Honey Hot Chicken Tenders
Ingredients
- 1 cup pickle juice
- 1.5 lbs boneless, skinless chicken breasts sliced in half lengthwise, and then cubed
- 3 eggs whisked
- olive oil spray
Crispy Coating
- 1 cup panko
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp paprika
- salt and pepper to taste
Sauce
- 1/2 cup butter one stick
- 1/2 cup honey
- 1 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1 tbsp paprika
- 1/4 tsp salt
Instructions
- Place the cut chicken in a bowl with the pickle juice. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- In a small bowl, whisk the 3 eggs, set aside.
- In a medium bowl, mix together the flour, panko, onion powder, garlic powder, baking powder, paprika, salt and pepper. Set aside.
- Drain the pickle juice brine from the chicken and transfer the chicken pieces to the bowl with the egg.
- Remove the chicken pieces one by one from the egg mixture, letting excess egg drip off. Then, add the chicken to the flour mixture to coat each piece.
- Transfer the chicken pieces to a sprayed air fryer tray. Do not pile them up - they must be in one layer. If your air fryer is small, you will have to work in batches.
- Spritz the coated chicken with oil and transfer to your air fryer.
- Air fry at 400°F for 5 minutes, flip the chicken pieces, spritz again and return to the air fryer.
- If using an oven style air fryer with 2 layers of racks, swap the racks at this point too.
- Air fry for 3-4 minutes. The final cook time will depend completely on how thick your chicken pieces are. Average cook time is 8-10 minutes.
- While the chicken cooks, make the sauce by melting the butter on low heat. Once melted add the honey, cayenne pepper, paprika, and salt. Stir until all combined and remove from heat.
- Once the chicken tenders are done, you can toss the sauce and tenders together or use the sauce as a dipping sauce, your choice!
Notes
To make these for your freezer so that you can grab a handful and air fry on a busy weeknight, prep them all the way to the cooking stage and lay them on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Place the raw, uncooked chicken tenders into the freezer for a few hours. Then, transfer it to a freezer bag.
To cook from frozen, decrease the temperature to 375F and increase cook time to about 10 minutes per side. Again, the total time will be dependent on how thick your tenders are.