressure Cooker, Sterilizer, Slow Cooker, Rice Cooker, Steamer, Saute, Yogurt Maker, and Warmer, 6 Quart, 14 One-Touch Programs

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 8Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving:Calories: 335Unsaturated Fat: 0g

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