How to make the best kid and adult friendly chicken nuggets at home. These nuggets are so easy, and you only need three main ingredients to make them!
How to Make the Best Chicken Nuggets at Home
Unlike the restaurants and fast-food eateries, we bake these homemade chicken nuggets instead of frying them. They are easy to make, too!
The traditional way to make chicken nuggets is to bread them by following a three-part process. You would dredge in flour, then into egg, and finally, coat in breadcrumbs. This method makes great chicken nuggets, but we’ve found another way! It’s easy and tastes amazing.
Instead of using flour and breadcrumbs, we use potato chips. You can use any brand or flavor of potato chip you like (you can even use the baked varieties). We love how crunchy kettle cooked potato chips are, so we usually reach for those.
I especially love using dill pickle flavored chips, but that’s me. You can use whatever flavor you love. Think about barbecue, buffalo, salt and vinegar or even plain salt. Bonus: since we are using potato chips for these, they are gluten-free if you choose a gluten-free flavor!
If you love these nuggets, take a look at our Crispy Flaky Homemade Fish Sticks or this recipe for Easy Baked Popcorn Chicken. They are so simple!
To make these potato chip crusted chicken nuggets, we follow the following steps (a full recipe is below):
- Cut boneless, skinless chicken into nugget-sized pieces. In our photos, we used chicken breast, but chicken thighs would be excellent.
- Dip the chicken into a whisked egg. We use the whole egg, but for fewer calories, use egg whites.
- Roll into crushed potato chips until well coated.
- Place onto a baking sheet and bake until crispy.
I told you these chicken nuggets are simple. We love to serve them next to fry sauce, honey mustard dipping sauce, but ketchup or buffalo sauce work, too.
For more easy homemade baked snack recipes, take a look at these:
- How to make oven-baked potato wedges that are perfectly browned and crisp on the outside and tender on the inside.
- How to make tater tots at home without frying. These homemade tater tots are baked, not fried so they are easy.
- Baked sweet potato fries that are caramelized and crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. No fryer needed here.
Easy Homemade Chicken Nuggets
- PREP
- COOK
- TOTAL
Kid and adult friendly homemade baked chicken nuggets. They are so easy, and you only need three main ingredients to make them!
You Will Need
1 1/4 pounds skinless, boneless chicken breast or thighs
5 ounces (3 heaping cups) favorite potato chips
1 large egg, see notes
Nonstick cooking spray or olive oil
Directions
1Heat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, foil, or a silicone baking mat.
2Add the chips to a resealable bag then use a rolling pin to crush them into crumbles. Alternatively, add the chips to a food processor and pulse until crumbled. Add potato chip crumbles to a wide bowl. Beat the egg in a separate bowl.
3Cut the chicken into 1-inch pieces (about 24 pieces). Then with one hand, dip a piece of chicken into the beaten egg. Shake any excess egg off to prevent soggy nuggets. Then, with your other hand or kitchen tongs, roll the chicken into the crushed potato chips and place onto the prepared baking sheet. Repeat with remaining pieces of chicken.
4Spray tops of the chicken with nonstick cooking spray or add a light drizzle of olive oil to the tops of the nuggets. Bake for 15 minutes, flip the chicken and then bake until an internal thermometer inserted into the chicken reads 165 degrees F, and they are no longer pink inside, another 8 to 12 minutes more. Serve with your favorite dipping sauce.
Adam and Joanne's Tips
- One egg is usually enough for coating the chicken. If, however, you run out of the egg, add a second one to the bowl.
- For even crispier chicken nuggets, insert a wire baking rack into a rimmed baking sheet. Then, instead of baking the chicken directly on the baking sheet, bake them on top of the wire rack. Since air flows around the chicken, there is no need to flip the chicken.
- Make-ahead chicken nuggets: Make the nuggets by following the recipe above. Let them cool then freeze up to a month. To reheat, place them from frozen in a 400F oven and bake until crisped up and hot throughout, 10 to 15 minutes.
- Recipe inspired by Gimme Some Oven.
- Nutrition facts: The nutrition facts provided below are estimates. We have used the USDA database to calculate approximate values. We assumed full-fat salted potato chips. For fewer calories and fat, use baked chips.
If you make this recipe, snap a photo and hashtag it #inspiredtaste — We love to see your creations on Instagram and Facebook! Find us: @inspiredtaste
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I made this tonight for the third time in the past week, it is outrageously delicious and so easy to make! (Also, in the past couple of weeks I made your fry sauce, simple strawberry smoothies, black bean soup, and blueberry muffins, and every single thing was out of this WORLD. (For the fry sauce I subbed pickle juice from the jar because I didn’t have vinegar on hand, and for the muffins I replaced the milk with vanilla caramel flavored coffee creamer – only because I was out of milk – and it all turned out lovely :)). I will never buy soup to-go from a restaurant again, there is no need to. The simplicity of the recipe and quality of the outcome supersedes anything I can find elsewhere, you guys are amazing and I appreciate you sharing your talents for all to enjoy. Instead of just preparing food, you have helped me evolve into a person that can “cook” 🙂
Wow! What a wonderful comment to start our day! 🙂 Thank you so much for coming back to let us know that you love our recipes 🙂
I did three of the potato chips BBQ , Dill pickles, salt & vinegar. I also added cayenne pepper to the chips to give it a little kick . Great recipe idea . Keep it up! Oh by the way I used the air fryer when I make them they turn out out great.
Tips… allergic to eggs – no worry – marinade chicken in a little water, GF corn starch and little salt or your favorite spice blend, add chicken pieces to bag of crushed chip or torlilla, very easy and less handling of raw chicken.Try this ckicken in a ceasar salad, so yummielicious
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I just made this chicken nugget recipe in my air fryer and they are delicious! My daughter has allergies and has gradually become allergic to every chicken nugget we have bought. She is able to eat Organic Kettle Brand Plain and Vinegar and Salt potato chips, so I thought this would work out great for us. I kept the ingredients very simple. First I brined a boneless thigh for about 45 minutes. I then cut it up and dipped the pieces in just egg and rolled in the crushed chips. I cooked them at 370 in the air fryer for nine minutes. They turned out great and she loves them (so do I)! This recipe is a blessing to us!
they are awesome
Oh so easy. Why bother with pricey chicken nuggets when these are so quick, and you control everything about them. The meat is tender and not dry, crunchy and not soggy. It’s so simple that I’m calling it a “how to” not a recipe. This “how to” is a win.
Seems like a good recipe for an air fryer and shorter time
I hate to be the one to tell you this, but flavored potato chips do contain gluten, unless they are certified gluten free, you have to assume always, that they have gluten in them. Read the labels to be certain. Some frozen vegetables contain gluten as well as they are dusted with a light coating of flour before being frozen to prevent them from sticking together.
Hi Wendy, thanks for the tip. We do recommend that readers check the packaging of the chips used.