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    Home » Recipes » Sous Vide » Sous Vide Chicken » Sous Vide Frozen Chicken Breast Recipe – a How to Guide | Sip Bite Go

    Sous Vide Frozen Chicken Breast Recipe – a How to Guide | Sip Bite Go

    Published: Apr 2, 2022 · Modified: Jul 18, 2022 by Jenna Passaro · This post may contain affiliate links.

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    Cook fresh or freezer chicken breast with this guide!! Did you know you can sous vide frozen chicken breast without thawing it first? Today I’m going to share how to sous vide chicken breast that’s frozen OR fresh / thawed. So whip out the precision cooker and I’ll teach you how to make it…

    Making a Sous Vide Frozen Chicken Breast Recipe with lemon and garlic
    If you’re looking for sous vide prepared meals, this one’s perfect candidate—we make a ton of sous vide frozen chicken because it’s super convenient, and only takes an extra hour of cooking time.

    Table of Contents

    • Why this is the best sous vide chicken recipe…
    • Can you cook frozen chicken sous vide style?
    • Use this recipe for fresh or frozen chicken
    • Time and Temperature
    • Ingredients
    • How to cook sous vide chicken breast from frozen
    • How long can frozen chicken breast stay in the freezer?
    • Vacuum seal flavors with the chicken then freeze it
    • Marinating sous vide chicken before freezing it
    • More ideas for meal prepping
    • Why sous vide meal prep with frozen chicken breast?
    • Can you sous vide frozen chicken legs, thighs, wings?
    • So… can you sous vide a frozen whole chicken?
    • Finishing out the dish
    • FAQs
    • Final Cooking Tips
    • The Perfect Sous Vide Setup
    • Are you a foodie, too?
    • How to Sous Vide Frozen Chicken Breast Recipe | Sip Bite Go

    Why this is the best sous vide chicken recipe…

    • It’s NEVER dry!
    • Chicken cooked sous vide style is always tender.
    • When it comes to cooking chicken breast for meal prep, sous vide is a winner because it’s easy to make ahead and cook from frozen.
    • Simple seasonings… use just a little salt and pepper, or throw in some lemon slices if you’d like.
    • NEW TO SOUS VIDE COOKING? Beginners, scroll to the bottom of this recipe for a full-length video I made just for you.
    sliced chicken breast sous vide cooked

    Can you cook frozen chicken sous vide style?

    Yes, it’s a handy trick for meal planning. There’s barely any difference when vacuum sealing then sous vide cooking frozen chicken breast vs. fresh or thawed.

    In this guide, you’ll learn…

    1. How to season chicken in the vacuum seal bag before freezing sous vide chicken
    2. The time and temp for sous vide frozen chicken breast
    3. Tips for freezing whole chicken for sous vide cooking
    4. How to finish and serve frozen sous vide chicken
    5. And more… because I have a lot to say about sous vide freezer meals!

    Use this recipe for fresh or frozen chicken

    The best part about this recipe is that cooking sous vide chicken breast from frozen tastes just as great as cooking fresh chicken sous-vide style. That’s so important, because why would you bother if you didn’t know the results would be spectacular?

    Time and Temperature

    The general rule of thumb is to sous vide chicken breast that is frozen at 140 degrees F for an additional 60 minutes.

    This is why choosing a cook time and temperature for sous vide frozen chicken breast is simple. Add on 60 minutes to your sous vide cooking time. So if you normally cook sous vide chicken at 140 degrees for 1 hour, adjust the time to 2 hours and keep the temperature at 140 degrees.

    This isn’t the truth for all cuts of chicken, though, so read on. Below I’ll get into the nitty-gritty details of it all.

    Choose the right chicken sous vide temp and time for perfectly cooked white or dark meat. Get temperatures and times for breast, thighs, legs, and from frozen.

    Ingredients

    Use this recipe as a base. Most obviously, you’ll need boneless skinless chicken breasts or chicken tenders, then you can add any salts, garlic, lemon, or herb combinations that you’d like.

    You can also freeze marinated chicken sous vide with balsamic dressing or bbq sauce if you’d like.

    sous vide chicken breast with anova sous vide machine
    Who would have thought bagged chicken dunked in hot water could create a gourmet meal?

    How to cook sous vide chicken breast from frozen

    Prepare to be mind-blown at how super simple this is.

