Cajun Chicken
Grilled Cajun Chicken marinated in a cajun chicken marinade that is bold and bursting with amazing flavors. This smoky, spicy, savory, slightly tangy, incredibly tasty Cajun and Creole inspired chicken tenderloins is truly a summer spectacular!
This delicious cajun chicken recipe can also be pan-fried on the stovetop
If you love Cajun and Creole inspired recipes, be sure to also check out my Muffuletta Pasta Salad, Cajun Sausage Alfredo Pasta, Creole Cream Cheese Wonton Cups, and Potato Casserole with Andouille Sausage!
Cajun Chicken Recipe
This yummy Cajun Chicken is a tried and true recipe from my husband, John.
When we were dating, this was the very first thing he ever made for me, and it’s so good I decided it needs its own place on my blog!
John has perfected the marinade for this Grilled Cajun Chicken dish over the years, and he doesn’t have a written recipe so I made him measure every single ingredient so I can share this with you.
Thank you, honey! ❤️
The Cajun chicken marinade is truly the secret to the tastiness of the dish. It is fairly simple, but produces flavors that will make your tastebuds do the happy dance.
In addition to the delicious marinade, this Cajun Chicken dish is grilled (charcoal strongly preferred) which gives it that incredible smoky flavor.
If you do not have a grill, pan-fried is another option but I’ve got to be honest, grilling your Cajun chicken is always the yummier way to go.
What to expect: this cajun chicken has a unique cajun flavor with a nice savory and spicy blend. It has a full, bold flavor, and the smokiness from the grill brings out the great flavors even more. In short, if you love big beautiful flavors, you are in for a treat with this!
With a name like ‘Cajun Chicken’, you betcha this dish has quite a kick, but you have the option to make it less spicy as well. More on that later!
Ingredients for Cajun Chicken Marinade
The secret ingredient in this Cajun Chicken recipe is Tony Chachere’s Creole seasoning. It is a delicious bold-flavored seasoning, and is a great seasoning to have on hand to make your favorite Creole and Cajun dishes.
It can be found in most regular grocery stores in the United States. If you cannot find it, check it out here.
This seasoning has a kick to it, and a little goes a long way. It has a relatively high salt content. Because of that, we will not be adding any additional salt to our Grilled Cajun Chicken.
Side note: We also love the Tony Chachere’s Creole seasoning on our scrambled eggs. It also goes well with lots of other protein, and is also a nice spice to top on pasta and soups.
Along with Creole seasoning, our Cajun chicken marinade also consists of:
- Worcestershire sauce – this also has salt in it as well
- Tabasco sauce – bring on a bit more heat and some tanginess. If you like your cajun chicken less spicy, you can omit or reduce this.
- Dried oregano
- Garlic powder
- Black pepper
- Butter – used as the “oil” for this recipe.
How to make Grilled Cajun Chicken
The very first thing you need to do is to bring together the cajun chicken marinade.
Heat all the sauce ingredients (Creole seasoning, Worcestershire sauce, tabasco sauce, oregano, garlic powder, black better and butter) in a pot to get the flavors to combine.
Next, let’s fire up that grill! Give some time for grill to heat, especially if you are using a charcoal grill
When grill is heated, add chicken tenderloins onto the hot grill, then brush the cajun chicken marinade generously onto the chicken pieces.
Once one side is done, flip, and brush cajun marinate on the other side. If you have additional marinate, just gently pour/brush the rest of it onto onto the chicken.
No wasting of good marinade here!
As a reference point, our charcoal grill shows 300℉ and we cooked it about 7 minutes on each side. So in other words, it cooks fast!
Regardless of how you cook it make sure cajun chicken has an internal temperature of at least 165℉ before removing from grill.
Charcoal grill is definitely my favorite way to make these grilled cajun chicken because in my personal opinion, nothing beats a good smoky flavor on chicken.
BIG FAN OF THE SMOKE.
As you can see, cajun chicken is actually a fairly simple chicken dish with a good solid marinate/sauce on it.
If you like it with less kick, reduce the amount of Creole seasoning you put in there, because that thing definitely is SPICY.
Tender, juicy pieces of chicken soaked in an incredible cajun inspired marinade – lots of flavor, lots of kick if you want it.
While it is simple, grilled cajun chicken is also fairly unique and will leave you thoroughly satisfied.
Everyone needs a couple of simple, good, solid chicken recipes in your back pocket!
How to Serve this
We typically serve Grilled Cajun Chicken with pasta and marinara sauce. I don’t know if it is an us ‘thing’ but we do it all the time and can’t imagine eating anything else with it.
The tomato-y pasta pairs perfectly with the bold-flavored spicy chicken. Sometimes we toss some spinach in the pasta to get some veggies in there, or serve a veggie side with it.
It is delish, will give your tastebuds a little party of their own.
Behold photo evidence 👇🏽 (scroll to see).
Frequently Asked Questions
If you are pan-frying the chicken, I highly recommend marinating the chicken for at least 45 minutes, or up to a couple of hours, then pan-fry it with some vegetable oil. When you bring the chicken to the skillet/cast iron pan, avoid adding sauce onto the skillet. Optional: brush on more sauce as chicken cooks. The goal is to pan fry the chicken fairly dry, with the marinate already soaked into the chicken, and just a tiny bit on the chicken.
Absolutely! We make and use leftovers for meal prep or other dinners. The longer the flavors sit on the meat the tastier it is!
The spicy primarily comes from the Creole seasoning so lessen the amount of the seasoning and omit Tabasco if you like your Grilled Cajun Chicken less spicy. There is no way to completely remove the spicy component of this dish because omitting the Creole seasoning will lose its Cajun/Creole flavors.
DID YOU ENJOY THIS RECIPE? Please comment below and give us a 5-star rating! This will help others find this recipe on Google and Pinterest. We very much appreciate your help! 🤍
More Chicken Recipes!
Other simple chicken recipes that we love includes (but not limited to):
- Lemon Balsamic Grilled (or Pan-Fried) Chicken
- Hawaiian Chicken with Coconut Rice
- Panko Baked Chicken
- Creamy Spinach Chicken
- Spinach Artichoke Stuffed Chicken
- Spicy Baked Chicken Tenders
- Thai Grilled Chicken
- Grilled Pineapple Chicken Kebobs (by Savor the Best)
ENJOY!
Grilled Cajun Chicken
Ingredients
- 1.5-2 lbs chicken tenderloins
- 1 tbsp butter
- 3/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
- 1/4 tsp tabasco sauce
- 1 tsp oregano
- 1 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 2 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tbsp Creole Seasoning (I use Tony Chachere's) Reduce amount for less spicy!
Instructions
- Heat butter, Worcestershire sauce, tabasco, oregano, black pepper, garlic powder, and Creole seasoning (Note 1) in a pot under low heat for a few minutes to mix the flavors together. If it gets to a boil that is fine, but there is no need to.
- Heat up grill to medium high heat (See Note 2), and add chicken tenderloins to it.
- Brush sauce to the chicken, cook for 5-8 minutes, flip chicken over, and brush addition sauce to it. If there is leftover sauce, brush the rest of it to the chicken. Cook for another 5-8 minutes, or until internal temperature of chicken reaches 165℉.
- Serve (recommended with red sauce pasta) and enjoy!
This is the stuff summers are made for! You know you’re doing it right when you have those perfect grill marks.
Thank you!! 🙂