These gluten-free chicken tenders are a regular dinner item at our house. With a golden brown crispy coating and tender, perfectly cooked chicken in the centre, they go perfectly with salad, on a wrap or alongside your favourite dipping sauce. After making these crispy chicken tenders for years, I’ve figured out the quickest and least messy way to prepare them! And I’ve also included two different cooking methods, depending on how much time you have.
Jump to Recipe
I’ve used gluten free bread crumbs and tapioca starch to keep to keep this recipe gluten free. For those of you who are ok with gluten, feel free to use regular bread crumbs. I love serving my Gluten Free Chicken Tenders with my Chopped Kale Salad, Crispy Chicken Tender Salad or alongside my Sriracha Mayo. Or for more chicken recipes you might want to try my Asian Ground Chicken Rice Bowls or my Chickpea Chicken Salad.
What’s to Love About This Recipe
- a family favourite – this is a recipe that the whole family will love! Because who doesn’t love fried chicken?
- allergy friendly – this recipe is gluten free, dairy free and nut free.
- simple ingredients – I found all of the ingredients for this recipe from my local grocery store.
- healthy – my homemade chicken tenders are made using healthy, wholesome ingredients.
Ingredients Notes & Substitutions
I love making these tender chicken strips and love even more that all of the ingredients are really easy to find! No trips to find weird and wonderful ingredients here. You can find the ingredient quantities in the recipe card at the bottom of this post.
- chicken tenderloins – I prefer to use free range chicken but this is completely up to you. You can also use skinless chicken breast if you don’t have chicken tenderloins, I just slice them through the centre to make two thinner fillets before tenderising.
- gluten free breadcrumbs – I’ve just used regular gluten free breadcrumbs but you can also use gluten-free panko breadcrumbs. If you are following a paleo or low carb diet then you can swap the breadcrumbs for almond flour.
- large eggs – I haven’t tested this recipe with an egg free substitute but if you have an egg allergy you could definitely give it a try. I wouldn’t recommend using flax eggs for this recipe however.
- tapioca flour – otherwise known as tapioca starch. You can swap this for organic corn starch (or non-organic) or arrowroot flour.
- sea salt – I use finely ground sea salt in this recipe, not sea salt flakes.
- spices – dried thyme, onion powder and dried oregano.
- cracked black pepper
- extra virgin olive oil – I use olive oil for shallow frying. You could also use avocado oil as it has a high smoke point also.
How to Make Gluten Free Chicken Tenderloins
The first step to making these yummy chicken fingers is to tenderise the chicken. Place around 3 chicken tenderloins onto a piece of parchment paper on a chopping board. Cover the chicken with a second piece of parchment paper and use a tenderiser or wooden rolling pin to tenderise the chicken. Transfer the tenderised chicken to a large plate and repeat this process with the remaining chicken.
If you are using chicken breasts, slice them through the centre first to create two thinner chicken breast fillets before tenderising. After tenderising, you may wish to slice the tenderised chicken breasts into thinner strips.
Tenderising the chicken helps it to cook more quickly, which means the crumb doesn’t overcook before the chicken is cooked through.
Then it’s time to crumb the chicken. There’s a few different ways that you can prepare the crumbed chicken. The first way is the more traditional method while the second is my quicker method. You can do either, however I find I am usually pressed for time when preparing dinner and prefer my quicker method (which is also less messy too!).
Method 1
Crack the eggs into a shallow bowl and whisk with a fork. Add the tapioca starch to a second bowl. To a third shallow bowl add the breadcrumbs, sea salt, dried thyme, dried oregano, onion powder and cracked black pepper. Stir to combine.
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Place a piece of chicken in the tapioca starch and coat. Place that same piece of chicken into the egg mixture and then into the crumbs and coat with the crumbs. Transfer the crumbed chicken onto a dinner plate and repeat the process with the remaining chicken.
While this method does create evenly crumbed pieces of chicken, personally I find it to be very messy and time consuming, which is why I use method 2.
Method 2
Crack the eggs into a medium or large bowl. Add the tapioca starch and whisk to combine. Add the tenderised chicken pieces and toss to coat all of the chicken pieces in the egg mixture.
To a large freezer bag add the bread crumbs, dried thyme, dried oregano, onion powder, salt and pepper. Hold the top of the bag and toss the bottom of the bag around to combine the crumb mixture.
Add all of the chicken into the bag of crumbs. Seal the top of the bag and shake vigorously, making sure to coat all of the chicken in the crumb. Open the bag and pull apart any chicken pieces that became stuck together and coat any uneven bits with leftover crumbs in the bag.
How to Shallow Fry the Chicken
Pour enough olive oil into a pan so that it is around 1/4 inch deep. Place the pan onto a medium heat to heat the oil. The oil will become very thin and appear to ripple as it gets up to temperature. Add around 3-4 pieces of chicken to the pan and fry for two minutes or until golden. Flip each piece of chicken over and fry for a remaining two minutes on the second side.
Transfer the fried chicken to a paper towel lined plate and repeat this step until all of the chicken is fried.
How to Bake the Chicken
If you are short on time or don’t feel like standing over a pan to fry chicken then you can also oven bake it! Line a large baking sheet or two with parchment paper and place the chicken pieces onto the tray in a single layer, separated by at least a few centimetres. Brush the tops of the chicken with olive oil and place into a preheated conventional oven to bake for 15 minutes or until golden. I find this works well but I still personally prefer to pan fry them.
Storage
Store any leftover chicken in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days. To reheat before eating, warm either in the microwave, oven or in the air fryer.
Gluten Free Chicken Tenders
Equipment
- Large freezer bag
- Measuring Cups & Spoons
- Sharp knife
- Chopping Board
- Parchment paper
- Frying pan
- Tenderiser or wooden rolling pin
Ingredients
- 1 kilogram chicken tenderloins
- 2 large eggs
- 1/3 cup tapioca
- 1 teaspoon sea salt
- 1 1/4 cups gluten free bread crumbs
- 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
- Cracked black pepper
- Extra virgin olive oil, for frying
Instructions
- Place each piece of chicken between two sheets of baking paper and use a wooden rolling pin or tenderiser and to tenderise the chicken. You will need to do this in batches. Set the tenderised chicken aside while you tenderise the remaining chicken.
- To a large bowl add the eggs and tapioca starch. Whisk to combine.
- Add the chicken to the bowl and toss to coat evenly.
- In a large zip lock bag, add the gluten free bread crumbs, dried thyme, onion powder, sea salt and cracked black pepper. Toss the bottom of the bag to mix the ingredients together well, being careful not to spill the crumbs.
- Add all of the battered chicken pieces to the bag, close the ziplock and then toss to coat all of the chicken in crumbs. Some pieces of chicken will stick together, just seperate these bits from each other and coat in crumbs.
- Pour olive oil in pan so that it is around 1/4 inch deep. Heat oil to a medium heat. Once hot, add 4-5 pieces of chicken, being careful not to overcrowd the pan. Cook for approximately 2 minutes on each side, lifting the chicken throughout and checking to make sure it doesn’t burn. Transfer the fried chicken to a paper towel lined plate and set aside while you fry the remaining chicken.
- If you prefer oven baked, place each piece of crumbed chicken onto a baking paper lined tray. Brush each piece liberally with olive oil and place into a 180 degree Celsius oven for 15 minutes or until golden brown.
- Serve warm, whichever way you please!
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