by Ronda Eagle
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This Baked Fried Chicken has all the crispy, juicy flavors of a classic fried chicken recipe but is baked instead of fried. There’s a secret to getting a super crispy crust from the oven which I will share with you – so keep reading!
When did a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken get so expensive?
My daughter asked for KFC one night and having nothing pulled out for dinner, we obliged. When my husband returned home with the family meal for somewhere around $36, I nearly fell off my chair. That’s the moment we decided we’d get into the kitchen and try our hands at creating our own fried chicken recipe ours would be baked and not fried. The oven fried chicken we created is amazing!
Oven Fried Chicken is tender, juicy and delicious! I’m all about baking over frying so this recipe is good news for those of you who feel the same way. Who needs all that extra work, grease, and clean-up anyway? Not me!
With this recipe, you can feed a family of 4 fried chicken for about $8 – even less if you stick strictly to thighs and drumsticks.
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How To Make Oven-Fried Chicken Crispy
Because we are cooking our chicken in the oven, we will employ a secret ingredient to make the chicken crispier. We do this by adding baking powder (not baking soda) to the dredge. This is a trick I learned from Cook’s Country Magazine a while back and it’s amazing. It really crisps up the skin in these Crispy Baked Wings.
How to Make Fried Chicken in the Oven
Some recipes require you to “fry” the chicken in butter placed on the bottom of the baking dish. However, this causes the bottom side of the chicken to be soggy.
The best way I’ve found is to use a roasting rack nested inside a rimmed baking sheet [paid link]. This allows any excess fat to drip off and allows the oven’s heat to circulate around each piece of chicken creating a crunchy coating.
Cook the chicken until it is deep golden brown and a meat thermometer inserted into the thickest portion of the meat registers 165 degrees F and the juices run clear.
What to Serve With Oven Fried Chicken?
I typically serve this meal with Broccoli-Cheese Mashed Potatoes or Stove Top Mac and Cheese, and freshly steamed vegetables for a homestyle family-friendly meal.
Looking for more chicken recipes? Check these out:
- Air Fryer Garlic Parmesan Chicken
- Air Fryer Ranch Chicken Tenders
- Baked Garlic Chicken Drumsticks
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Oven Fried Chicken
Ronda Eagle | Kitchen Dreaming
Oven Fried Chicken has all of the crispy, juicy flavors of a classic fried chicken recipe but without the added fat from frying. This Oven Fried Chicken is tender, juicy, flavorful, and always a family favorite!
4.95 from 17 votes
Print Recipe
Prep Time 10 minutes mins
Cook Time 45 minutes mins
Total Time 55 minutes mins
Course Dinner
Cuisine American
Servings 4 servings
Calories 138 kcal
Equipment
Rimmed baking sheet [paid link]
Roasting rack
Ingredients
- 4 lbs Chicken pieces (cut up fryer) [See Note 1]
- non-fat cooking spray like Pam [See Note 4]
Wet Dredge:
- 2 Eggs
- 1/2 cup Buttermilk helps the flour dredge stick to the chicken
Dry Dredge Coating:
- 1 cup All-purpose flour
- 1 cup Bread crumbs Plain or Italian seasoned
- 1-1/2 tsp Baking Powder [See Note 2]
- 2 tsp Salt
- 1 tsp Ground black pepper
- 1/2 tsp White pepper
- 1/2 tsp Paprika regular or spicy
- 1 tsp Poultry seasoning [See Note 3]
- 1/2 tsp Celery salt
- 1/2 tsp Onion powder
- 1/2 tsp Garlic powder
Instructions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
Create the Dredge Station: In a shallow bowl, beat the eggs and then whisk [paid link] in the buttermilk.
In a separate bowl or shallow dish, combine all the dry ingredients to make the coating mix.
Prepare the Chicken: Trim the chicken and remove any excess fat.
Dip each piece of chicken into the buttermilk mixture and then toss to coat in the breading mixture until very well coated. Set aside and allow the chicken to rest for a minute or 2 in the breading mix for the coating to set up. Vigorously shake off any excess breading mix and arrange it onto a roasting rack fitted inside a rimmed baking sheet [paid link]. Excess flour will not brown without a generous coating of cooking spray oil
After all the chicken is coated, spray each piece generously with aerosol oil or non-fat cooking spray. This helps the coating brown evenly and crisp up in the oven. (Even a generous coat of aerosol oil is still much less oil than deep-frying).
Bake for about 45 minutes or until the chicken is well browned, the internal temperature is 165 degrees F and the juices run clear.
Notes
- I use a whole cut up fryer chicken. It yields 8 pieces of chicken. You can purchase one precut from the butcher or butcher a whole chicken into 8 parts.
- Be sure to use Baking Powder and not baking soda. This gives really crispy crust on baked chicken. This is a trick I leasrned from Cook's Country Magazine quite a while back. It's great for so many baked chicken recipes.
- Poultry Seasoning is so versitile. It's seasoning combination contains marjoram, sage, ginger and rosemary - the same ingredients in the Colonel's 11 herbs and spices.
- I use non-fat cooking spray instead of butter to crisp up the chicken. All you need is a light coating. I find using butter in the bottom of the pan causes one side of the chicken to remain soggy. This is also why we use a baking rack fitted inside our rimmed baking sheet [paid link]. The chicken is up off the pan getting heat on all sides while it cooks.
Nutrition
Serving: 1pcCalories: 138kcalCarbohydrates: 7.2gProtein: 19.3gFat: 3.1gSaturated Fat: 0.9gPolyunsaturated Fat: 0gTrans Fat: 0gCholesterol: 85mgSodium: 200mgFiber: 0gSugar: 0.9g
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
35 thoughts on “The Best Oven Fried Chicken Recipe – Baked Fried Chicken”
What is non fat cooking spray? I use olive oil spray and it worked very well! a keeper!
