This Oven Fried Chicken With Bread Crumbs recipe is the best way to have your favorite fried chicken without worrying about frying in oil. It’s no-fuss, great tasting fried chicken with bread crumbs that’s easy and fast to make. This Oven Fried Chicken is so good and easy to make. The bread crumbs provide a crisp outside while keeping the moist and juicy inside. This chicken recipe is great to serve with rice and vegetables or mashed potatoes.
Oven Fried Chicken III
Crispy chicken that is moist even if you choose to take off the skin!
Recipe Summary
Servings:
5
Yield:
5 servings
Ingredients
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Original recipe yields 5 servingsIngredient Checklist
- 1 (2 to 3 pound) whole chicken, cut into pieces
- 1 cup dried bread crumbs
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried thyme
- ½ teaspoon paprika
- 1 cup mayonnaise
Directions
Instructions Checklist
- Step 1Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
- Step 2In a medium bowl or gallon size resealable plastic bag, mix together the bread crumbs, garlic powder, salt, pepper, thyme and paprika.
- Step 3Coat the chicken pieces with mayonnaise. Place chicken pieces in bowl/bag with bread crumb mixture and coat/shake until well coated. Place chicken pieces in a lightly greased 9×13 inch baking dish and bake for 45 minutes or until juices run clear.
Crispy Oven Fried Chicken
This is my way of making oven fried chicken – and I think it is the best method out there to get it crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside. Better than KFC!
A few years back I loved getting chicken from KFC as a Sunday night treat. Now that I have my own family, I much prefer to stay home and cook a homemade meal. And I especially prefer to have less greasy traditions! That’s why I figured out how to make “fried” chicken at home.
Everyone will love this crispy oven fried chicken recipe – it’s so simple to make but full of flavor! We love to serve it with mashed potatoes, potato wedges or a quick mac and cheese, plus a vegetable on the side. But it’s also delicious in a burger or a sandwich!
Ingredients you’ll need
Here is a visual overview of the ingredients in the recipe. Scroll down to the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post for quantities!
Ingredient notes
- Chicken parts: I usually use skinless, boneless chicken breast because it’s easiest for me to make and everyone will eat it. You can use whatever pieces you want, though – many readers have successfully made it with thighs and drumsticks!
- Buttermilk: It’s not mandatory to use actual buttermilk. If you don’t keep any on hand, feel free to use either just regular milk or regular milk with 1 teaspoon white or apple cider vinegar stirred in.
- Breadcrumbs: I use plain breadcrumbs because I always have those on hand, but Panko is also very delicious and yields amazing results.
- Salt and spices: I reduced the salt by half from a previous version because some people felt it was too salty; if you’ve made this before and the saltiness was right for you, feel free to increase. And I know it sounds like a crazy amount of spices… But trust me here, your chicken will turn out bland if you don’t season it enough. If you want to add some heat, try using some cayenne pepper or chili powder.
- Baking powder: This helps the breading to puff up a little and behave more like a batter fried in oil. I know it sounds like a strange ingredient in oven fried chicken, but please don’t skip it!
- Butter: While this is a baked recipe, it still needs fat to crisp up and brown right. If you prefer to stay away from butter for whatever reason, I have also made this with canola oil before and it turned out well.
How to make Oven Fried Chicken
1.Start by heating the oven. You want to place your baking sheet in the oven as it preheats, it needs to be hot when you add the breaded chicken later for best results.
2.Prepare the breading ingredients: Whisk the buttermilk and egg in a medium bowl, and combine all of the dry ingredients in a shallow dish (I use a small-ish baking dish so there’s enough room to properly coat the chicken).
I also cut the chicken into pieces (about 2-3 per breast). If you leave yours whole or leave chicken thighs whole, you’ll need to increase the baking time.
3.To bread the chicken, proceed as follows:
- Toss the chicken in the breadcrumb mixture (I do them all at once for more efficiency).
- Shake off any excess flour, then coat with egg wash (again, I do all of the chicken pieces together here because it’s faster and works just as well).
- Finally, thickly coat each chicken piece with dry mix again (this needs to be done for each piece individually). You’ll want to pack on a lot of breading and then pound it onto the chicken with kitchen tongs or a large spoon to make it stick.
4.Melt the butter on the prepared, pre-heated pan (careful, hot, use oven gloves and keep kids/pets away!), then add the chicken.
Bake for 10-12 minutes, then very carefully flip. Add more butter if need and finish baking for another 8-10 minutes. I always finish the chicken under the broiler for 1-2 minutes for the ultimate crispy result!
Recipe tips
- Use a dark pan: A dark pan reflect the heat best, which results in the crispiest chicken. A silver pan is acceptable and yields good results, too.
