Coming up with an easy dinner for busy nights is easier than ever with this Slow Cooker Root Beer Chicken recipe. It’s a main course dish that adds a fun twist to traditional chicken the whole family is sure to enjoy.
Easily create a full course meal by adding my delicious Slow Cooker Root Beer Baked Beans. These also pair well with Slow Cooker Root Beer Pulled Pork.
Why this root beer chicken recipe works
If you love root beer, you can’t go wrong with using it to create an awesome recipe. Because it has so much flavor, you won’t need many other ingredients, which is another plus. For this particular chicken recipe, all you need is a can of root beer and a bottle of Sweet Baby Rays barbecue sauce.
As for the seasonings, you’ll use pantry staples like garlic powder, onion powder, and cayenne pepper to create a flavor that is sure to keep you and your family wanting more.
Recipe Ingredients
- Chicken: I prefer to use boneless skinless chicken thighs because they are more flavorful and shred just as easily as other chicken cuts. Be sure to go for a pack that is well-trimmed of fat. Though you can use chicken breast if desired.
- Barbecue Sauce: Sweet Baby Rays is one of the most popular barbecue sauces used for slow cooking. You can use your favorite barbecue sauce though!
- Root Beer: You can use a brand of your choice; however, I use and recommend A&W.
- Seasonings: A combination of onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, and dried oregano is used to season the chicken prior to cooking.
Step-by-Step Directions
Step One – Place the chicken thighs into the slow cooker.
Step Two – Sprinkle the oregano, garlic powder, onion powder, and cayenne over the chicken.
Step Three – Pour over the bbq sauce.
Step Four – Pour over the root beer.
Step Five – Cover and cook on LOW for 7 hours.
Step Six – Shred chicken with two forks. Serve and enjoy!
How to serve
- Use this delicious root beer bbq chicken for sandwiches. You can use hamburger buns, hoagie buns, or even sub bread.
- You can also serve a helping of the root beer chicken over white rice, a bed of mashed potatoes, or on tortilla chips.
- Give your salad a twist by adding some of this chicken on top as well.
Recipes FAQs
Pretty much any cut of chicken you have on hand will work fine in this recipe, such as Chicken drumsticks, boneless skinless chicken breasts, bone-in thighs or breasts, chicken tenderloins, and chicken wings. Whatever you use, you must thaw your chicken first, frozen chicken is not recommended.
If you use a whole chicken, make sure it is thawed completely and cook until no pink is left, I suggest 8 hours on low for a whole chicken. The temperature for any chicken should be above 165 degrees Fahrenheit.
Using that brand is just a personal preference, but you can use any kind you’d like. You can use regular root beer or use a sugar free root beer (like a diet root beer).
If you want to use chicken wings in this recipe you won’t need to cook more than 5 hours on low. Beware that chicken wings in the slow cooker fall apart very easily, tasty but messy.
Place any leftover chicken in an airtight container and store in the fridge for up to 3 days.
Lettuce, sliced tomato and onion, jalapenos, and dollops of mayo, ketchup, and mustard would taste great with this chicken.
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Slow Cooker Root Beer Chicken
Equipment Needed:
Ingredients:
- 2 lbs. boneless skinless chicken thighs well trimmed of fat
- 1/4 tsp. dried oregano
- 1/4 tsp. garlic powder
- 1/4 tsp. onion powder
- 1 1/2 cups barbecue sauce I use Sweet Baby Rays Original
- 12 oz. can Root Beer I use A & W
- 1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper
Instructions:
- Add the chicken to the slow cooker.
- Sprinkle over the oregano, garlic powder, onion powder, and cayenne over the chicken
- Pour over the barbecue sauce,
- Pour over the root beer.
- Cover and cook on low for 7 hours.
- Shred chicken with 2 forks and serve over buns or rice.
How to Video:
Recipe Notes:
- Chicken drumsticks
- Boneless skinless chicken breast
- Bone-in thighs or breasts
- Chicken tenderloins
- Whole chicken (more time)
- Chicken wings (less time)
Nutrition Information:
Nutrition info is auto-generated. This information is an estimate; if you are on a special diet, please use your own calculations.
