You’ve heard of coconut prawns or shrimp. Meet its cousin, coconut chicken. Last weekend we celebrated my daughter’s 8th Birthday with a house filled with girls, Hannah Montana, and food fit for a princess. When deciding on a menu my daughter requested her favorite dish, coconut chicken tenders. Who could blame her? Each tender is dipped in sweetened egg batter, coated with a panko coconut mixture and pan-fried to perfection.
Although the kids prefer them without a dipping sauce, my husband and I love dipping them in a marmalade honey sauce. This kid and adult friendly finger food will be a hit with or without sauce. You are going to love these! Enjoy!
Recipe: Coconut Chicken Tenders with Honey Marmalade dipping sauce
Ingredients:
2 lbs of chicken tenders
1 1/2 cups of panko bread crumbs (can be found in the Asian aisle of grocery stores)
1 cup of shredded sweetened coconut
1 egg
1/2 can of condensed milk
1/2 cup of orange juice
salt and pepper to taste
Peanut Oil for frying
Directions:
On a cookie sheet, season chicken with salt and pepper on both sides. Set aside. In a medium bowl, mix orange juice, condensed milk, and a beaten egg until your “wet” mixture is well incorporated. In another bowl, mix coconut and panko crumbs.
Heat peanut oil in a medium pan or skillet on medium-high heat. Fill pan to about 1/2″ of oil. Dip and fully coat each tender in the egg mixture first and then the panko/coconut mix.
Set each coated chicken on a cookie cooling rack.
Fry each tender for 6-8 minutes until golden brown. Serve with Honey Marmalade dipping sauce. Enjoy!
Honey Marmalade Dipping Sauce Recipe:
1/2 cup of honey
1/2 of marmalade
Directions: In a small bowl, add honey and marmalade. Heat in the microwave for 1 minute. Stir everything until well mixed and serve with coconut chicken tenders.
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{ 45 comments… read them below or add one }
How delicious!!! I have had coconut shrimp but never thought of doing the breading on chicken. That sauce looks super tasty too:)
Alice,
These look better than tasty. Thanks for sharing!
~Jim
I’m not entirely convinced the Nuni would eat it, but that’s OK because she’d have to pry it out of my hands.
I never thought of using coconut with chicken tenders. This looks great. I love the honey marmalade dipping sauce you made for it to. Looks and sounds delicious.
I love coconut chicken, but have never made it at home. This sounds wonderful!
These look so good! I KNOW I will be making these. My husband’s favorite dish on our honeymoon in Jamaica was the coconut breaded chicken. I’ve never been able to duplicate it… but this sounds close! He will be sooo happy!
They look lovely and yummy!
I cannot wait to try these as I have all the ingredients already in the kitchen! Looks great
Nom nom nom! This is definitely going on my “try-out” list!! Looks absolutely delish!
I have always wanted to make coconut chicken and never have….this looks and sounds fantastic – I NEED to make it now
That coconut crusted chicken whit dipping sauce looks really good!
I just made these for dinner, and they were so delicious! I have found a new blog to follow
hey those are gorgeous photos! i love your counter tops
Hi Alice, it’s Joy. I’m looking for some inspiration for dinner tonight. Think I found it. Miss your other blog. Glad your doing this one.
♥
Joy
Thank you everyone for your kind words.
QUYNH: I am really glad you liked them!
I made them Friday night and loved them. Soooo Good!
These were absolutely delicious! I substituted the panko bread crumbs since I couldn’t find them at my grocery store for crushed rice krispy cereal. It was absolutely wonderful and everyone loved it! Thank you for the fabulous recipe!
Danielle, what a fantastic substitute! You’re brilliant. I bet crushed Corn Flakes would work too!
This recipe was perfect! My family ate it up and begged for more
I hope you don’t mind, I’m writing a blog post about how much my husband in particular loved it, and I’m including the recipe and a link to you. I should have it up by Monday at the latest, so let me know if you’d rather I didn’t post it for some reason. I’m not a food blogger, so I don’t know if it’s considered OK for me to post someone else’s recipe? I hope so, though, because I think my readers would really like it! Have a nice weekend 
Do you think you’d be able to cook these in the oven, as oppose to frying them?
Indy
Indy: Yes you could bake them.. however I’ve found they do not crisp up as much. You will also want to make sure to mix a little bit of butter or oil with the panko crumbs before coating the chicken in order for them to crisp up a little. Baking times will be the same as you would when you normally bake chicken. Hope that helps!
Alice
I love this recipe!!! Am going to try it tomorrow. My kids are tired of chicken steaks and nuggets…thanks for a lovely recipe!!
Alice, such a PLEASANT surprise to find your blog. I was in desperate need of going grocery shopping, but last night decided to create something with the ingredients I had left. I had everything your recipe asked for and actually was looking for a coconut chicken recipe when I stumbled across yours! We made this along with the rice and Korean style spinach. The chicken was FABULOUS! My husband thoroughly enjoyed it, and I’m excited to continue using your recipes. As a Korean American, I’m excited to see that you have Kalbi and Bulgogi recipes as well.
