60 Best Chicken Recipes

You can never have enough chicken recipes in your weeknight dinner repertoire.

Whether you’re looking for exciting ways to use up that pack of thighs or drumsticks in your freezer, recipes that guarantee juicy chicken breasts every time, something you can throw on a sheet pan or an unforgettable whole roast chicken for a special occasion, we’ve got you covered with plenty of winner chicken dinners — 60 of them, in fact.

These recipes will ensure that this versatile bird never gets boring.

Chicken breast recipes

Whenever Elizabeth Heiskell is making chicken for dinner, her kids always ask if it’s “the good chicken.” When they find out it is, the celebration begins. So easy to make with flavor-packed pantry staples like ranch dressing and dried gravy mix, this gussied-up chicken and rice dish is a winner, winner … you know the rest.

Sweet, saucy, and oh-so-delicious, this is a dish your whole crew will really enjoy. It’s bright, colorful and packed with protein and other countless nutrients, thanks to the chunks of juicy pineapple, red onion and bell peppers. The best part? This recipe comes together fast on a single sheet pan.

Chicken satay is a popular Southeast Asian dish that’s typically grilled on skewers and served with a spicy peanut sauce as an appetizer. This recipe skips the skewers and the grill and air-fries the chicken instead, which is perfect for weeknight dinners.

This chicken staple hits the spot for diners of all ages. Perfectly crunchy outside, tender, juicy inside, with a dusting of salt makes this style of chicken heavenly to eat.

The juiciness of the chicken and the complexity of the flavors make this a winner anytime of year. It’s funky, juicy, bright and slightly spicy. Plus, it can be eaten by itself, rolled up into tacos or served over rice — it’s incredibly versatile.

This extra crispy oven-fried chicken is the ultimate dish for all the fried chicken lovers out there. The cracker crust provides a salty-yet-sweet flavor that’s hard to resist.

This quick and easy one-sheet wonder requires just a handful of basic ingredients and features a smoky and flavorful marinade for the chicken that the whole family will love. The crispier the Brussels sprouts, the more delicious, so don’t be afraid to let them get nice and brown.

Everyone loves a good paillard, which is just a fancy French term for a piece of meat (usually chicken or veal) that has been pounded thin and cooked quickly. Grainy mustard and chives bring a tangy saltiness that makes this hot dish shine with bitter greens.

This is a lighter, quicker but just as cheesy version of chicken Parm — no deep-frying required! Melissa Clark’s family loves it with a big green salad on the side.

Sure, this recipe is a bit of a treat, but rice flour and gluten-free panko make it a little lighter and easier on the stomach. Giada serves it the way they do in Italy, topped with an arugula salad dressed with lemon and salt, or without the salad and just a squeeze of lemon juice.

This dish is so versatile, and it’s also great for meal prep. Whether you’re making tacos or stuffed bell peppers, it’s something that you’ll enjoy all week long.

The bracing acidity from the lemons and bright brininess of the olives and capers makes this a standout dish. It’s perfect for a casual weeknight dinner but special enough to serve for any occasion.

This recipe is popular because it has all the flavor and comfort of traditional chicken piccata without all the buttery and breadcrumb-y heaviness.

Fried until crispy then layered in tomato sauce and gooey melted mozzarella cheese, this classic chicken Parm is irresistible.

This nutty variation of the kid-favorite comes together fast and provides a lower-carb and protein-packed way to enjoy the classic meal. Big bonus: The chicken fingers are baked, not fried, yet they still crisp up nicely.

Served with a crisp, bright Israeli salad, this chicken schnitzel is equally at home on a dinner plate as it is packed into a pita with a spoonful of hummus and a drizzle of hot sauce.

Chicken leg, thigh and drumstick recipes

In this relatively speedy sheet-pan dinner, boneless, skinless chicken thighs are seasoned with a savory, cumin-scented spice mix and roasted with whole garlic cloves and cherry tomatoes, which turn soft and sweet in the oven’s heat.

The sweet tomatoes beautifully balance the bracing acidity of the tangy sherry vinegar and briny olives in this easy chicken dinner. This recipe is so easy to throw together and has a bright pop of flavor in every bite.

