Homemade chicken nuggets almost always fall apart at exactly one point: processing the meat. If you blend chicken breast into a smooth paste, you get a tough, rubbery mixture that tastes like factory food. We do it differently, and that is precisely why these Thermomix® nuggets stay as juicy as a well-cooked piece of chicken breast.
We have been putting these nuggets on the table for years when the kids have friends over or when we do not fancy a long cook at the weekend. 500 g of chicken breast yields around 20 pieces, enough for four hungry eaters or two adults with leftovers for a packed lunch the next day. Preparation takes 25 minutes in total, roughly five of which are in the Thermomix® and the rest goes on coating and frying.
Chicken Nuggets with the Thermomix®
Ingredients 0 / 12 ✓
- 60 g unsweetened cornflakes
- 100 g tortilla chips
- 500 g chicken breast fillet
- 3 slices white sandwich bread (crusts removed)
- 1 egg
- 1 garlic clove
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp white pepper
- 1/2 tsp sweet paprika
- 100 g full-fat cream cheese
- 70 g milk
- 10 g rapeseed oil
Instructions 0 / 5
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1
Chop cornflakes and chips.
Place the cornflakes and tortilla chips in the mixing bowl, chop for 3 sec / speed 5 and set aside.
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2
Prepare the chicken.
Cut the chicken into pieces. Dice the sandwich bread and remove the crusts. Beat the egg in a small bowl.
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3
Chop the garlic.
Peel the garlic, place in the mixing bowl and chop for 3 sec / speed 8.
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4
Mix the nugget mixture.
Add the chicken, salt, pepper, paprika, bread, cream cheese and milk, chop for 10 sec / speed 6, scrape down with the spatula and repeat.
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5
Cook the chicken nuggets.
Shape the mixture into nuggets, dip each one through the egg, then coat in the breadcrumbs and fry in a pan with oil until golden brown.
Video
Nutrition per serving
Chicken breast roughly chopped, not blended to a paste
Factory nuggets are made from mechanically separated meat pushed through a mincer and bound together with additives. That gives the characteristic uniform, slightly spongy texture. We want the opposite: pieces where you can still see the meat. The key is the speed and time when chopping.
We add the chicken breast together with the bread, cream cheese, milk and seasoning to the mixing bowl and chop for 10 seconds at speed 6. Then scrape down with the spatula and repeat. This produces a coarse, mouldable mixture where the meat is still visible. Go to speed 8 or above and you get paste. Stay at speed 4 and you get chunks that are too large and fall apart when shaping. Speed 6 is the sweet spot we found after many attempts.
Cream cheese and bread instead of egg and breadcrumbs
Most nugget recipes use a raw egg in the mixture. That works, but it tends to make the meat firm. Instead we use 100 g of full-fat cream cheese and 70 g of milk, plus three slices of de-crusted sandwich bread. The cream cheese brings fat and creaminess to the meat, the bread absorbs liquid and lightens the mixture. We save the egg for the coating, where it belongs.
The crusts must come off the bread. When mixing, the crusts do not blend in well and give the nugget mixture brown specks that interfere with the coating later. Three slices are right for 500 g of chicken breast. More makes the mixture too soft.
Double coating of cornflakes and tortilla chips
Standard breadcrumbs are fine, but they go soft quickly in the oven. Cornflakes and tortilla chips, roughly chopped in the mixing bowl for 3 seconds at speed 5, produce a coating with noticeably more crunch. The cornflakes give snap, the tortilla chips bring salt and a light corn flavour that pairs particularly well with chicken.
The key is not to blend the crumbs too fine. Three seconds at speed 5 is enough so that visible pieces remain. Those pieces are what create the characteristically irregular, crunchy surface after frying. If you chop at speed 8 you get powder, and the powder simply falls off during cooking.
