This homemade hot honey chicken is all about the combination of flavors — that sweet, spicy, tangy, savory hot honey sauce that clings perfectly to tender grilled chicken that’s been sprinkled with cayenne, garlic and onion powder. Our hot honey chicken recipe is a total summer dinner flavor bomb. If you’ve got kids at your table, just grill chicken for them that’s seasoned more simply and keep the hot honey chicken for the grown-ups. Still not sure if honey and chicken belong in a recipe together? Check out our other honey chicken recipes, like One Pan Honey Mustard Chicken and Vegetables, Honey Harissa Chicken Sheet Pan and our Honey Mustard Curry Chicken, and consider yourself convinced.
Hot Honey Sauce Ingredients
Salted butter. We love salted butter for savory dishes — it saves us a step and it makes everything taste extra delicious.
Honey. Any honey is fine here, and you may even want to opt for a generic honey that is more neutral in flavor than some fancy varieties so that it can play nicely with the spicy, salty, tangy flavors we’ll pair it with in the hot honey sauce.
Sriracha. Chili garlic sauce, also known as “rooster sauce” because of the rooster on the label. We love it so much. If you’re not sure what else to do with it, we’ve got lots of ideas for you! Try it in our Sesame-Garlic Noodles, Chicken Teriyaki Bowl, or juicy Pork Banh Mi Burger.
Apple cider vinegar. We love the slight sweetness that cider vinegar adds (no seriously, there’s a hint of apple-sweetness under all that acid) to our hot honey sauce. We don’t recommend substituting other kinds of vinegar here.
What To Serve With Hot Honey Chicken
Our deliciously spicy honey grilled chicken recipe obviously packs a little punch, so we like to pair it with cool, refreshing summer side dishes and drinks. Classic creamy sides can help cool the heat (yogurt or mayo-based salads, for example) and icy drinks help us actually cool down when the temps rise. A few of our favorite things to serve with this hot honey chicken recipe are:
Asian Slaw With Sriracha Dressing (there’s that sriracha again!)
Tips For The Best Hot Honey Chicken
You can make this recipe with chicken breasts or chicken thighs, but we’re partial to chicken thighs! They’re just a little more juicy and yes, they do have a little more fat than breasts but they also tend to be a bit more budget-friendly. As part of an overall healthy diet, chicken thighs (especially skinless ones) are not really a splurge.
Brush the chicken generously with the hot honey sauce as you grill it, but make sure the heat is controlled. It should get nicely sticky as it coats the seasoned chicken, but hopefully not burnt.
More Sweet & Sticky Chicken Recipes
Tonight, Hot Honey Chicken. Tomorrow, The World!
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