“Smothered chicken is a time-honored tradition in the South,” says Carla Hall. “Decades before everyone became more aware of health and nutrition, my Granny was at the forefront. She spent her days as a hospital dietitian, but her life’s work was as a loving wife, mother and grandmother. When my grandfather began to have heart problems, she immediately took her family’s classic Southern recipes and made them more nutritious. Those are the recipes she passed down to me.”

There’s a reason most professional chefs prefer chicken thighs in their recipes. The dark meat is tender and more flavorful from the higher fat content. This quick-to-prep recipe capitalizes on the natural taste and balances it beautifully with robust garlic and creamy cucumber sauce.

If you want a comforting, fall-off-the-bone meat dish without babysitting a roast all day, might we suggest the humble chicken thigh? This savory, earthy dish uses a simple cooking method that keeps the meat tender while the skin gets crackly-crispety-crunchety (these are technical terms, you understand).

Chicken salmoriglio is a prime example of Sicilian cooking: fresh herbs, lemon, honey, olive oil and greens. Simple and exceptional.

Dark-meat chicken and bread come together all in a sheet pan for this delicious meal. Tossed together with delicious dressing and fresh greens make it a win-win weeknight meal.

This Dijon chicken combines easy cooking techniques with big flavor. Each ingredient in this recipe adds a layer of flavor. This one-pot dish allows fresh ingredients to unite and produce a lively yet comforting meal.

I love this recipe because it’s just so cozy! Chicken and potatoes are a classic and jazzing it up with harissa and yogurt adds spice, tang and richness.

The robust flavor of a variety of spices like cumin, coriander and garam masala bring warmth and heat to the biryani. The saffron and milk add color and aroma.

We love the interplay of hot and cold in this weeknight dinner — the crispy chicken and roasted fingerling potatoes with the slightly bitter greens and mustard vinaigrette. It hits all the right notes.

Soy sauce, ginger and crispy garlic make this classic Filipino chicken an irritable addition to anyone’s favorite chicken recipes.

These chicken thighs couldn’t be easier to make — just season them and throw them into the oven, and they cook while you put the rest of the meal together.

A quick, nutritious and delicious Chinese meal is certain to get you back on track, especially during busy winter nights when all you want to do is cuddle up with a good book. Full disclosure: It tastes just as good in summer, though.

Heirloom garlic, though not as long-lasting as the commercial varieties at the grocery store, has a more intense flavor and cooks up sweeter in this naturally spiced and fragrant dish.

If you like quick and easy meals that can be prepped in advance, this is the recipe for you. The marinade can be made months in advance and frozen. Defrost overnight and pour over the chicken the morning you want to cook it. And yes, one pan means less mess to clean up.

The quickest and the most efficient way of adding a ton of flavor to protein is making this za’atar marinade. Unlike other marinades that might require some time, this one just needs a good rub on your choice of protein and it’s good to go.

Chef JJ Johnson loves cooking with Peruvian-style adobo sauce. This recipe features the unexpected sweetness of rice vinegar along with West African palm sugar, which we love for its rich, caramel flavor.

Chock-full of Spanish ingredients like chorizo, bomba rice and olives, this savory, easy-to-throw-together chicken dish is one of those meals that comforts you from the inside out.

Lidia Bastianich serves her chicken cacciatore with polenta, as it’s traditionally eaten by game hunters.

This spicy, herby chicken is full of bright, zesty flavors and is very easy to make. The yogurt tenderizes the chicken as it marinates, making the meat very tender. It goes with everything — but is especially nice with pita or other flatbread bread and a big cucumber-tomato salad.

This is a classic Taiwanese recipe that is perfect for an easy and speedy supper. It’s called three-cup chicken because traditionally it uses 1 cup of soy sauce, 1 cup of rice wine and 1 cup of toasted sesame oil. It’s a fuss-free recipe for a fabulous family meal that is inexpensive, too.

Sweet tea is an incredible base for a chicken marinade. It gives the chicken the most subtle sweetness but still keeps all the other flavors front and center.

This recipe takes a basic comfort food and turns it into something really special. The spicy harissa, sweet pomegranate, crunchy walnuts and fresh mint hit all the flavor notes. Also, the whole thing only takes about 30 minutes to make, so you’ve got a full dinner on the table, fast.

