Sweet & Spicy Chicken Thighs {Kid Approved}

Sweet and spicy chicken thighs. Finger lickin' Ah-mazing! This is an easy weeknight (or any night) one skillet meal which delivers every time. It's pretty much fool proof and wickedly delicious. And...they make a great lunch the following day.

Sweet And Spicy Chicken Thighs

These sweet and spicy chicken pieces are sweet, sticky and fall apart perfectly with the smallest touch. Each piece is lovingly rubbed with a homemade Portuguese Spice Rub (you will LOVE this) and drizzled with a sweet and sour honey marinade. 

My husband bought me a stove to oven skillet for my birthday that can go from the stove top to the oven and it's awesome. Most meals can be made in one pot - which means hardly any washing up! Yay! And the flavors stay in the pan from beginning to end.

My kids, the hubby and every person I have EVER made it for absolutely love this easy to make chicken thigh dish. Well, to be honest, what's not to love? It's sweet, sticky and tastes a lot like the ribs from our favorite restaurant. Personally I think my chicken tastes better, but I may be biased. Kids reckon it's a tie. But what do they know?

Sweet and Spicy Seasoning

The seasoning I use for this chicken is made up from spices and herbs you've likely got in your pantry, so nothing too fancy here. It's mild enough for kids to enjoy, I use 1 teaspoon of chilli flakes but you can reduce this if you've got a particularly spice sensitive child.

I often make up a batch of this seasoning mix and keep it in an airtight jar in the pantry. It's easy to rub onto some chicken when you've run out if time and need something to throw together, and it's especially good if you've got a crowd of the kids friends coming over and need something they're going to eat!
A huge plate of these with some wedges is never going to be unwelcome!

Make sure to rub the seasoning into the chicken really well, you want it to get into all the crevices and season as much of the surface of the meat as possible.

What To Serve With Sweet And Spicy Chicken Thighs

For a light lunch, I serve these with a green salad. If the kids are a little hungrier I make some wedges in the oven. Usually we have these as a buffet sort of food, a help yourself lunch, especially if we've got people over and there's a few different plates of food on the table.

You could serve some of these with these chicken thighs:

• Shoestring fries
• Parmesan fries
• Cucumber and tomato salad
• Caprese salad
• Clean eating fried rice

Make Ahead

If you want to make these ahead of time, there's two ways you can go about it. Firstly, you could make the whole recipe and serve the chicken thighs cold as part of a cold, help-yourself lunch.

If you'd prefer to have these hot and straight from the oven, you could make the sweet and spicy seasoning mix up ahead and pan fry the thighs until they're brown, let them cool and then keep them covered in the fridge until you want to put them in the oven.

Right before they go in the oven, pick up the recipe and pour over your honey mix and cook as usual to finish cooking the chicken. You'll need to bring the chicken up to room temperature before you finish cooking them, preferably for a couple of hours. Keep them out, covered, on the work top to take the chill off them if you're doing this.

*The chicken, once browned, will look cooked but isn't, so make sure no little hands reach for these in the fridge before you finish off cooking them in the oven!

How To Store Leftover Chicken Thighs

Once fully cooked and cooled, store any leftover chicken, covered, in the fridge for up to 2 days, or sooner depending on the use by date on your chicken. I've tried freezing these but the glaze doesn't like being in the freezer, so I don't recommend you freeze these. They're pretty easy to put together, so I recommend making and eating these fresh!

Chicken Breast And Wings

Using this sweet and sticky seasoning on chicken wings and legs works a treat. As before, make sure the seasoning gets into all the little awkward parts of the piece of chicken you're using so you get a fully seasoned piece of chicken.

You can leave out the honey mix part of this recipe on wings if you prefer and they'll be a slightly less messy adaptation. This is good for lunchboxes, and especially on wings, you get a crispier piece of chicken.

Chicken breast meat tends to be slightly drier than the cheaper cuts and so I don't use it in this recipe for this reason. If you'd prefer to use breast meat though, I would butterfly cut right before seasoning it so it's thinner and cooks faster, keeping the meat as juicy as possible.

How To Make Sweet and Spicy Chicken Thighs

There are only two basic steps to this recipe:

•  1. Rub chicken with the spice mix and fry for around 6-8 minutes until brown.
• 2. Pop in oven for 20 - 25 minutes until sauce is sticky and thick and chicken looks golden and irresistible. 

This recipe works with most cuts of chicken - wings, thighs, legs. I don't usually use chicken breasts as I think they dry out too much and the cheaper cuts hold the flavor so much more.

If you are looking at entertaining and need a plate of nibbles that you want to impress - opt for some chicken wings or legs. Trust me, there will be a line up for your 'secret recipe'.

Ingredients

• 6 Chicken thighs You can use legs or wings if you prefer

Spice Rub

• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp chilli flakes
• 1 tsp cumin
• ¼ tsp oregano
• ½ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp black pepper

Honey Drizzle

• ¼ cup Honey
• 2 tbsp Apple cider vinegar
• 2 tbsp Olive oil Or sesame oil

Instructions

• Preheat Oven to 380F
• Mix Spices together in bowl. Rub spices on uncooked chicken.
• Heat up a skillet on the stove top. Add oil and chicken. Fry for around 6-8 minutes until browned all over.
• Mix honey and apple cider vinegar together and pour over browned chicken.
• Transfer skillet to oven and bake for 25 minutes until sauce thick and sticky (longer may be needed for legs. Check that chicken is cooked through).
• Serve on rice with fresh greens.

More Clean Eating Chicken Recipes

• Chicken tenders and fries
• Healthy chicken Donburi bowl
• Chicken and pineapple skewers
• Honey chicken

Sweet and Spicy Chicken Thighs Recipe

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