Burrito Bowls Recipe [Chipotle Copycat]

No need for takeout with this Copycat Chipotle Chicken Burrito Bowls Recipe! Made just like your favorite restaurant’s burrito bowl, this recipe is filling, healthy and can be made simple with pre-mixed ingredients or homemade options.

If you’re anything like me, Chipotle is your go-to quick and easy, takeout meal on the regular. It’s filling, it’s packed with some of my favorite foods, and it’s relatively cheap… Can the guac just be free already?!

Since our move, we’ve realized how much we used to eat out! When you live in walking distance to so many amazing restaurants, it’s so easy to opt for eating out instead of meal planning and grocery shopping. We’ve been working on planning out our weeks, leaning on our favorite cookbooks for inspiration and meal prepping intuitively to eat in more. Now instead of regularly eating Chipotle, we’re regularly eating a variation of these homemade burrito bowls! 

For basically the price of one serving, we can make four meals. Winning!

Here’s What You Need:

What I love most about this recipe is that it can be as quick or involved as you want it to be. If you’re short on time you can buy store-bought versions of salsa, guac and even rotisserie chicken. If you’re more of a “from scratch” type of person I’ve included recipes for each.

• Romaine hearts or any leafy greens
• Black beans – I like to use canned beans so I don’t have to think about pre-soaking and cooking my beans.
• Rice – use brown rice, white rice or cauliflower rice for extra veggies!
• Salsa – I like my homemade pico de gallo or pineapple salsa but feel free to use store-bought if short on time.
• Guacamole – go for my homemade authentic version or pick up store-bought if short on time.
• Lime
• Chicken breasts – if you want to take a shortcut, rotisserie chicken works great in this recipe but my hack is to dry-rub two chicken breasts with salt and 2 tbsp of chipotle seasoning and then follow my stove-top grill recipe.

Customize Your Burrito Bowl

One of the best things about Chipotle is that everyone can pick what they want in their burrito! Want extra veggies? Great. Like spice? There’s a salsa for that. If you want to spruce up your homemade burrito bowl, here are some bonuses you could add:

• Sauteed veggies – slice bell peppers and onions and saute in a little oil with salt and pepper. 
• Corn – Steam corn or get fancy and make street corn by mixing sweet corn with mayo, paprika and cotija cheese. 
• Cilantro  – I love finishing off my meal with fresh herbs. Cilantro pairs well with these burrito bowls!
• Chipotle aioli – I’m in the camp that every meal is better with aioli. Just me? Mix a chipotle pepper in adobo sauce with mayo for a fun sauce!

More Bowl Recipes

The bowls don’t stop there! For all the bowl lovers out there (you know who you are) I wanted to share my other favorite bowl recipes! These all have specific recipes but you can 100% make them your own. Customize with your favorite vegetables or sauce and as always, have fun in the kitchen!

Chicken Burrito Bowls

No need for takeout with this Copycat Chipotle Chicken Burrito Bowl! Made just like your favorite restaurant’s burrito bowl, this recipe is filling, healthy and can be made simple with pre-mixed ingredients or homemade options.

• Author: Davida Lederle
• Prep Time: 10 minutes
• Cook Time: 20 minutes
• Total Time: 30 minutes
• Yield: 4 servings 1x

Scale 1x2x3x

Ingredients

• 2 heads romaine hearts, shredded
• 1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
• 1 cup of dry rice, cooked according to package instructions
• 1 recipe for guacamole (I use my traditional guacamole)
• 2 cups salsa (I like my homemade pico de gallo or pineapple salsa but feel free to use store-bought if short on time)
• 1 lime, cut into quarters

For the chipotle chicken*:

• 1.5 lbs organic chicken breasts (roughly two medium chicken breasts)
• 2 tbsp chipotle powder
• 1 tsp salt

*you can always use store-bought chicken or rotisserie chicken instead

Instructions

1. Cook rice according to package instructions
2. When finished mix with black beans.
3. Pat dry chicken breasts and then coat with chipotle powder and salt covering all sides.
4. Grill on stove-top (using these instructions) or on your grill.
5. Once chicken has cooled slightly cut into strops
6. If making from scratch, whip up guacamole and salsa/pico de gallo
7. Assemble all bowls with a layer of shredded romaine.
8. Top with rice/beans mix followed by salsa, guacamole and sliced chicken.
9. Squeeze lime over top.
10. Serve immediately or store in individual containers for each ingredient for up to 3 days.