Whole chicken recipes

We love the short amount of time this recipe takes, and the flavor is incredibly robust. This cooking method ensures the chicken stays crispy on the outside and super moist on the inside.

Lemon? Check. Crispy skin? The delicious smell of fresh herbs as the bird roasts? Easy enough to make on a weeknight? Check, check and check again. This recipe ticks all the boxes.

Who doesn’t love a great sheet-pan recipe? This version pairs juicy, bursting sweet grapes with charred red onion, loads of rosemary and crispy, ancho chile-rubbed chicken. The pan juices are just so darn good — make sure to have a bit of bread to sop up all the goodness.

The secret to moist, tender, evenly cooked chicken is roasting it in the oven, then finishing it on the grill. Trying to grill chicken from raw will make you nuts. Roasting the bird in halves cooks it evenly while locking in the juices and also intensifies the marinade flavors.

This super simple sheet-pan chicken utilizes the garlicky, onion flavor of ramps, smashed garlic and lemon slices to infuse the chicken with these flavors, while the chicken drippings, in turn, season the rest of the dish. The lemon rinds will become soft and edible and the garlic soft and spreadable.

The combination of brown sugar, vinegar and soy sauce make this chicken sweet, sour and savory all at once. A true flavor sensation!

This is the very best roast chicken ever. It’s so easy to do that the only skill you’ll need is being able to follow a recipe.

Not as laissez-faire as other sheet pan recipes but much easier than most ratatouille recipes, the combination of crisp chicken skin, fragrant herbs and soft summer vegetables is well worth the work.

What’s not to love about fried chicken? It’s the perfect comfort food and this recipe adds some unexpected flavors with fresh herbs, aromatic shallots and sweet brown sugar.

A hearty, beautiful Sunday roast chicken is Marcus Samuelsson’s tribute to his mentor, Alberta Wright, whose Paris-based restaurant, Jezebel, inspired the chefs’ concept for Red Rooster in Harlem, New York.

This all-in-one dish requires only four ingredients, plus some salt and pepper and an assortment of whichever vegetables you prefer for the side. Its simplicity and versatile veggies make it easy to tailor it to what’s in season, whether you want roast carrots and beets or wintry squash and parsnips.

The combination of the zesty lemons, sweet and smoky harissa, and earthy olive is so Mediterranean. The ingredients in this recipe are also wonderful with meaty fish, like hake or cod. The bulgur wheat is so refreshing and works perfectly alongside the chicken. And it only takes 15 minutes to prepare.

This fried chicken is crusted in a seasoned flour and fried in a bath of peanut oil scented with bacon. Covering the frying pan for a time while the chicken is cooking may be controversial to some, but it really concentrates the crunch of the skin. The chicken is just as good cold or at room temperature the following day.

“I describe it as a connector because the familiar and the unfamiliar: The dish that speaks to that kind of invisible — but sometimes intuited — umbilicus between the African continent and the American hemisphere,” Dr. Jessica B. Harris says of comforting chicken dish served with rice.

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve made this!” says Ina Garten. “I have the butcher butterfly the chicken so all I do is grind the thyme, fennel seeds, salt, and pepper, mix it with olive oil, and brush it on the chicken. When the lemon slices are roasted and caramelized, you can eat them with the chicken.”

Shawarma spices flavor the chicken in this one-pot, low-and-slow dish. The moist, tender chicken shares the stage with pearl onions and cremini mushrooms, all finished with fresh herbs, butter and white wine sauce over Lebanese couscous.

Set your taste buds ablaze with chef Kevin Sbraga’s hot, hot, hot take on fried chicken.

For the folks who felt roasting the whole chicken was daunting, this simple yet satisfying recipe takes 10 minutes to prepare (yes, only 10 minutes!). Then just give it an hour or so in the oven, and that seemingly lavish weeknight dinner will be on.

A family friend taught Siri this method to roast a chicken, and it will always be her go-to recipe. It requires very few ingredients, no giant roasting pan or trussing/stuffing involved, and it relies on the chicken’s natural juices for impeccable flavor. Once you master this technique, you will impress your family and friends time and time again.

The secret to this incredibly juicy chicken with amazingly crispy skin is that there is no secret. All it takes to make a delicious roast chicken is a handful of basic ingredients, a few easy techniques, time and a little patience.