I was looking for something to cook for a large family for this upcoming Labor Day weekend to test yesterday. I found this recipe and was a bit confused on some of the negative comments but searched on line for comparable recipes and I decided to make this recipe as is with one exception…. I would test it at the 4 hour mark. I used thighs as instructed (just thawed out the Costco ones in the huge bag). This was perfect, delicious and done at the 4 hr. mark per the thermometer. The sauce in there was fine at this point was not thin as others stated.
What I decided to do was to leave this on the warm setting from then on after I shredded it for about 1.5 hrs. longer only because we weren’t ready to eat it. The consistency of the sauce was perfect and I put it on a Brioche bun with the North Carolina coleslaw I made. The recipe I used for coleslaw was a bit tangy alone, but over this chicken it was perfect. It seemed to compliment each other.
In any event this recipe is perfect and I will be doubling it for our huge family this coming weekend. Only difference would be to test it (a solid piece of thigh) at the 4 hr mark as I did – it was just over 165 degrees so then took all the pieces out and shredded it and put back into the slow cooker and reduced the setting to “warm” – and left it there till my husband and I were going to have dinner in an hour and a half. It was perfect but feel it would have been just as good at the 4 hr mark too. But I like the fact I can leave this dish on the warm setting and the plan is to have time to make a few other dishes to go with it. This is a 5 star dish for so many reasons. Just test for the 165 degrees it at the 4 hr mark as I know all slow cookers are different.
The comments are correct: good flavor, very bad proportions, waaaay too long cooking time. Even with 8oz of root beer and BBQ sauce and almost 4lbs of meat there was still alot of runny sauce. I thickened it wit some cornstarch + cold water, that helped. The thighs were done in 4.5 hours on low. This is very similar to “Golfer’s Chicken” (plenty of those recipes around), with better flavor and better measurements.
Can this be done in the instapot?
I don’t see why not!
Can I cook this on high in the crock pot? If I can how long should I cook it for?
4 hours will work great.
Can I use this receipe for Bear loin????
It’s hard to say without trying it first.
7 hours was to long for me! Chicken was over cooked unfortunately
What I did was boil the root beer down to syrup before adding it to the bbq sauce. Just a low bubbling so it doesn’t burn. It was a nice change to bbq chicken and a great way to use up flat root beer.
After looking at comments, I cut back on both BBQ sauce and root beer, using 8 oz of both root beer instead of the 12 oz listed. I also had 3 large chicken breasts weighing almost 3 pounds and figured that would help with the soupiness since there would be almost a third more meat. But it was still verrry runny. I left the lid off for awhile and that helped cook off some of the liquid. The flavor itself was pretty good and I might try it one more time with more meat and at least half the root beer and BBQ sauce. Will update rating/comments if that improves the outcome.
It was ok, but I won’t make it again. Root beer and BBQ sauce kept the chicken moist, but if I made it again I would cut the root beer in 1/2. Was just soupy and tasted too much like root beer. Fairly bland.
This is a fantastic (and easy) recipe! I used Sweet Baby Ray’s Honey BBQ sauce because that was the only SBR at the store. I served it on homemade burger buns (from Mommy Oven, on YouTube) with my husband’s recipe for coleslaw. He couldn’t stop raving about how much he loved it and I absolutely agree.
Hi .. can you use frozen chicken breast ?
I used frozen thighs for mine and it turned out great. To be on the safe side, I added an hour to the cook time and stirred a few times during that hour to even out the temperature (I used my instant read thermometer to check).
Hi I made this last night, I’m not sure if I did it right. Between the BBQ sauce and the rootbeer it came out very soupy. I strained off the excess fluid and added a little more bbq sauce to it. Still had great flavor. Next time I’ll either double the amount of chicken or use half as much bbq sauce and rootbeer!
Hi, I love your recipes. Can you use diet root beer in this recipe?
I have heard of people doing it successfully! If you are used to the taste of diet, it will be fine! I actually LOVE diet root beer to drink, tastes great.
I did for mine because that was what I had. It turned out great!
How long should I cook this if I use chicken wings instead of thighs?
I would do the same amount of time.
Thank you for this recipe! So easy and huge hit in my house! My husband and stepsons couldn’t stop raving about it! Will make again and again. Used chicken breasts instead of thighs but didn’t change anything else. It was perfect!