Easy Chicken Quesadillas (with leftover rotisserie chicken)

It's that point in your life, when you're in pure survival mode; you fantasize about sleeping through the night, sleeping in, relaxing bubble baths and that day when your kids will finally puke in the toilet and even make their own sandwiches.

 It was at this time and purely out of necessity, that I created van picnics, along with quick meals like these Easy Chicken Quesadillas using leftover rotisserie chicken (4 WW points). Necessity was my navigator in those early days. It is the mother of invention, after all. And as a mother, you're so immersed in it, you have no idea how much you'll miss it until it's gone.

Jump to:

• 🥘 Ingredients
• 📖Variations & Substitutions
• 👪 Serving Size
• 🔢WW Points
• 💭 What goes well with chicken quesadillas?
• 🍽Equipment
• 🌡️Storage
• 📋 Easy Chicken Quesadillas recipe

Van picnics were simply a way of making something that wasn't necessarily desirable - eating grocery store food, off paper plates, in the back of a van, while driving to evening activities, just a little more "fun". Everyone loves picnics, right?

Van picnics consisted of food I quickly grabbed at the grocery store, between work and racing across town to pick up the kids at daycare:

• rotisserie chicken
• potato wedges
• veggies and dip
• sushi
• fruit for dessert

And since I'd be half-starved myself by this time, I'd dip into a little on the way to pick up the kids at daycare cause I'd be far too busy feeding them and driving to get myself fed once they were back in my loving care. After I buckled them snugly in their seats, filled their plates, and handed them back a paper plate of food, we were off  - to dance or whatever activity was on deck that night!

🥘 Ingredients

And of course, at the time, they were little and they didn't eat very much... so.... what to do with all that leftover rotisserie chicken?

Make chicken quesadillas, of course~!

All you need is:

• leftover chicken
• salsa
• tortillas
• cheese
• black olives
• cilantro

This was always one of my absolute favorite things about van picnics - the leftovers. These are not only the best chicken quesadillas recipe, it's an easy, kid-friendly, 20 minute meal that uses up chicken leftovers. You can make it when you get home from work or make ahead and freeze. You only need a few ingredients and a few minutes. And no matter what age your kids are or how busy you are, a delicious and quick easy meal is always a blessing.

📖Variations & Substitutions

• Gluten-free - use gluten-free tortillas
• Cheese - use spicy habanero or jack jalapeno cheese or use cheddar cheese

👪 Serving Size

This leftover rotisserie chicken quesadilla recipe makes 12 servings. You can half, double, or triple the recipe by clicking on the blue serving number and selecting the number of servings you'd like. The ingredient quantities will automatically adjust.You can also make more pancakes if you make them smaller (with only a ¼ cup of batter).

🔢WW Points

This quesadilla recipe is WW friendly @ 4 WW points.

💭 What goes well with chicken quesadillas?

• Quick Cucumber Kimchi
• Garden salad
• Mandarin Orange Salad Recipe
• Spinach salad
• Easy Spanish Brown Rice

🍽Equipment

For this chicken quesadilla recipe, you'll need a large skillet (affiliate links).

🌡️Storage

Store these quesadillas for up to 4 days in an airtight container in the fridge.
They can be frozen for up to 3 months in a sealed container or Ziploc freezer bag.

Now that my kids are older, many of their activities start later in the evening. And since I'm not racing from work at one end of the city to the other and picking them up at daycare,  like I was in those early days of child-rearing, I have a wee bit more time to play with.

These days they even come home from school on their own, puke in the toilet, and can even make their own sandwiches.  I also get to sleep through the night, sleep in on weekends and have bubble baths; all the things I fantasized about in the midst of our van picnic days. I guess you'd think that I was living the dream now ? Well, the dream I had when they were small anyway.

But with bigger kids come bigger problems....

And although those days were tough and van picnics were a major juggling act on their own between balancing paper plates, someone crying, someone spilling something, someone having to go to the bathroom and a dance shoe missing, all while I was utterly exhausted from lack of sleep and stressed from work,  I often ache for the simplicity of our van picnic days...

My mom always said:

"The days are long but the years are short."

I now truly understand the meaning of that. My son recently reminded me that in 4 months, I'll officially have a teenager on my hands. Yikes. These days I'm no less busy, but it's different.

There are very few leftovers these days, but I still buy those rotisserie chickens from the grocery store on my way home, not only for the chicken quesadillas but for the van picnic memories.

And as a I dip into a little of that rotisserie chicken as I'm driving, just as I did picking them up from daycare all those years ago, I can taste the simplicity of those early days, and almost see my 6-year-old son and 4-year-old daughter innocently peering back at me from their car seats, while I savor the chicken and the memories and forget about bigger kid problems... for just a little while.

Although, I do have to admit, I wouldn't trade sleeping through the night and sleeping in on weekends for all the van picnics in the world. I guess sleep just trumps simplicity and pretty much everything and anything else when you're a parent!