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Delicious, Authentic, Easy Tandoori Chicken Sheet Pan Dinner is about to become your new favorite meal! Loaded with warming spices, fresh ginger and garlic, and comes with a side too! The masala roasted potatoes are out of this world!
Step aside basic sheet pan dinners.
We’ve got a new one in town that’s going to blow your socks off!
My Easy Tandoori Chicken dinner recipe is a family favorite in the fall and winter. I love it because it’s less dishes to clean and with a little prep work I can get this on the table super fast. And my husband loves it because it’s loaded with warming spices like cumin, garam masala, and turmeric. Not to mention that it’s totally man food with tons of protein and potatoes. And bonus: he didn’t even have to turn the grill on to make this tandoori chicken recipe!
What I love even more is that you only need a simple tomato and onion salad on the side. Maybe some basmati rice if you need a little something extra here. And my two ingredient naan are never a bad idea either.
If there’s one thing you know about me, it’s that I’m known for my Butter Chicken recipe. Like, so much so that there are mock recipes with my title ‘Finger Lickin’ Butter Chicken‘ all up and down the internet! So when it came to this easy tandoori chicken sheet pan dinner, I wanted to make sure it was as perfect as can be. And I think it’s finally made it there. Perfectly aromatic, tender chicken pieces with masala potato wedges. They taste like healthy masala fries and there’s no way anyone could be mad at that!
And I have a feeling that you are gonna love this recipe!
I made this recipe for my family. It was delicious and so easy to make. Even the kids ate it!
Ingredients for sheet pan tandoori chicken
- Bone-in chicken: for this recipe I like to use bone-in chicken breasts, chicken thighs, or chicken drumsticks. You can also use boneless chicken thighs (pictured) and they cook up in the same amount of time as well.
- Lemon Juice: You can also use lime juice if that’s what you have on hand, either works!
- Soy sauce: this adds a bit of umami to the recipe and provides the sodium. If you’re gluten free, make sure to use gluten free tamari instead.
- Red Pepper paste: This is mostly for added color and a bit of flavor, so you want something that isn’t overly spicy! I like to use red pepper paste from the middle eastern market, or sambal – whatever I happen to have on hand!
- Oil: we’ll use a couple tablespoons in the marinade.
- Seasonings: for the seasonings you’ll need kosher salt, kashmiri chili powder (or hot paprika), ground cumin, ground coriander, turmeric, black pepper, garam masala, and fenugreek leaves. You can’t replace the fenugreek leaves with the seeds, for this recipe, unfortunately. You will need the leaves specifically. These are very typically ingredients in most chicken tikka masala and tandoori recipes.
- Baking soda: Baking soda acts as a natural tenderizer in this recipe. It is my secret ingredient for take-out recipes as it gives the chicken a tender texture even if you marinate it for just a few minutes.
- Ginger Garlic Paste: I buy this stuff in a jar from the international aisle of my grocery store. You can also use the stuff that comes packed separately in a tube. You can also grate up a few cloves garlic and a knob of ginger to make the paste yourself. You’ll need 1 tablespoon total.
- Greek yogurt: a couple tablespoons helps tenderize the chicken.
- Potatoes: I like to use yellow potatoes for this recipe as they have a bit more flavor. Russet potatoes or even sweet potatoes would work too!
- Chopped Cilantro: adds color and flavors to the finished dish.
Making Sheet Pan Tandoori Chicken recipe
- Marinate the chicken. Start by adding all the seasonings and spices to a large bowl. Feels free to make some swaps, here if you don’t have kashmiri chili powder, I like to add about ¼ teaspoon of cayenne pepper and replace the remaining ¾ teaspoon without paprika. Once the marinade is ready, taste and adjust the salt if it needs more.
- Make deep cuts for better flavor. The thing that makes tandoori chickentandoori chicken is that 1) it cooks in a tandoor oven or clay oven and 2) the deep cuts in the flesh of the meat that allow the marinade together deep into the chicken. Make these cuts and then add the chicken to the marinade.
- Let it hang out. Now cover up the chicken with plastic wrap and place it in the refrigerator for as little as an hour, and up to 24 hours. This will allow the chicken to tenderize and cook up beautifully in the oven.
