My favorite thing to do with a recipe is to pare it down as far as possible while maintaining big flavor. I’ve made a lot of Asian inspired marinades and glazes over the years, but this time I took my marinade down to the bare bones, and guess what? I think it’s my favorite one by far. You just can’t beat simple. So, if you’re new to cooking, this Sticky Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken is probably a good recipe to start with because it’s so damn simple and I promise you’ll impress yourself with the flavor. ;)
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Sticky Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken pictured here with jasmine rice and a drizzle of sriracha!
Can I Use Chicken Breast?
This super simple marinade can be used on chicken breast or thighs, but I prefer thighs because they’re usually already in small, manageable, and quick-cooking pieces that stay juicy and tender. If you’re using chicken breasts, I suggest cutting them into smaller pieces or pounding them thin to both increase chicken to marinade contact and to make sure they cook quickly.
Cook OR Grill Your Sticky Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken
Once marinated you can cook the Sticky Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken in a skillet or on a grill (I almost used my George Foreman, but decided a skillet made for better pictures #foodbloggerlife). A grill probably gives you better browned edges and caramelized sugars, but a skillet is just SO easy.
And I like easy.
Pictured with jasmine rice and Cucumber Mango Salad.
Sticky Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken
Servings 8 piecesIngredients
MARINADE
- 1/4 cup brown sugar ($0.16)
- 3 Tbsp soy sauce ($0.26)
- 2 cloves garlic ($0.16)
- 1 Tbsp fresh ginger, grated ($0.05)
- Freshly cracked pepper ($0.05)
- 1 Tbsp cooking oil ($0.04)
CHICKEN
- 8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs (about 1.75 lbs total) ($7.10)
- 1/2 Tbsp cooking oil ($0.02)
GARNISHES (optional)
- 2 green onions ($0.17)
- 1 tsp sesame seeds ($0.07)
Instructions
- Mince the garlic and grate the ginger using a fine holed cheese grater or box grater. In a small bowl stir together the brown sugar, soy sauce, garlic, ginger, some freshly cracked pepper (about 15 cranks of a pepper mill), and cooking oil. Place the chicken thighs in a shallow dish or a gallon size zip lock bag. Pour the marinade over the chicken and turn to coat. Cover the chicken and marinate for at least 30 minutes or up to a day (refrigerated).
- When ready to cook the chicken, heat a large skillet over medium flame. Once hot, add 1/2 Tbsp cooking oil and swirl to coat the bottom of the skillet. Add half of the chicken pieces and let cook until well browned on each side and cooked through. Remove the cooked chicken to a clean plate, then repeat with the second batch.
- Once all the chicken has been removed from the skillet, pour the leftover marinade into the skillet and allow it to come up to a boil. Whisk the marinade as it boils to dissolve any browned bits from the skillet. Let it continue to boil until it reduces to a thick glaze*. Turn the heat off, add the cooked chicken back to the skillet, and dredge it in the thick glaze. Garnish with sliced green onions and sesame seeds if desired.
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Notes
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!See this recipe used in my weekly meal prep.
How to Make Soy Glazed Chicken – Step by Step Photos
To prepare the awesomely easy ginger soy marinade, mince two cloves of garlic and grate about 1 Tbsp fresh ginger (more information on how to buy and use ginger can be found here). Combine the garlic and ginger with 1/4 cup brown sugar, 3 Tbsp soy sauce, 1 Tbsp cooking oil, and some freshly cracked pepper (about 15 cranks of a pepper mill).
Place eight boneless, skinless chicken thighs in a shallow container or gallon size zip lock bag and pour the marinade over top. Turn the thighs to coat in the marinade, then cover and marinate (refrigerated) the chicken for at least 30 minutes or up to one day.
When ready to cook, heat a large skillet over a medium flame. Once hot, add 1/2 Tbsp cooking oil and tilt the skillet to swirl the oil over the surface. Add half of the chicken thighs and cook on each side until well browned and cooked through. Remove the chicken from the skillet onto a clean plate, then repeat with the second batch of chicken.
The reason the marinade is not poured in WITH the chicken and the chicken is cooked in two separate batches is because too much moisture in the skillet will prevent those nice browned edges and caramelized sugars. So, work in two batches and cook the marinade separately.
