Once you’ve made these chicken nuggets at home, you’ll never get them at a fast food joint again. These really are so easy that you might find yourself making them two or three time a week.

I made this with one chicken breast, which was fine as a snack.  If you want to double or even triple this, or if you want to spend a few hours over a pan of hot oil to feed an entire party (let me know how that goes!), you can adjust the spices and flour to suit your tastes.  You could even double the spices as I have them in the recipe card below if you like an extra kick.

Not pictured is the brine – because, boring.  This is a key element to juicy chicken nuggets. We’re using fish sauce here due to its high concentration of salt, slight sweetness and for an added element of flavor. If you don’t have fish sauce, you can sub in soy sauce, worcestershire sauce or just some kosher salt and sugar.  The important thing here is we’re flavoring the chicken and protecting it from over cooking when we add it to the frying oil.

Sorry, I forgot to show the smashed panko.  This is important too.  Panko gives the perfect amount of crunchiness as a coating for the chicken.  When we mix all these ingredients together, after a brining and a good drying, they stick absolutely perfectly to the chicken.  It’s like magic! But its just cooking and #youcandoit! We’re going to double down on the crunch in a minute too.

We’ve removed our chicken from the brine and it’s drying off.  Dry chicken will allow the eggs to stick without the need of a flour dredging. I’m keeping this in mind for the future.  I have a hypothesis that the flour dredge may actually prevent good stickage.  So, chicken goes in to egg, then flour, shake excess and let rest on paper towel for ten minutes.

Chicken Nuggets

Anthony

Once you’ve made these chicken nuggets at home, you’ll never get them at a fast food joint again. These really are so easy that you might find yourself making them two or three time a week.

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 30 minutes mins

Total Time 45 minutes mins

Course Snacks

Cuisine American

Servings 12 Nuggets

Ingredients

  

• 1 chicken breast nuggetized
• 1 Tbsp fish sauce
• 2 cups water
• 2 egg whites whisked
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup panko bread crumbs smashed
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp cayenne
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp black pepper
• Canola Oil

Instructions

 

• Combine fish sauce and water in a medium bowl.
• Dice the chicken breast in to small bite size pieces.
• Add chicken to brine for 45 minutes. 
• Remove chicken and pat dry on paper towels.
• Add whisked egg whites to bowl for dredging.
• Combine flour, salt, peper, cayenne, garlic powder, onion powder, baking soda and panko.
• Dredge chicken in egg then in flour. Set aside for 10 minutes on paper towels.
• Heat oil in skillet over medium-low heat.
• Before adding chicken to oil, dredge in flour again and shake to remove excess.
• Fry chicken on each side 3-4 minutes or until golden brown.
• Remove to cool on wire rack.