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Chicken Cakes cook up moist and flavorful. These can be made ahead, then cooked quickly for an easy family meal.
I can’t believe it – we only have one more week to go before the new school year begins! (I know for many of you living in other parts of the country – school already started weeks ago!)
It’s only a matter of time before the week is filled with all sorts work, school and after school activities – so easy and delicious meals like today’s Chicken Cakes will come very much in handy! They are made in advance, then chilled before cooking, so these delicious Chicken Cakes are perfect for those nights when you don’t have a lot of time to get dinner on the table.
Our Chicken Cakes are made in a similar style to a crab cake. We placed a mix of chicken breasts and thighs into the bowl of a food processor and processed the meat into small chunks. Then a mix of mayonnaise, eggs, cracker crumbs and lots of herbs and seasonings gives great flavor to the chicken mixture.
I will note that as my husband Jack developed this recipe, he tried a few different techniques to ensure that the recipe would result in the most flavorful and juicy Chicken Cakes. He found that the best method was to cook half the chicken mixture, then cool it before mixing with the rest of the uncooked chicken mixture. At that point, the mixture is formed into patties and chilled again before finally frying and serving. We found that this method was the best to avoid having outer edges over-cooked while the inner chicken was still undercooked.
This Chicken Cakes recipe makes a fairly big batch – so you’ll have enough to pack for lunch the next day, or for a dinner of leftovers. You could even freeze some of these Chicken Cakes to enjoy at a later date if you’d like.
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Chicken Cakes
Chicken Cakes cook up moist and flavorful. These can be made ahead, then cooked quickly for an easy family meal.
Ingredients
- 1 pound boneless skinless chicken breast
- 1 pound boneless skinless chicken thighs
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 1 cup small diced red, yellow or orange bell pepper, but not green
- 1 cup small dice onions
- 1 pinch red pepper flakes (optional)
- 1 teaspoon poultry seasoning such as Bells
- 2 tablespoons fresh garlic, minced fine
- 1/2 cup crushed Ritz crackers
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 1/4 cup fresh Italian flat leaf parsley chopped fine
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 4 shakes Tabasco sauce (optional)
- 1/2 cup seasoned bread crumbs
- 2 whole eggs, beaten
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- 2 tablespoons oil for frying, divided
- 2 tablespoons butter for frying, divided
Instructions
- Place breast meat and thigh meat in a food processor and process until the meat is ground down to about pea sized pieces. Try not to over process. Divide the mixture in half.
- In a large sauté pan, melt butter and over medium heat, sauté peppers, onions, pepper flakes and poultry seasoning for four minutes. Add garlic and cook for one more minute.
- Add half of the ground chicken meat and stir and cook until cooked through, about three minutes. Set aside to cool completely.
- In a large bowl place crackers, mayonnaise, parsley, salt, pepper Tabasco, bread crumbs, eggs and mustard. Mix to combine.
- Add raw chicken and cooled mixture from sauté pan and mix.
- Form the mixture into 18 balls and press to a disc shape and place on a tray lined with parchment paper. Place in the refrigerator to firm up for at least 30 minutes
- Heat a large flat griddle pan over medium heat and add half the oil and half the butter. Once melted, place half the chicken cakes into the pan. Fry for about 3-4 minutes per side. Since we are dealing with raw chicken, I inserted a probe thermometer into the side of one of the cooked cakes to make sure it was at least 160 degrees F before removing to a platter. Repeat for second batch, cover loosely and let sit for five minutes to set up. As the cooked patties sit, there will be carry over heat which will bring these up to the safe temperature of 165 degrees F, as recommended by the USDA. This goes for all poultry.
- Alternatively, if you have two griddle pans or a large griddle you can cook all at once.
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Notes
We included both red pepper flakes and Tabasco sauce in the recipe which gives a gentle heat to the Chicken Cakes. If you don’t like the little bit of heat that these two add, feel free to eliminate one or both.
I realize this was initially posted almost 10 years ago, but when I read the cooking instructions I was shocked. Telling readers to cook poultry to an internal temperature of 150 degrees is irresponsible and dangerous. According to USDA regulations, poultry must be cooked to an internal temperature of 165 degrees Fahrenheit. This is to ensure lethality of listeria bacteria. In fact, USDA recommends any ground meat be cooked to that temperature for food safety reasons. The fact that this is being recommended again is even more irresponsible.
Joe
There will be carry over temperature, however I agree that to be safe, I should talk about this in the recipe. I will go in now and write the recipe up differently.
Thanks,
Jack
These chicken cakes are outstanding! I immediately sent the recipe to my SIL
Thanks Linda!
Amazing! Delicious, low calorie, easy to make and zesty!
Thank you so much!
I Loved these! I thought it a little strange mixing raw with cooked chicken, but I was curious..they were very juicy and flavorful! Thanks for a keeper recipe!
So glad you enjoyed the recipe Linda!
I thought this recipe looked great! I saved it for a long time. I was a bit concerned about mixing raw with cooked, worried that I might not cook it enough at the end, I used my thermometer. OMG , it was so good! only thing I changed was I used whole wheat Panko to coat the patties. It was DELICIOUS! Thank you!
You’re welcome Linda – so glad you enjoyed it!
2# chicken, 1# each of breast & thigh
18 balls = 8 Pattie’s
?
I want to make 8 sliders but find this confusing
Hi Joy – This recipe already makes smaller pattys and we assume 6-8 portions per recipe (so 2-3 chicken cakes per serving). If you only want to make 8 small sliders, you could cut the recipe in half or freeze some. Hope that helps.
Do you know that the carb count on these are??
Hi Honey – I just added the nutritional information to the bottom of the recipe card (we’re slowly working our way through the list of recipes – adding that info).