Oh man this looks good! I LOVE coconut prawns, but my husband is not a fan… this will be a great day for me to get a fried meat coconut fix, and for him to not have to eat prawns.
If you bake them, you can always turn on the broiler at the end for a couple of minute to give them the extra crunch! I’m making these tonight for my 5 year old son and my husband, thank you!
Hi Alice!
I’m just curious about something in this recipe. Is it SWEETENED condensed milk, as in Eagle Brand?? the recipe didn’t say sweetened, and I’ve never seen any other type of condensed milk, only evaporated milk, so I wanted to make sure.
thanks!! love your blog and all the beautiful photos!
These were so easy and delicious!! Big hit with my boyfriend, Mom, Dad and sister! Will make time and time again! Thanks!
Just curious,
do you think it’d be okay to cook with olive oil? I don’t have peanut oil but if you think it will turn out differently I’ll pick some up. I’m so happy I found your blog. Thanks for the inspiration.
Also,
what kind of sides do you make with this? Suggestions?
Hi Jessica,
I find frying anything in olive oil generally doesn’t work very well. Canola oil or vegetable oil would be a better alternative. These chicken tenders are great as a main dish or an appetizer. If I were to pick a few sides, I would go with some type of lighter salad and perhaps some steamed vegetables to offset the fried food. Let me know if I can answer anymore questions.
Sooo excited to try this. Didn’t have all the ingredients so I’m trying a few subs. Soy milk for condensed, no orange juice
, and using coconut oil instead of peanut. Side dish of julienned zuchini cooked in coconut oil with a touch of soy and rice. We’ll see how it goes.
Alice,
I was wondering what other bread crumbs can I use? I couldn’t find panko bread crumbs in my asian isle…
Hi Leslie,
Sometimes Panko can be found where regular bread crumbs are shelved. If that doesn’t work, crushed Corn Flakes would be a great alternative. I don’t recommend regular bread crumbs because the texture doesn’t compliment the coconut very well. You could also try just using coconut.
I am looking forward to tasting this recipe!!! Got everything prepped! Easy and quick thank you for that! The kids are excited for dinner!
I just made these chicken tenders and now I’m sure that I can make whatever you post here and I can’t do it wrong- it will taste simply wonderful.
I just came across your website and found these wonderful recipes for Coconut Chicken Tenders and the Honey Marmalade Dipping Sauce. I can’t wait to try them out on my family this weekend! I will definitely be back to this website and see what other recipes you have that I can try. Thanks for being here!
Great recipe and very versatile.
Didn’t have some of the ingredients so I used:
skim milk w/ 1 tsp sugar
no orange juice
Fried in Coconut oil
and used Honey Mustard dressing
Put it on top of a big salad.
Husband loved it, Yum!
Made this for my Husband and son tonight and they loved it. Pretty easy too.
I have tried this recipe twice and liked it both times but i am having trouble with the frying part. It’s the only part of the recipe that I don’t like. Is there any way to bake these?
YES! I would bake them! while I love the greasy, flavorful and colorful result of pan frying….I dont like the extra fat and I hate pan frying when there are a lot of batches. I would use a parchment (my favorite) or non-stick foil lined cookie sheet (or spray with Pam or similar). Oven at 425 degrees. If you want a little extra color or flavor, LIGHTLY drizzle (or spray) the chicken with oil or melted butter before baking. Bake for 6-8 minutes on first side, flip over and bake another 6-8 minutes or until browned and cooked through. I am planning to make coconut chicken tender and coconut shrimp for dinner tonight and plan on baking them all! good luck!
One question, you mean sweetened condensed milk?
whole thing sounds really sweet! sweetened milk, OJ, coconut, honey, marmelade….making this (or using this recipe for inspiration and will kinda make it up as I go) for dinner tonight. I think I am gonna do my egg mixture with a little reg milk and and OJ. And for the sauce, I plan to add some dijon mustard to even out the sweetness a bit. Love anything in panko! made the best version yet of oven baked crispy zucchini fries the other night with panko- amazing!
i made this for dinner tonight. i couldn’t find panko crumbs or sweetened coconut, since i’m out in italy, so i used stale bread and regular shredded coconut. also, i used orange juice instead of marmalade(i realized i didn’t have any, so i improvised.) and i put garlic in it. and reg. milk instead of condensed. but it was still amazing. thank you so much for this recipe!
Hi Alice!
I’m making these tonight for the first time. This will be the first “actual” recipe I have made from you because up until now it has been nothing but your AMAZING chocolate chip cookies! I can’t wait to see how these turn out. Thank you so much for the recipe! Both my tummy and I greatly appreciate your constantly updating blog.
I just made this recipe and it didn’t turn out as good looking as your picture did. Mostly bread crumbs stuck to the chicken and not alot of coconut, so they basically just tasted like regular chicken tenders. And the marmalade/honey sauce was overwhemingly honey-flavored. I ended up using a whole jar of marmalade to the 1/2 cup of honey. It tasted good but it didn’t taste like it was supposed to I don’t think.
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