Hot Honey Pretzel Chicken Fingers with House Sauce.
We’re doing it! Major flavor game changer here with pretzel crusted chicken fingers!
I’ve basically never loved chicken fingers more in my life than I do right now.
If you’ve been around for a while then you are aware of the ridiculous arsenal of chicken finger recipes I have here on the blog. To this day, they remain one of Eddie’s favorite foods – they are his ultimate comfort food. Sometimes he even orders a salad with chicken fingers on it!
My go-to method for making the chicken is much like the way I showed you how to do this parmesan chicken a few weeks ago. A wire rack is necessary because it helps keep the chicken crispy all the way around. If you don’t have one already, I suggest putting one on your wish list because I use it all the time.
The other necessary ingredient is olive oil spray or some form of cooking spray. Back in the day when I started making chicken fingers like this, the only available option was Pam cooking spray! I would literally spray them with Pam. These days, you can find avocado oil spray (our fave), olive oil spray, coconut oil spray and so on. Spraying the crusted tender and using the rack when baking practically makes the tenders taste “fried.” Or least have that “fried” texture.
It’s imperative for my perfect chicken finger recipe.
Now… on to the flavor! First of all, crushed pretzels are what we use for the breading here and let me just tell you… it’s incredible. Max and Emilia LOVE pretzels. In fact, pretzels might be their favorite snack of all time. So I knew that making pretzel-crusted chicken would be a huge, gigantic, enormous hit.
I was right!
To make these a little more grown up-friendly, I added in the hot honey drizzle. We adore hot honey in this house too. I’ve used it on pizza, on pineapple wedges, sweet potatoes and even salmon. It elevates the simplest, most boring meal and makes it exciting.
For instance, I don’t necessarily want plain chicken fingers. But I definitely always want hot honey chicken fingers!
The honey is not overly spicy either. Well, technically I guess that depends on your peppers, but I remove the seeds before drizzling and it’s perfect. And I don’t love spicy food. To me, adding hot sauce on everything just… ruins it for me. Dishes that are ridiculously spicy aren’t enjoyable for me; it’s almost like they paralyze my taste buds and I can no longer taste the flavor of the food.
So when I say the hot honey is worth it… it’s worth it. However, it’s not the only sauce here.
My house sauce is from The Pretty Dish and it’s to die for. Creamy, a little tangy and the perfect dip for pretty much everything. Like every food under the sun.
Now go RUN and make these delicious crunchy bites!
Pretzel Crusted Chicken Fingers with Hot Honey
Hot Honey Pretzel Chicken Fingers
Ingredients
pretzel chicken
- 1 ½ pounds boneless skinless chicken tenders
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon pepper
- 2 cups mini pretzel twists crushed
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 2 eggs lightly beaten
hot honey
- 1/2 cup honey
- 1 jalapeño pepper thinly sliced
How Sweet Eats house sauce
- ½ cup mayonnaise
- 2 tablespoons dijon mustard
- 1 tablespoon yellow mustard
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 1 tablespoon your favorite BBQ sauce
Instructions
pretzel chicken
- Preheat the oven to 450 degrees Line a baking sheet with foil and place a wire rack on top. Spray the rack with nonstick spray.
- Season the chicken tendres with the salt and pepper. Place the pretzels in a food processor and blend until mostly fine crumbs remain. Place the pretzels in a bowl. Stir in the garlic powder.
- In another bowl, lightly beat the eggs.
- Take each chicken tender and coat it in the beaten egg. Dredge it through the pretzel crumbs, pressing gently so the crumbs adhere. Place the tender on the rack and repeat with remaining chicken. Once all the chicken is finished, spray it with avocado or olive oil spray.
- Bake the chicken for 12 minutes. Flip it gently and spray the other side with the oil spray. Bake for another 10 to 12 minutes.
- Let cool slightly before serving with the house sauce and hot honey.
hot honey
- Heat the honey and the jalapeños in a saucepan over medium-low heat. Let the honey come to a light simmer then turn off the honey. Let it sit for 5 minutes. Strain the honey through a fine mesh sieve to remove the peppers and the seeds.
How Sweet Eats house sauce
- Whisk all ingredients together until creamy and smooth and combined. This stores great in the fridge for a few days.
Did you make this recipe?
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I appreciate you so much!
I want to float on a pretzel raft in that house sauce.
68 Comments on “Hot Honey Pretzel Chicken Fingers with House Sauce.”
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Yum! Do you think you think these would work in an air fryer?
I’m wondering the same….
hi guys!! i do! i tested them in the air fryer last week and they worked well. i would do 400 degrees for 10-15 mins! flip once during cooktime!
These sound amazing. I buy a pretzel version of shake n bake and it is our absolute favorite. Will have to get a wire rack, (the only one I have is coated) and give these a try ASAP. plus that hot honey sounds awesome. I am your camp with food not being too too spicy. What kind of BBQ sauce do you normally use in your house sauce? would bone suckin sauce work? Thanks.
love that!! and yes i use bone suckin sauce the most. it’s my fave. i used it for the sauce above.