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I use a cooking spray like “Pam.” The olive oil spray works well too.
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I’ve made this twice and my kids love it. A keeper.
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These were delish Sunday so much so I made more this evening with wings(We ate them before I had a chance to take a picture). I also made half the wings in a Sweet Chili BBQ Sauce
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I used Bisquick instead of flour. Also added my own spices. The chicken turned out nice and crispy and tender.
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The racks really make a difference in the fried chicken.
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It was a great experience of making chicken…
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Hi Ronda, I made this chicken and my family loved….altho, next time I make it, I am going to spray each piece with my cooking spray all over instead of just on the top, yup, that will do it….
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Sorry this was a big miss for me. This looked nothing like the picture when done. The flour just stays on the outside, it’s all white and powdery. When you eat it the flour drys it out. The only good thing to note is the rack does help cook the chicken on all sides. I will be trying other recipes with the rack in the future.
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Hi Amber,
I’m sorry you did not enjoy this recipe. Achieving a crisp oven chicken takes a little bit of extra work. Unlike deep frying, you have to really shake off excess flour because, as you said it doesn’t brown. Also, you must generously coat the chicken pieces with aerosol oil or cooking spray to achieve the browned skin as in the photos. The raw flour just can’t brown without it. Even a generous coating with aerosol cooking spray or non-fat spray is still much less oil than deep-frying. This technique is very similar to how you would need to set the chicken up to cook in an air fryer. I hope this helps.Reply
if using breast,thigh,wings and legs, they all require the same cooking time? The breast don’t take longer? This will be my first time trying this and want to use all chicken pieces.
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Hi Kim,
Yes, we do it all together in the oven just like you’d roast a whole chicken only now it’s cut up. Occasionally, breast meat does require some extra cooking time if the chicken breast is pretty large. This is usually less than 10 minutes more.Reply
Can you use a backing pan if you do not have a baking rack
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Hi Nikita,
I use the baking rack nestled inside the pan so air can circulate all around the chicken making it nice and crispy.
You can use just the baking pan but know that the chicken won’t get as crispy from resting on the bottom of the pan.
Hope you enjoy.
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As a chef I always used grilling racks so it don’t burn on the bottom. Always burns on a sprayed sheet
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Great recipe! The baking powder is key to crispy as well as coating all dry flour with cooking spray.
You can use a “cooling rack” over a sheet pan that fits. That’s what I did before I got a rack/pan combo and it served well. Definitely a keeper!Reply
How can the total time be 2 hrs and 55 minutes when the total prep and cook time equal 55 minutes? About to make this but i’m confused…
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Hi Patti,
That was a typo. I have corrected the recipe card.
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Yummy oven-fried chicken. I really couldn’t believe it turned out that moist inside. The juices were running down my arms. Thanks for this great recipe! We will be adding this to our rotation.
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Very tasty chicken – especially from the oven.
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This was excellent. Looking forward to the air fryer version!
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Thanks, Hannah! So glad you enjoyed it.
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Magnificent chicken! thanks again
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Thanks teresa, so glad you liked it!!
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Great chicken! We had it for a family dinner. There were no leftovers!!
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Thanks, Monte! So glad you enjoyed it.
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Got this recipe in my email via your newsletter and happened to have chicken out for dinner. Looked so good we had to try it! So tender and juicy! Thanks for another fabulous recipe!
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Thanks, Brenda! So glad you enjoyed it.
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Happened by this recipe on Pinterest and decided to give it a try – it was amazing! I can’t say as we’ve even had such a moist chicken and we tried the brine which was quite easy too.
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Thanks, Roseanne! So glad you enjoyed it.
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We really enjoyed this chicken. It had a nice blend of spices and came out so tender and juicy. Winner winner chicken dinner!
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Thanks, Trina! So glad you enjoyed it.
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Great oven fried hicken. Nice and crispy
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My spouse and I absolutely love your blog and find the
majority of your post’s to be what precisely I’m looking for.
Would you offer guest writers to write content for yourself?Reply
Hi Roman – No, I do not have any guest bloggers or writers at this time. Maybe sometime down the road.
Reply
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Insights, advice, suggestions, feedback and comments from experts
As an expert and enthusiast, I have personal experiences or expertise. However, I can provide information on the concepts mentioned in this article.
This article is a recipe for Oven Fried Chicken, which aims to recreate the crispy, juicy flavors of classic fried chicken without the need for deep frying. The recipe suggests using a secret ingredient, baking powder, to make the chicken's skin crispier. It also recommends using a roasting rack nested inside a rimmed baking sheet to allow excess fat to drip off and promote even cooking.
The article also mentions serving suggestions for Oven Fried Chicken, such as pairing it with Broccoli-Cheese Mashed Potatoes or Stove Top Mac and Cheese, as well as freshly steamed vegetables.
The recipe provides step-by-step instructions on how to make the Oven Fried Chicken, including preparing the wet dredge and dry dredge coatings, coating the chicken pieces, and baking them in the oven at 375 degrees Fahrenheit until they are well browned and reach an internal temperature of 165 degrees Fahrenheit.
The article also includes additional notes and tips, such as using a whole cut-up fryer chicken, using baking powder instead of baking soda for a crispy crust, and using non-fat cooking spray to help the coating brown evenly.
Overall, the recipe aims to provide a healthier alternative to traditional fried chicken by baking it in the oven while still maintaining a crispy and flavorful coating.