    Step 1. (You can start with fresh or frozen chicken breasts) Season chicken breasts with garlic salt and pepper. Add any other ingredients you want to cook the chicken with to the bag, like sliced lemons or fresh herbs. Vacuum-seal seasoned chicken breast in a flat layer and freeze until it’s time to cook.

    vacuum sealing sous vide chicken breast tenders

     Step 2. Preheat sous vide machine to 140 ºF. When it comes to temperature, drop the vacuum-sealed frozen chicken breast in the sous vide bath. Cook frozen sous vide chicken at 140ºF for 2 hours.

    drying sous vide chicken after it cooks
    It’s important to pat chicken dry after sous viding it so it crisps up on the outside in the cast iron skillet.

    Step 3. Cool cooked chicken (in a vacuum-sealed bag) in an ice bath for two minutes. If I’m in a rush, I skip the ice bath. Remove chicken from the bag and pat dry.

    finishing chicken in a cast iron skillet
    It takes just a few minutes to finish chicken breast sous vide style in a cast-iron skillet. This will lock in so much flavor, although it’s technically fully cooked (and you could eat it) after the sous vide bath.

    Let’s be honest – sous vide chicken looks strange – doesn’t it?

    Step 4. Finish the chicken any way you’d like: on the grill, with an air fryer, in the broiler, or how I’m going to explain next: in a pan on the stove.

    Add olive oil to a cast iron skillet on medium-high heat. Remove lemons or any other ingredients that will burn if they are seared. Sear chicken breast for 1-5 minutes on each side, until browned to your liking. Transfer to a cutting board to cool for ~10 minutes then serve.

    sous vide chicken tender breasts finished with cast iron skillet

    How long can frozen chicken breast stay in the freezer?

    The beauty of vacuum sealing means that frozen chicken breast can last a couple of years in the freezer. You can also use a ziplock bag to freeze sous vide chicken and cook it later, but it won’t last as long.

    See more on vacuum sealing vs. ziplock bags for sous vide cooking.

    vacuum sealed sous vide chicken with lemon slices

    Want something tasty to make for weeknight meals? I’m currently obsessed with an Italian-inspired sous vide dinner dish… See how to make sous vide lemon chicken breasts.

    See how to cook smoked chicken breast…

    Vacuum seal flavors with the chicken then freeze it

    Let’s chat more about adding flavors to frozen sous vide chicken before vacuum sealing it.

    But, that does mean that you need to do that prep beforehand and package it up in the right way so all you need to do when it comes time to cook is drop your chicken into your sous vide multi-pot or sous vide stick water bath..

    If you want to cook your chicken with a few additional ingredients such as onions, garlic or shallots, as well as your favorite spices, it is as simple as seasoning your chicken and seal the bag.

    Marinating sous vide chicken before freezing it

    If you want to cook your chicken with a marinade, then things can get a little more difficult, since it can be difficult to vacuum seal a liquid without a chamber vacuum sealer.

    What you can do instead is pour the marinade over your chicken, then freeze it. Once the liquid marinade has frozen solid, then you can seal it as you normally would, making it much easier to get rid of any extra air in the bag. Use a Ziploc bag if that’s what you have on hand.

    Chicken is sometimes underrated when it comes to sous vide cooking. See my guide to the best sous vide chicken recipes.

    More ideas for meal prepping

    One of the best things about cooking chicken sous vide from frozen is that it eliminates almost all of the prep time from when you’re about to cook the chicken; it’s every meal-prepper’s dream.

    At the end of the week, I like to do a refrigerator cleanout to use up leftover fruits and vegetables in creative recipes. In salads, soups, and even meatballs. You see, my husband is convinced that he’s never eaten a meatball without a hidden vegetable in it – – and, he’s right. Lucky guy.

    The end of the week refrigerator cleanout is perfect for meal prepping frozen chicken for sous vide cooking. For example, leftover lemons are cut in slices and popped in a bag with chicken tenders and herbs from my kitchen herb garden.

    A couple of weeks later, we sous vide frozen chicken with lemon slices to make sous vide chicken piccata pasta or another sous vide lemon chicken dish with garlic and fresh herbs like rosemary or thyme.

