Have you ever tried chicken teriyaki? If not, then this blog post is for you! Japanese teriyaki chicken is a dish that originates from Japan and it’s typically made with chicken thighs or chicken breast meat. It has a sweet and savory flavor, thanks to the sauce which typically consists of soy sauce, ginger, and sugar. Today, I am going to share how to make chicken teriyaki from scratch!
One of my daughter’s favorite dishes to order when we go to a Japanese restaurant is teriyaki chicken. It’s definitely one of her go-to comfort meals.
What’s not to love about chicken that is tender and juicy on the inside with a sweet glaze on top?
But recently, my daughter asked me if I could make chicken teriyaki at home- just like she orders it at her favorite spot in town. She said she missed it because her favorite Japanese restaurant had closed down.
When we’re craving something really delicious, homemade usually tastes better than someplace else. So I decided to make chicken teriyaki from scratch!
Here’s how you can make it too.
Why You Will Love This Teriyaki Chicken Recipe
Every single bite of this chicken is bursting with a combination of umami and sweet flavors. The dance of salt and sugar is delightful. There is a reason this is one of the most popular recipes in Japanese restaurants!
You are going to love my recipe! Not only is it authentic and delicious, but it is incredibly simple too. Its beauty is in its simplicity. This is something you can make for lunch or as a fast dinner on hurried weeknights.
It tastes even better than takeout and doesn’t take much effort at all. Not only will I share my recipe with you, but I’ll give you some tips so that your teriyaki chicken is tender, juicy, and extra delicious.
What Is Teriyaki Chicken?
We can thank Japanese immigrants that settled in Hawaii for creating this deliciously sweet and savory dish. They combined the umami flavor of soy sauce with locally sourced pineapple juice and brown sugar. The result is a thick and sweet marinade that tastes perfect on chicken, pork, and even just drizzled on rice.
Ingredients Used In This Chicken Teriyaki Recipe
There are two simple ingredients in this recipe – the chicken and the marinade.
Chicken Thigh vs Chicken Breast Meat
The best type of chicken for teriyaki chicken is chicken thighs.
In order to make juicy and classic Japanese teriyaki chicken, you need chicken thigh with the skin on. Chicken thigh has more flavor and the chicken breast meat is too dry for this recipe.
If you want to use chicken breast, I suggest marinating it in some teriyaki sauce overnight so it isn’t as dry.
Homemade Teriyaki Sauce
The other ingredient is the homemade teriyaki sauce. It’s an easy condiment to make and it can be stored for a month refrigerated. It only requires 4 ingredients:
- Soy sauce
- Mirin
- Sake
- Sugar
If you love Japanese food and cook authentic Japanese food, you may already have all 4 ingredients in your pantry. It is definitely worthwhile to make your own.
Tip: Check out this post for my authentic Japanese teriyaki sauce recipe.
How To Make Japanese Teriyaki Chicken From Scratch
It might surprise you just how easy this is to make. All you do is cook the chicken thighs in your skillet. Then, pour the teriyaki sauce on the chicken until it thickens up.
I have some tips below and all the exact steps (including how to make sure the chicken cooks evenly) are in the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post.
3 Tips To Make The Perfect Teriyaki Chicken
Here are some tips that will help you make the perfect teriyaki chicken every single time.
1. Pan-Fry Skin Side First Without Oil
Score the chicken thigh to make the meat even. Heat the frying pan over medium heat and don’t add any oil because the chicken skin will produce more than enough oil.
2. Remove Extra Oil With A Paper Towel
Remove excess oil with kitchen paper while pan-frying, otherwise, the oil will separate the sauce from the chicken meat.
3. Reduce Teriyaki Sauce In The Pan
Pour over the teriyaki sauce and reduce the teriyaki sauce a little bit. You can tell by looking at the bubble the teriyaki sauce creates.
What To Serve With Teriyaki Chicken
As you already know, you can use teriyaki chicken as rolled sushi fillings and for other dishes like teriyaki chicken don (teriyaki chicken bowl), teriyaki burgers, sandwiches, etc.
Previously, I chopped up the chicken thigh into small pieces to be able to eat it easily with a pair of chopsticks. You can cut the chicken thigh before cooking but if you do, you need to add oil to the pan.
This small bite-sized chicken recipe is great for Teriyaki Chicken Donburi (rice bowl) with a side of Asian cucumber salad. The acidity of the salad perfectly balanced out the sweetness from the teriyaki sauce!
FAQ
Before I get to the recipe card at the bottom of this post, here are some questions people often have about teriyaki chicken.
Store leftover teriyaki chicken in an airtight food storage container in the refrigerator. It will stay fresh for up to 4 days.
Yes, my homemade teriyaki sauce is perfect to use as a marinade. You can use it on pork too.
Either boneless or bone-in works. I prefer boneless because it is easier to cut when I pan fry it.
Yes, it is possible to make teriyaki chicken in the slow cooker, but I do not recommend it. I prefer pan-frying because it makes the chicken skin nice and crispy. When you make food in the slow cooker, the texture is a lot softer. If you don’t mind soft chicken, then it’s totally fine to use the slow cooker.
Related Recipes
If you enjoyed this teriyaki chicken recipe, here are some more Japanese chicken recipes you might want to try next. They are some of my favorites!