- Bake it up. Get the oven preheating 425 degrees F. While that’s happening, grab a sheet pan and spray it with cooking spray. Remove the chicken pieces from the marinade and place them on the sheet pan. Toss the potato wedges into the same bowl and let them soak up all that chicken marinade while the oven preheats. Toss them on the same sheet pan, placing them around the chickened then roast until the thickest parts of the chicken register 160ºF on an instant-read thermometer.
- Serve it up. Top with a sprinkling of cilantro and serve with a simple tomato and onion salad or over fluffy prepared basmati rice.
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Easy Tandoori Chicken Sheet Pan Dinner
Ingredients
- 3¼ pounds drumsticks thighs, or bone-in chicken breasts
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon kosher salt plus more
- 1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce or GF tamari
- 1 tablespoon red pepper paste or sambal
- 2 tablespoons oil
- 1 teaspoon kashmiri red chili powder or hot paprika
- 1 teaspoon ground coriander see notes
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin see notes
- ½ teaspoon ground turmeric
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- ½ teaspoon garam masala
- 1 teaspoon fenugreek leaves
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 tablespoon ginger garlic paste or use ½ each
- 2 tablespoons greek yogurt
- 1 ¼- ½ pound potatoes thick slices or wedges
- 3 tablespoons chopped cilantro
Instructions
- MARINATE: Add all the ingredients for the marinade except the chicken and the potatoes to a big bowl and stir to combine.
- CHICKEN: Make deep gashes in the chicken pieces using a sharp knife. You want the marks to go all the way down to the bone so that the chicken gets nice and flavorful!
- COVER AND LET SIT: Add the chicken to prepared marinade and stir to combine so that all the pieces are evenly coated. Cover using plastic wrap and let the chicken marinade for at least 1 hour and ideally, for up to 24 hours in the refrigerator.
- BAKE: Place a wire rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 425ºF. Spray a baking sheet with cooking spray. Remove the chicken from the marinade to the baking sheet, leaving behind as much of the marinade as you can. Add the potatoes and ½ teaspoon of kosher salt to the marinade and give them a toss. Let them hang out while the oven preheats. Then spread the potatoes around the chicken pieces and bake in the oven for 27-37 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through and registers 160ºF on a meat thermometer. Kick the broiler on for 1-2 minutes or until the chicken gets nice and golden on top.
- SERVE: Remove from the oven, sprinkle with cilantro and serve with lime or lemon wedges on the side.
Notes
- Making roasted coriander and cumin powder. Though you can use ground coriander and ground cumin from the store, I like to buy the whole seeds, toast about 2 teaspoons of each in a dry skillet over medium heat until fragrant, then pop them in a spice grinder or a mortar and pestle until they’re crushed up. This is how my mom has always made her dishes, and this is how I make mine!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Like This? Leave a comment & rating below!
I was looking for a recipe that uses Tandoori seasoning (I recently acquired a bottle). This recipe came up in my search for a way to use my new seasoning and I’d really love to try it. How should the recipe be altered if I’m using a tandoori seasoning instead of the separate ingredients? It says it contains coriander, cumin, sweet paprika, garlic, ginger, cardamom, and saffron. Thank you!
Hi Trudy! This could vary greatly based on the potency of the seasoning you’re using, so I won’t be able to make a recommendation on how much to use. I suggest using your best judgement as a starting point, adding what you think would work best for your family, tasting, and adjusting before you add the chicken to the marinade. Hope that helps!
Are we able to substitute the red pepper sauce with Harissa or would that alter the outcome?
It might heat things up a bit more, but it’ll work!
I made this recipe for my family. It was delicious and so easy to make. Even the kids ate it!
I’m so glad to hear your family enjoyed it! Thank you for taking the time to come back and leave a review 🙂
Great recipe! It tasted great even with a few of the ingredients missing, like the red pepper paste. Lots of Flavor.
So glad to hear you enjoyed it, Jessa! Appreciate you circling back to leave a review! 🙂
Thanks for the recipe. I had to order a few ingredients on Amazon because I could not find them in my local grocery stores, but I made this tonight and it was a hit! Flavors were very nice. Marinated for about 4 hours. Maybe next time I will try to marinate longer. I followed the recipe exactly and made a quick raita with ingredients I had on hand which was a nice addition.
I’m so glad to hear you enjoyed it, Angie! Appreciate you circling back to leave a review ☺️