Once the second batch of chicken has been cooked and removed from the skillet, pour in the leftover marinade and let it come to a boil. Whisk the marinade as it boils to dissolve the browned bits from the skillet. Let it continue to boil until it reduces to a thick glaze (this only takes a few minutes because there isn’t much marinade). This cooks the marinade, just like you cooked the chicken, to kill bacteria (it’s no less safe than the actual chicken or the marinade that is on the surface of the chicken when it cooks). FDA foodsafety guidelines for marinades. If this still makes you uncomfortable, you can skip this extra glaze (the chicken will still be nice and sticky), or double the amount of marinade in the beginning and only use half on the chicken. You can cook the second “clean” half in a sauce pan until it thickens to a glaze.
Return the cooked chicken to the skillet and dredge it on both sides in the sticky glaze. Top the chicken with sliced green onions and sesame seeds, if desired.
I paired my Sticky Ginger Soy Glazed Chicken with jasmine rice and Cucumber Mango Salad. The cold and tangy Cucumber Mango Salad was the PERFECT side to this dish (plus I was lucky enough to get mangoes on sale 3/$1 this week!!).
Just made this last night. Absolutely the best/easiest recipe I’ve tried in a very long time. This is so flavorful and basic to make. I e got it memorized already. Can’t wait to play around with side dishes to enhance this meal next time.
This was rSuch good flavors!!eally delicious and easy.
My boyfriend and I made this tonight it was amazing!!
is there an area where i can find the nutritional info for these recipes?
Looks great I cant wait to try it. One question though, how do you prepaid the cucumbers and mango salad?
Here is the recipe for the Cucumber and Mango Salad.
I cooked mine in a cast iron skillet. Almost Browned the chicken before I added the glaze. Didn’t bake at all. You can control the thickening of the glaze this way…
This is soooo good!! When my husband was walking up to our house he could smell it and thought “I hope that is coming from my house!”
Thanks for another winner!
Thank you, can’t wait to prepair this dish. It’s 4:35am and Im looking up recipes. #lovernewrecipes
Very good. I don’t usually like chicken thighs but these were cooked so well that I could get past my bias! Easy to put together, I served with brown rice, steamed broccoli and shishito peppers. It tastes like it costs way more than it did.
This looks delicious! I am thinking of trying it with boneless, skinless chicken breasts and slicing them into chunks or strips before marinating. Do you think that will work?
Yes, I think that would work. :)
Thank you for sharing. Looks delicious. Will try this out now. :)
Can you bake the chicken instead of sauteeing? I have been totally loving the flavors of this chicken, but I hate dealing with hot oil. If I wanted to bake it, how would you suggest? How long, at what heat, in/on what kind of cookware? Would laying the pieces out on a foil-covered metal roasting tray work? Thanks for the great recipes!
I’d have to experiment with it to find the right time and temperature. You might not get the same amount of evaporation and thickening of the sauce in the oven as you do in a hot skillet, though.
The first time I made this I tried the stovetop method,and found that the sauce started burning before the chicken had cooked through. I finished it off that time by baking in the oven, which turned out pretty good. This time I just went straight to the oven –put the chicken and all the marinade directly into a 9×11 glass baking dish and baked at 400 F for about an hour, turning the pieces a couple of times in the middle of cooking so that they would get more of a caramelized glaze. The sauce cooked down some, but was still pretty runny. You could always finish it off on the stove — I just spooned a bit over the rice and it was tasty that way, too.
The chicken was nice and tender (I used skinless thighs, bone-in). My family wants me to make this again!
Delish! I bet this would be fantastic swapping the brown sugar for orange marmalade too.
I made this for dinner as the recipe stated, only changing it by adding some sriracha to the marinade. I let the thighs (4) marinate for 6 hours or so. It was so good! The chicken looked beautiful and tasted fabulous. Marinating it really let it absorb all the ginger and soy sauce flavor. I will make this again for sure.
Hey Beth – thanks for the recipe. It was great.
I wanted to mention here that, except for the salt in the soy sauce, the marinade’s other flavors will penetrate very little into the chicken. I think a couple of food bloggers, America’s Test Kitchen, and a few other sources have shown this to be true.
I made the marinade, dredged the chicken in it, and let the excess for each piece drip back into the bowl. Then I cooked the chicken directly in the hot pan.
For the marinade, I cooked it at a very low flame to extract the garlic & ginger flavors for 2-3 minutes. Took it off heat, then boiled in the last minute before the chicken was finished. I combined the results after everything was done. It significantly shortens the prep time for the recipe.
Thanks again!
Great tip! Thank you!