- Chicken Katsu Curry
- Karaage Japanese Fried Chicken
- Oven-Baked Char Siu Chicken Drumsticks
- Oyako Don Chicken and Egg Rice Bowl
- Chicken Nanban
Here is my recipe for Teriyaki Chicken and If you liked it, please rate it and leave a comment below. Also, don’t forget to follow me on Youtube, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to keep up to date with all the latest happenings on Chopstick Chronicles. Don’t forget to use the hashtag #ChopstickChronicles so I can see your wonderful creations!
Teriyaki Chicken 照り焼きチキン
Video
Ingredients
- 1 Chicken thigh the thigh just has more flavour 500g
- 50 ml Teriyaki sauce
Instructions
- Score the chicken thigh meat and open up to make the meat thickness even.
- Poke the chicken thigh skin with a fork in order to allow the sauce to go through easily.
- Heat a large frying pan on high heat (you do not need oil)
- Once the pan has heated, place the chicken meat on the pan with the skin side down
- Brown the side and make the skin crisp for about 5 minutes. Remove any oil produced from the skin as much as possible.
- When the skin is crisped, turn the meat over and cook the other side.
- Pour the teriyaki sauce over the chicken meat. Keep pouring sauce over the chicken meat with a spoon until the teriyaki sauce has reduced a little bit.
- When the sauce starts to make bigger bubbles around the chicken and the sauce has thickened, turn the heat off and remove the pan from the heat.
- Slice the chicken thigh about 2 cm thick to serve with your choice of vegetables.
Question: the recipe says to reduce the teriyaki sauce but the teriyaki sauce recipe its already reduced about 70%, should I reduce the sauce further in this recipe or I should use a sauce not as thick for this recipe.
Thank you in advance 🙂
Hi Brenda, thank you so much to ask this question. Great question. You don’t need to reduce the teriyaki sauce. I will fix the recipe. Thank you for bringing my attention to the recipe 😀
This truly was the best!! A keeper recipe for sure, the flavors were great.
Scoring the chicken really did help it absorb the teriyaki flavor! Thanks for the tip.
Very nice recipe just made this today was great.
Thank you for making this recipe 😀
Loved the recipe for teriyaki sauce. It is SO key and so many recipes are too sweet.
Thank you Jessica 😀
Such an easy, yet perfect recipe. Everyone always begs for this one.
Thank you Kristen 😀
Homemade chicken teriyaki is so much lighter and more flavorful than take-out. This is a great recipe!
Thank you Taryn 😀
My mom doesn’t like chicken thighs either, but I agree they make for some awesome meals, especially for something like this delicious teriyaki chicken! I love the simple ingredient list!
Yep ;D and my daughter don’t get that point….
I love this teriyaki chicken – it’s so flavorful and easy to make!
Teriyaki chicken is probably the easiest Japanese dish you can make 😀
This is the perfect weeknight meal! We love teriyaki chicken at our house!
Yes! because it is so easy and takes only 15-20 minutes to make 😀
Love the step by step pictures of this delicious teriyaki chicken, pinning it away! Thank you for sharing!
You are welcome 😀
I love love LOVE this simple teriyaki sauce recipe! Using it on chicken thighs is brilliant….so much flavor!
Thank you April, it is very simple and easy to make 😀
Homemade teriyaki chicken is one of my favorite meals to make! I need to try your version!
Thank you Madi 😀
This is really a great recipe and I love this recipe as I love chicken a lot
Thank you Hazel.
LOVE that this recipe uses chicken thigh. So much more flavor!!! 5 star recipe 🙂
Thank you Aimee 😀
I love that you have your own version of Teriyaki sauce and it’s so do-able with only 4 ingredients. This chicken looks wonderful and the step by step pics are very handy.
Thank you Jane, yes homemade Teriyaki sauce is the best 😀
My favorite ! I love teriyaki chicken!
Nice! I’m glad you love it 😀
Shihoko, this is a great recipe and so easy to make! I tried it for the first time and am eating the teriyaki while writing this 😀 I didn’t have any sake so I doubled up on mirin and only added a couple pinches of brown sugar. I thought a whole teaspoon of ginger would be too much but I went ahead and added it all anyway – I’m glad I did because I can taste the flavour of the ginger just enough, and there’s a little kick too! I’ll definitely cook this again and maybe add a bit of garlic next time (I love garlic). Thanks for posting this!
Hi Michelle I am glad that you liked the recipe. Yes as you said if you dont have sake you can still make teriyaki without it:D I love ginger so I usually add ginger a lot and adding garlic will be a great isea:D
Ohhhh. Sarap ( Means So Yummylicous ) I substituted brown sugar into honey in my Terriyaki Chicken so a healthy taste experience . Thank you so much for this recipe.
Good healthy choice, I’m glad it turned out yummy for you! Thank you so much for using my recipe!
Wow! This looks delicious and finally, a teriyaki recipe that isn’t swimming in sugar. I have seen so many that just had tons of it (like I’m talking cups of the stuff for pretty small servings) and I always pass them up like “There is no way I could eat something that sweet!” I can’t wait to try this out.
Thank you Nurisha, really? I never ever put that much sugar in any of my recipe. I even replace sugar with rice malt syrup, or Natvia for sugar alternative. Try this recipe you will love it<3
You’re very welcome and I’m sure I will! 😀
😀