Dip the nuggets through the beaten egg first, then coat thoroughly in the coarse crumbs. Press gently so the coating sticks. If you like a particularly thick crust, repeat the process: through the egg a second time, then into the crumbs a second time. This gives a really substantial crust like you would get from a deep fryer, but without the frying fat.
Frying pan or oven, both work
In the original recipe we fry the nuggets in a non-stick pan with 10 g of rapeseed oil until golden brown. This is quick, gives a very crispy crust and takes about three minutes per side over medium heat. If you want to cook several trays at once or prefer to avoid the extra fat, you can place the nuggets on a baking-paper-lined tray and bake in a preheated oven at 200°C top and bottom heat for 15 minutes. Turn them halfway through so both sides brown evenly.
Per serving we get around 455 calories, 33 g protein and 21 g fat. Nutritionally that is considerably better than frozen nuggets, which often reach 600 calories per serving and contain less actual meat.
What can go wrong and how we fix it
The mixture is too soft to shape
This happens when the chicken breast releases a lot of its own liquid or when the cream cheese was too warm. Our fix: Chill the mixture in the fridge for 15 minutes. It firms up and can then be shaped into nuggets with damp hands without any trouble.
The coating falls off during frying
Usually this means the nuggets were not drawn through the egg thoroughly enough, or the crumbs were chopped too fine. Our fix: Press the crumbs on gently when coating so the breadcrumbs really grip. And do not move the pan too soon. Only turn them when the underside is properly firm and brown, otherwise the coating comes with it.
The nuggets are dry inside
Cooked for too long or shaped too small. Our fix: We shape the nuggets about a thumb’s thickness and three fingers wide. That gives roughly 20 pieces from 500 g of meat. At that size they are cooked through after three minutes per side in the pan and stay juicy inside.
Variations that work for us
Herb nuggets: Add a teaspoon of dried Italian herbs to the mixture. Works well with a tomato dip.
Cheese nuggets: Mix 50 g of grated Parmesan into the crumbs. Gives an intense, savoury crust.
Spicy version: Add half a teaspoon of cayenne pepper to the crumbs or the mixture. Highly recommended for an adult version.
Gluten-free version: Replace the bread with two tablespoons of ground almonds and use gluten-free cornflakes and maize tortilla chips for the coating. Works just as well in terms of flavour.
What we serve alongside
We classically serve a dip with the chicken nuggets. Our Thermomix® salsa dip goes very well when the nuggets are already well seasoned. If you prefer something milder, take our homemade mayonnaise as a base and stir in some chives or garlic. For the children there is usually our strawberry ketchup on the table, which is sweeter and milder than classic tomato ketchup.
As a side dish, oven chips, a simple green salad or rosemary potato wedges all work well. For a quick snack we also like to tuck the nuggets into a sliced bread roll with salad and a dollop of mayonnaise. That is our homemade version of a chicken burger.
Leftovers and storage
Cooked nuggets keep in the fridge in an airtight container for two days. To reheat, pop them in the oven at 180°C for six to eight minutes and the coating crisps up again. The microwave works too, but makes the crust go soft.
Freezing works very well. We freeze the raw coated nuggets on a tray first so they do not stick together, then transfer them to a freezer bag. They keep for three months. Straight from the freezer into the oven, 200°C, 20 minutes, turn once. Handy when the kids announce they are hungry out of nowhere.
How other recipes differ
Many Thermomix® chicken nugget recipes use cornflakes or crushed tortilla chips in the coating for extra crunch. We deliberately stick with classic breadcrumbs because they brown the nuggets evenly and do not taste sweet. Other cooks mix cream cheese directly into the minced chicken or marinate in buttermilk, which briefly adds moisture but masks the natural flavour. The cooking method also varies: oven, air fryer and frying pan all have their fans. We fry in the pan with a small amount of oil because the double coating comes out crispiest that way. For dipping we often see only ketchup suggested, yet a yoghurt and herb sauce or a sweet and sour sauce work at least as well.