    Another great way to use up leftover vegetables, outside of sous vide recipes, is in a make-ahead Mexican salad, or a Caprese salad, or a tortellini pasta salad with some sous vide corn on the cob. These easy side dishes are so tasty, a couple of them were featured on air on the local Portland morning news.

    meal prep sous vide chicken with limes for lunch
    This here is lunch – – delicious!

    Why sous vide meal prep with frozen chicken breast?

    You probably haven’t landed here because you have endless amounts of time to cook dinner every night. Me either!

    Before becoming a mom, spending endless amounts of time in the kitchen was no big deal. It was fun, it was creative, and it was an activity I could do while sipping on some delicious Oregon Pinot Noir. Win-win.

    Back then, saving time – meal prep – was not my thing because I lived in downtown Portland and could walk to a handful of grocery stores and restaurants. That’s how I spent tons of time creating this list of the best Portland lunch restaurants.

    But, alas, my 30s caught up with me, and we settled down. Chef Hubs and I are proud new parents to a 1.5-year-old food critic. If he doesn’t like it, he throws the food on the floor. In fact, even if he likes the food, it may also end up on the floor. But that’s beside the point…

    Now that we live in the suburbs, cooking chicken sous vide from frozen is a regular thing around here. We buy and freeze in bulk from Costco and online butchers. Then we vacuum seal meat in bulk and cook frozen steak sous vide, and chicken breast sous vide from frozen 1-2 times a week.

    sous vided chicken breast meal prepped
    I’ve got this whole sous viding frozen chicken thing down to a science. It takes 15-20 minutes of prep work to line up weeks of chicken dinners with various flavored salts and seasonings. Then they are frozen and when it’s a few hours out from dinner, the frozen chicken cooks in the sous vide bath for an extra hour. It sounds like a few steps, but it’s one of the most hands-off way to make a perfectly cooked chicken dinner. Plus, you can’t argue with making 2-3 meals at a time.

    Can you sous vide frozen chicken legs, thighs, wings?

    Yes, sous viding frozen chicken legs, thighs, and even sous vide chicken wings works pretty much the same as chicken breast. Plan to add 60 minutes on to the sous vide cook time for these smaller cuts of chicken.

    Make sure to vacuum seal chicken in a flat layer so it thaws and cooks evenly.

    whole chicken sous vide cooked on a baking sheet
    Isn’t she lovely? Isn’t she wonderful… This here is beautiful whole chicken sous vide style. You have to try it! So juicy. So moist. So much better than any other chicken cooked conventionally because you can basically never dry it out.

    So… can you sous vide a frozen whole chicken?

    My favorite method of sous viding a whole chicken from frozen is to spatchcock chicken before vacuum sealing it. When you sous vide frozen whole chicken that’s butterflied or spatchcocked, add on 2-3 hours to the cook time just to be safe. The general rule of thumb is to add about 50% cook time when cooking a whole chicken sous vide from frozen.

    A whole chicken, in tact, takes much longer to thaw, and therefore, adding one hour of cook time may not safely cook the whole chicken sous vide style. So that’s why I always add 2 hours.

    sous vide chicken and lemon pasta dish recipe
    Here’s an easy way to cook sous vide chicken for dinner – this is a sous vide chicken and lemon pasta dish that’s always very popular (ie. no leftovers) at my house.

    Finishing out the dish

    The whole point of cooking frozen chicken sous vide style is convenience. Which is why I like to keep the whole meal around chicken cooked this way super simple. Here are some ways to enjoy sous vide frozen chicken for dinner.

    • Sous vide chicken tacos served in mini corn tacos with red cabbage and carrot slaw
    • Lemon garlic pasta with sous vide fried chicken piccata, red wine caramelized red onions, and roasted cherry tomatoes
    • Sous vide BBQ chicken thighs (the chicken is frozen with bbq salt then finished in the broiler with bbq sauce)
    • Chicken tenders sous vide style cooked then wrapped in overnight sous vide bacon and broiled until the bacon is crisp
    • Nashville style sous vide chicken
    • Use sous vide chicken in place of oven baked chicken breast in caprese chicken sandwiches
    • In chicken rice bowls with ridiculous amounts of diced avocado and chipotle hot sauce
    • Use as a topping for any of these gourmet nacho ideas

    You can basically add on any tortillas, soft sandwich buns, or make a chicken salad with leftover frozen sous vide chicken.