- Use kitchen tongs plus spoons: Use kitchen tongs to toss the chicken in the flour mix initially, and to pound on the breading. Use one large spoon to stir the chicken in the egg mixture and to remove single pieces to drop back into the dry mix (this is your “wet spoon”). Then use a second, separate spoon to pile breading mix onto the chicken (this is your “dry spoon”). This is the easiest way to keep the mess to a minimum.
- Breading: Do not skip pressing/pounding on the dry flour mix in the final step of breading. This is very important to help the breading stick to the chicken and to keep it from flaking off during baking.
- Flip it VERY carefully: Use a spatula to slide underneath the chicken and very gently release the chicken from the pan before flipping/serving. If you just rip it off with tongs etc, the breading will fall off.
- Let the chicken rest for 2-3 minutes before serving, but don’t let it sit around for longer than this. Otherwise, it will start getting soggy.
In full disclosure: While I do love this recipe 100% (I wouldn’t have shared it otherwise!) it is important to me to tell you that you shouldn’t expect the same results from baking as you should from deep-frying.
This recipe here does make a crispy oven fried chicken, but it’s not identical to regular deep fried chicken. It’s very delicious though (I do really do like it better than KFC!) and your family will probably fight for the last crunchy oven fried chicken piece. I know mine does 😉
Reheating leftovers
If you have leftovers, you can easily reheat them in the oven. The chicken won’t be quite as juicy as freshly baked, but it’s still good.
Freezer instructions
Either freeze the breaded, unbaked chicken OR the fully baked and cooled chicken. Flash-freeze in a single layer on a cookie sheet for ~1 hour before transferring to freezer bags (flash freezing is mandatory for the unbaked chicken, but also very much recommended for baked chicken).
Use a container or bag that is suitable for freezing. Label the bag or container with the contents, and the use-by date (freeze for up to 3 months). Place the flash-frozen chicken in the bag and freeze.
Breaded Oven Fried Chicken Thighs
These breaded oven fried chicken thighs come together quickly with just a handful of pantry ingredients including flour, eggs, bread crumbs, and olive oil. Sounds like dinner to us.
These breaded oven fried chicken thighs are superlatively easy to toss together in a jiffy. And while chances are you’re not going to turn to them at your next fancy schmancy dinner party, whenever that may be, these will more than please everyone at your table at every other dinner situation.
CAN YOU BREAD CHICKEN WITH SKIN ON?
We suspect you’ll be much more pleased with the results of this recipe when you use skinless chicken thighs. Save the skin-on chicken thighs for someplace where it hits the hot skillet unimpeded and has a chance to turn crazy crisp.
Breaded Oven Fried Chicken Thighs
- Quick Glance
- 15 M
- 40 M
- Serves 4
INGREDIENTSUSMETRIC
- 2 3/4 ounces all-purpose flour (heaped 1/2 cup)
- Pinch of salt
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup dried store-bought or homemade bread crumbs* (either plain or seasoned), plus more if needed
- 1 pound 5 ounces boneless, skinless chicken thighs, fat trimmed
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- Lemon wedges, to serve
DIRECTIONS
Preheat the oven to 350°F (176°C).
Line a large rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a medium bowl, combine the flour and salt. Into a second medium bowl, crack the eggs and whisk to blend. Scatter the bread crumbs on a plate.
☞ TESTER TIP: If you’re using unseasoned bread crumbs, you may care to add an extra pinch of salt to the flour mixture.
Season each piece of chicken with salt and pepper and then dip it first in the flour, shaking off any excess, then in the egg wash (allowing any excess egg to drip off), and then coat the thighs on both sides with the breadcrumbs and place on the lined baking sheet. Add extra bread crumbs to the plate, if needed.
Drizzle the coated thighs with the olive oil, turning to coat both sides as evenly as you can.
Bake for 10 minutes. Then turn and bake until the bread crumbs are golden and crips and the chicken is cooked through with an internal temperature of 165°F (74°C), 10 to 15 minutes more.
☞ TESTER TIP: If you’re using a thermometer to check the temperature of the chicken, hold it parallel to the baking sheet and insert it through the side and into the center of the thigh. Do not try to do this while the baking sheet is still in the oven! First take it out and rest it on the stove.
Serve the chicken thighs immediately with lemon wedges on the side for squeezing. Originally published April 01, 2020.
*WHAT CAN I DO TO FANCY UP THESE BREADED CHICKEN THIGHS (OR HOW TO MAKE IT SUIT YOUR PANTRY)
- If you want to glam up your chicken thighs with a little more bling (or simply need to adapt them to whatever you happen to have on hand!), you can easily add a generous pinch of dried or fresh herbs. Or maybe plenty of black pepper. Maybe even a handful of very finely grated Parmesan.No bread crumbs? No worries. Instead, crush some potato or tortilla chips into fine crumbs or simply use the crumbs found at the bottom of your bag of chips. If you have some of those trendy gluten-free Inca-style corn nuts, you can crush them into a powder and they’ll work just dandy, too.