Oh my goodness! These look amazing! Cannot wait to try!
thanks ashlyn!
I was going to make lemon dill chicken fingers, but I have the end of a bag of Pretzels.
So I’ll make these instead!
Go wire racks for many uses! YA!
those sound delish too!!
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These look and sound amazing!
thank you jeanette!
what a fun chicken coating, pretzels, ya! Great house sauce too, thank you
thanks sabrina!
These look freaking fantastic. They are so shiny!! I love shiny food. Especially NATURALLY shiny food. :-) I love that these will have a sweet-and-salty flavor because of the pretzels and the honey. My husband has also been meaning to try a hot honey sauce/marinade for chicken, so this recipe posted at the perfect time!! I just forwarded him the email. :-D
thank you so much CJ!
Won’t it be too salty if you first season it and then coat it with salty pretzels?
so i thought the same Iram! i tested these the first go round with no salt on the chicken. i used regular mini pretzel twists. i’m not sure what it is (maybe when you grind them, the salt just isn’t enough?) but they definitely didn’t have as much flavor. i highly suggest doing a sprinkle of salt on the chicken before coating in the egg and pretzels! :)
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These look amazing! My little refuses to eat store bought chicken fingers (yea!) so I’m always cooking up a batch. Can these be made in larger batches and frozen? If so, would it be frozen before or after cooking? Thank you!
i would freeze after baking, only because the breading would fall off too much otherwise! i think the best way to reheat would be to do it in an air fryer if you have one!
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Has anyone tried this in the air-fryer? I would love to have the setting and times if you did. Thanks ahead
i tested them in the air fryer last week and they worked well. i would do 400 degrees for 10-15 mins! flip once during cooktime!
I made these tonight and they were spectacular. So good!
These were SO DANG GOOD! I do want to say that breading is a soggy mess for leftovers, so plan accordingly. :) I mean I scarfed them down regardless, because soggy pretzels drizzled with hot honey still taste amazing! haha
The sauce was also to die for, can’t wait to use it anytime we need a side dip for something!
so glad you liked them ashley!!
Looks amazing. Reminiscent of honey crispers that you get at Chili’s, but I’m pretty sure those don’t hold a candle to this one. Love the work you’re doing over here and keep the deliciousness coming!
I need to make these as soon as possible, right after this heat wave is over though! I’m not planning on turning on this oven until its done!! :)
I made these in the air fryer and they were amazing! Served with some greek yogurt “ranch”, simply the best!
Oh my …. I need this in my life… It looks so good
Every element was outstanding! Just made this for dinner. My very picky husband and daughter both declared this to be a keeper.
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These were incredible! Definitely the best baked chicken finger recipe I have ever tried! Definitely adding this to our weeknight favorites list!
Wondering where you got the pretty cups you used for the sauces? Also, just to confirm the pretzels are the salted mini pretzels? Thank you.
These are AMAZING!!! Made them for the second time tonight and they have become a favorite for us! That hot honey is the best and I want to eat it on everything!
Had this for dinner last night – so the chicken was great and my kids gobbled it up which is a win in my books – but WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THIS SAUCE. I dramatically said to my husband “try this sauce, its kind of life changing” so he tried it and responded “oh my god, you are right, it IS life changing” and we legit probably spoke about how amazing the sauce was for 10 minutes. THANK YOU.
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I made these for supper tonight. My husband proclaimed them to be the best chicken fingers I have ever made! I loved the addition of the hot honey. My husband isn’t a huge “sauce” guy and he loved the house sauce (so did I!). Can’t wait to make these again :)
Do you think the hot honey sauce is too spicy for toddlers? I would loveee to try this recipe but not sure if it would be too hot and if it wouldn’t be the same without the jalapeño. Thanks!
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Do you think I could use chicken thighs? Recipe looks so yummy 😋
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These are in my air fryer right now! Slight mods, I used Dots pretzel coating because it’s already seasoned (those pretzels are AMAZING), and I’m sticking with honey mustard sauce. My mouth is watering waiting for them, though!!
I was just thinking of Dot’s coating when I was reading this recipe – how did they turn out??
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INCREDIBLE. Made these for Sunday dinner and the whole family loved them. We used gluten free pretzels and still worked amazing!! Don’t skip the sauce. SO GOOD.
how long does the honey jalapeno last ?
Honey lasts almost literally forever.
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Making these this weekend!!! Kids and I will love!!!!!
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Turned out delicious! Excited to add this to our regular rotation!
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This was so delicious and the kids gobbled theirs up! I was afraid the honey might be too spicy, so I served theirs without. After tasting it on my own, I think they’d actually enjoy the honey as well-not overly spicy, just as described! Thanks for another great recipe! We’ll definitely be having this again.