    Like this recipe? Try my recipe for super crispy sous vide boneless chicken thighs. They are seasoned with pepper, paprika, and cumin; and they are delicious served with a side of couscous or steamed rice, salad, and my creamy jalapeno ranch sauce. 

    sous vide cooking chicken breast from frozen

    FAQs

    Do you need to give sous vide cooked chicken breast an ice bath?

    Basically, NO, although I often do! If you’re going to eat the chicken immediately after sous viding, you don’t have to. But an ice bath after sous vide cooking chicken breast is a great idea to stop the cooking process and cool it down quickly if you’re going to store it in the fridge to eat later.

    For a little background… When sous vide cooking first became popular years ago, I would put everything in an ice bath after sous viding it. These days, unless I’m cooking sous vide steak and plan to add MORE heat to it after, like in a mayo seared sous vide ribeye for example, then I don’t always pop the food in an ice bath.

    How do you bag chicken breast with the water displacement method?

    Great question if you don’t have a vacuum sealer and want to use ziplock bags instead. For the water displacement method, you need to add the chicken breast to a sous vide safe (high temp) ziplock bag. Don’t seal the bag just yet! Then push the bag under water, allowing the water pressure to push the air to the top of the bag, forcing it all out the top. Once all the air is out, you can seal the bag tightly and sous vide cook chicken breast without it floating to the top of the water bath.

    Final Cooking Tips

    • Add 1 hour cooking time to basic (thin) cuts of sous vide chicken including chicken breast, tenders, wings, thighs, legs.
    • Remember: don’t sous vide a whole chicken from frozen intact and add on 1-hour thinking that will cook it – – instead, spatchcock it to break down the chicken and add on 2 hours to be safe.
    • Add flavor to the vacuum seal bag before freezing sous vide chicken – try lemons, flavored salt, herbs, and garlic.
    • Don’t forget to finish your sous vide chicken to lock in ultimate flavor. Grill, air fry, broil or cast iron skillet fry sous vide chicken to finish it.
    • Remove lemon wedges or anything else that will burn, before finishing sous vide chicken in a cast-iron skillet.

    The Perfect Sous Vide Setup

    Everyday I’m asked, “what do you need to sous vide food?”. Here’s my answer.

    1. A sous vide machine.
      Option 1: “stick” models like the Joule, Anova, or Instant Pot Slim.
      Option 2: “multipot” models like the SousPreme or InstantPot Duo Evo Plus.
    2. Sous vide container.
      If using a sous vide “stick” model, you need something to hold the water the food cooks in, like a bucket or stockpot.
    3. Bags to cook sous vide food.
      Keep it simple and sous vide in ziplock gallon bags, or get fancy like me with a vacuum sealer setup.
    4. Nice-to-have accessories for sous vide cooking.
      – Sous vide weights to hold down food that floats.
      – Mini mason jars for desserts and sous vide egg bites.
      – Cast iron skillet to sear sous vide steaks to finish them.
    5. My sous vide cookbook with 100+ recipes.

    Are you a foodie, too?

    There’s so much you can do beyond this guide to freeze then sous vide chicken. Obviously I’m super passionate about sous vide cooking and meal prep, which is perhaps why Sip Bite Go has become one of the most popular sous vide blogs on the interwebs.

    Stay in touch to get new videos and recipes on Instagram @sipbitego.

    For in-depth tutorials on sous viding frozen foods and more, subscribe to the Sip Bite Go channel.

    The Home Chef's Sous Vide Cookbook with Sous Vide Chicken with Sweet Baby Rays BBQ Sauce and sous vide chicken legs

    Oh, I couldn’t help but share one last pic…

    Most of the sous vide recipes I share like this one for sous vide BBQ chicken legs is 90% hands off – the food goes in a bag and cooks in hot water with a sous vide machine – and then it comes out and there’s a final step.

    For these BBQ chicken legs sous vide style, I finish them in the broiler to crisp up the skin and make a nice crust with that BBQ sauce. This final step just takes a few minutes and is quite delicious.

    Alright, time to wrap up this post! If you want more, see my new sous vide cookbook – The Home Chef’s Sous Vide Cookbook.

