Easy Honey Garlic Teriyaki Chicken is a super simple dinner recipe that can be thrown in the crock pot in a matter of minutes! Large juicy chicken breasts &/or thighs are slowly simmered in a sweet and salty sauce made with honey, garlic, fresh ginger, and soy sauce. Who needs takeout when you can make meals like this at home?!?
Quick and easy meals have quickly become my forte.
My health hasn't been that great over the past few years and working in the kitchen has become harder and harder for me to do. It is super stressful for me to take a step back and realize I can't cook the way I did before. Whipping up home-cooked meals is my love language so I need to make amazing food for my family for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I've just had to change the way I used to do things.
Don't get me wrong, we do eat some stuff out of the box (Hello, Annie's Organic Mac & Cheese) and go out a good bit, but what I do make has to be fresh, simple, delicious, and as EASY as possible.
My Easy Honey Garlic Chicken Teriyaki or some other Asian-inspired variation of teriyaki chicken, bourbon street chicken, Asian-style broccoli, Thai peanut pasta, or Aloo Gobi (potatoes and Cauliflower) makes an appearance in our meal plan once, if not twice, a week.
My schedule these days is so incredibly chaotic.
I'm constantly being shuffled back and forth from doctor appt to doctor appt, running errands, racing to pick up the littles from school, dog sitting my brother's Cairn terrier, attending bible study, or helping my mom babysit my niece and nephews while managing my own 4-year-old. Whew! It's seriously never-ending, and by early afternoon I'm usually wiped!
One day when working from my brother's house, I packed my lunch with this easy chicken teriyaki, blanched broccoli, and quinoa. I didn't eat it all and forgot to bring it back home. My sister-in-law found my leftovers, and I got a text about 10 minutes after leaving her house asking, "What is this delicious-smelling meat you have left on my counter? Can I eat it?"
Of course, I said yes and then promised I'd write up the recipe and post it on the blog.
So, here ya go!
Easy Honey Garlic Chicken Teriyaki
This recipe couldn't be any simpler to pull together! Stir all of the sauce ingredients together in the crock pot, drop in the chicken, and cook! It is very similar to my Slow Cooker Honey Pecan Chicken, but I have learned a thing or two about cooking chicken breast in the crockpot since then. The only thing you have to remember? Don't overcook the chicken! It cooks through and remains completely tender and juicy in as little as 2 hours!
PS. I just got an Instant Pot this week so expect some awesome new recipes featuring that life-changing device here soon!
Easy Honey Garlic Chicken Teriyaki
Ingredients
- 2 lbs whole boneless, skinless chicken breast or thighs
- ¼ cup low sodium soy sauce or coconut aminos
- ¼ cup teriyaki sauce or more soy sauce/coconut aminos
- 2 cloves fresh garlic minced
- 1 tablespoon fresh ginger grated or minced
- ½ teaspoon minced or granulated onion
- 3 tablespoon honey
- 2 tablespoon rice wine vinegar optional
- 1 cup water
- 2 tablespoon arrowroot or non-GMO cornstarch
- 2 tbsp water
- Pinch of salt if needed
- Freshly ground black pepper
- Sesame seeds and sliced green onion to garnish
Instructions
- Add soy sauce, teriyaki sauce, fresh garlic, onion, honey, vinegar, and 1 cup water in the bottom of the crock pot and whisk until combined.
- Place chicken in crock pot, cover, and cook on high for 2 hrs (if using only white meat) and closer to 3 hours if using dark meat or a mixture of both.
- Remove chicken from crock pot and allow to rest and cool slightly for about 5 or 10 minutes. Once cooled, shred or chop chicken up into large chunks.
- While chicken is resting, whisk together water and cornstarch to make a slurry. At this stage you can do one of two things: Pour teriyaki sauce from the crock pot into a small sauce pan, bring to a simmer, add slurry, and boil until the sauce has thickened OR stir slurry directly into the sauce in the crockpot, turn crockpot to high and allow sauce to thicken for 30mins to 1 hour.
- Add chicken back to the crock pot and pour over thickened sauce, stirring to coat. Taste sauce then add salt and pepper, if needed.
- Sprinkle on sesame seeds and green onion and serve with freshly steamed broccoli, rice or quinoa
- Enjoy!
Riya panday says
Thanks for having me over to share this family favorite recipe, Heather!
Donna says
Hello I’m trying to make the easy honey garlic chicken teriyaki recipe that Amber has online it mentions in the ingredients ginger but down in the instructions it doesn’t tell you when to add the ginger thank you
Amber says
Hey, Donna! I'm so sorry about that and thank you so much for pointing that out! You put the ginger in with the garlic, soy sauce, etc. Let me know if you have any other questions.