    Making a Sous Vide Frozen Chicken Breast Recipe with lemon and garlic

    How to Sous Vide Frozen Chicken Breast Recipe | Sip Bite Go

    Today’s post is all about convenience. Did you know you can sous vide frozen chicken breast without thawing it first? Since sous vide meal prep is a necessity in my house, and a super convenient way to eat restaurant style food at home, sous viding chicken from frozen is one of my favorite food prep tricks. Let me teach you how.
    5 from 5 votes
    Print Pin Rate
    Course: Dinner, Main Dish
    Cuisine: American
    Prep Time: 5 minutes
    Cook Time: 2 hours 10 minutes
    Finish: 10 minutes
    Total Time: 2 hours 25 minutes
    Servings: 4
    Calories: 17kcal
    Author: Jenna Passaro

    Ingredients

    • 4 pieces chicken breast sliced in half
    • ½ tsp garlic salt
    • ½ tsp pepper
    • lemon sliced, optional
    • herbs optional
    • ½ tbsp olive oil

    Instructions

    • Season chicken breasts with garlic salt and pepper. Add any other ingredients to the bag, like sliced lemons or herbs. Vacuum-seal seasoned chicken breast in a flat layer and freeze until it’s time to cook.
    • Preheat sous vide machine to 140 ºF. When it comes to temperature, drop the vacuum sealed frozen chicken breast in the sous vide bath. Cook frozen sous vide chicken at 140ºF for 2 hours.
    • Cool cooked chicken (in a vacuum sealed bag) in an ice bath for two minutes. Remove chicken from the bag and pat dry.
    • Add olive oil to a cast iron skillet on medium-high heat. Remove lemons or any other ingredients that will burn if they are seared. Sear chicken breast for 1-5 minutes on each side, until browned to your liking. Add a little butter if chicken begins to burn. Transfer to a cutting board to cool for ~10 minutes then serve.

    Video

    Notes

    • Add 1 hour cook time to basic (thin) cuts of sous vide chicken including chicken breast, tenders, wings, thighs, legs.
    • Remember: don’t sous vide a whole chicken from frozen intact and add on 1-hour thinking that will cook it – – instead, spatchcock it to break down the chicken and add on 2 hours to be safe.
    • Add flavor to the vacuum seal bag before freezing sous vide chicken – try lemons, flavored salt, herbs, and garlic.
    • Don’t forget to finish your sous vide chicken to lock in ultimate flavor. Grill, air fry, broil, or cast-iron skillet fry sous vide chicken to finish it.
    See the recipe: https://sipbitego.com/sous-vide-frozen-chicken
    Watch the frozen chicken sous vide recipe video: https://youtu.be/0cYgTIMkX4Q

    Nutrition

    Calories: 17kcal | Carbohydrates: 1g | Protein: 1g | Fat: 2g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 1mg | Sodium: 292mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 1g
    Tried this Recipe? Tag me Today!Mention @SipBiteGo or tag #sipbitego!
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    jenna passaro food blogger from Portland Oregon

    Hey, I’m Jenna Passaro.

    I develop easy recipes that can transform your kitchen into a restaurant – and you into a true home chef.

      

    Where to start?

    Learn the secrets to smoking tasty Traeger recipes and making pizza at home. And cook amazing tri tip steak dinners.

    Or, fall in love with something new to cook with your air fryer, pellet smoker, BBQ grill, sous vide cooker, and more…

    You’ll notice, I kind of geek out over new cooking trends and tools!

    Instagram me @sipbitego & chef hubs @handmodelpatrick

    My story. Growing up, I didn’t learn to cook.

    (I was actually banned from cooking for years)

    And then in my 20’s I didn’t have to cook because my job as an event planner involved a lot of travel and it was easier to eat out. At the time, I was 100% positive that restaurant food would always taste better than cooking at home, and there was nothing I could do about it.

    Until I fell in love with a chef. He would come over and cook me delicious meals right in my own kitchen. My mind was blown.

    Since then, I’ve been on a mission to figure out easy ways to make restaurant style food at home and share it here on Sip Bite Go.

    Love to eat out and travel? I can totally relate. See my guide on where to eat in Portland, OR.

    jenna passaro the home chef's sous vide cookbook

    Never in a million years did I imagine I’d ditch the 9-5 lifestyle in my late 20’s, move across the country on a whim, start a new life, start a food blog, and write a book.

    But here I am!

    See my book on Amazon: The Home Chef’s Sous Vide Cookbook.

     

       

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