Chicken Tikka is one of the most popular North Indian dishes, in which chunks of chicken are first marinated in an aromatic spice mixture and grilled on skewers to perfection. The result is the most delicious, juicy chicken tikka kebabs at home.
Check out our flavor-packed tandoori chicken or tangi kebab, paneer tikka.
What is chicken tikka?
Chicken tikka, a popular South Asian dish made from boneless chicken marinated in spiced yogurt and cooked on skewers over live charcoal until charred and smoky. Perfect recipe for your summer BBQ. But you can also make it in your oven, on the gas grill, or in an air fryer at home.
Secret to making the best tikka at home
The key to the dish is using a lot of spices, marinating, and longer resting time (8 hours or overnight), and controlling the oven-broiling time. When broiled, the chicken should develop uniform dark spots at the end of cooking; this is the signature of the yummiest tikkas.
Tikkas taste the best when they're spicy. Depending on the heat (spice level) you can tolerate, adjust the number of green chilies and red chile powder in the recipe. I have used coriander seeds and cumin seeds. If you find it difficult to get the seeds, you can substitute them with cumin powder and coriander powder.
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Ingredients
Chicken thighs - cut into bite-sized chunks
Onions, tomatoes, and green bell peppers (Capsicum): These are optional, but adding them gives your tikkas a restaurant-style feel and taste.
For the marination: Fresh green chilies, ginger, garlic, coriander seeds, cumin seeds, sour cream or yogurt, red chile powder, turmeric powder, salt, tandoori chicken masala, and kasuri methi, if available.
Check out the recipe card for the full list of ingredients.
Chicken marination
- In a mixer jar or blender, add coriander seeds, cumin seeds, ginger, garlic, green chilies, and yogurt, and blend to a smooth paste. To this, add red chile powder, turmeric powder, tandoori chicken masala, lemon juice, salt, kasuri methi, and mix well. Taste check and adjust the spices at this time.
- Alternate option: instead of grinding or blending, you can simply add spice powders and ginger garlic paste, and skip the green chilies as well.
- Add the chicken thighs to the marinade and mix well.
- Also, add onion, tomato, and capsicum to this marinade and mix well. (optional)
- Cover and refrigerate for a couple of hours or overnight.
Making of chicken tikka
- Preheat the oven to 500F.
- Skewer the marinated chicken and chopped veggies onto the skewers. I have used eight 12-inch skewers. I typically start with an onion, followed by a green bell pepper, tomato, onion, and chicken. I repeat this four times on each skewer.
- Place the prepared skewers in a 9-by-13-inch pan, lining them up along the shorter edge. This ensures we have sufficient heat circulation around the skewers, and all the drippings are caught in the pan, making for easy cleanup.
- Once the oven is preheated, change to broil mode. Brush the chicken with oil and transfer it to the oven. Broil on the highest setting available in your oven (approx 4 to 6 inches from the heating element.
- The total broil time is about 14 to 16 minutes till the chicken is cooked through. Flip the skewers halfway through cooking, and brush with more oil if needed. This ensures the tikkas develop uniform dark spots that are the signature of the yummiest tikkas.
- Serve tikkas with mint chutney, over a bed of rice, on naan, or as a side with drinks, and enjoy!
Expert tips
- If you do not have an oven, you can prepare chicken tikka on a stove top. For this, heat a non-stick pan over medium heat and add 2 tablespoon of oil. Once the oil is hot, add chicken (in two batches) to the pan and leave it undisturbed for 8 minutes, and then flip and cook for another 6 to 8 minutes.
- In the stove-top method, you can skip adding vegetables or, if you prefer, sauté them in a similar fashion to that described above.
- You can also make the tikka on a gas flame at home, just like we did our paneer tikka.
- Adjust the amount of red chile powder to taste.
- If using fresh ginger, garlic, green chilies, and whole spices, grind them with yogurt to form the marinade; otherwise, simply use the ginger-garlic paste and spice powders to avoid grinding.
Which works best for tikka: chicken thighs or chicken breasts?
Both work equally well, but I generally prefer using thighs over breasts as I love them, and the end result is amazing. The juicier the chicken, the better. An added bonus is that marinating thighs takes less time than marinating breasts. If you want to prepare this dish as quickly as possible, even for your weeknight dinner, then use chicken thighs.
If using chicken breasts for health reasons, make sure to marinate them a little longer. Overnight would give you the best results.
Serving suggestions
- You can serve the tikka as an appetizer with mint chutney, cilantro chutney, or raita.
- As a main course, over a bed of rice, or alongside any naan or roti.
- You can even use the same leftover tikkas to make the popular chicken tikka masala.
Recipe FAQs
Chicken tikka is a dry dish served as a side, starter, or appetizer, where marinated chicken seasoned with Indian spices is grilled to perfection on a BBQ (tandoor), stovetop, or in the oven.
Chicken tikka masala has more spices than chicken tikka, thus making it hotter and spicier. It is a gravy or curry-based dish that can be served as an entrée or main dish with Indian bread like naan or roti.
For maximum flavor, I would say overnight. But if you decide to make it all of a sudden or cannot resist tasting the dish, marinate at least for 1 hour, and use thighs in this case.
Most Popular Indian Chicken Recipes
Recipe card
Chicken Tikka | Grilled Chicken Skewers | Tandoori Chicken Kebab
Ingredients
- 4 Chicken Thighs, Boneless cut into at least 32 cubes or more.
- 2 Red onions large cubes, optional
- 4 Tomatoes large cubes, optional
- 2 Green bell pepper or Capsicum, cut into large cubes, optional
- 4 tablespoon Oil for basting/brushing, optional
For the Marinade
- 2 tablespoon Coriander seeds or 2 teaspoon Coriander powder
- 1 teaspoon Cumin seeds or 1 teaspoon Cumin powder
- 6 to 8 cloves Garlic cloves
- 1 inch Ginger
- 2 to 3 Green chillies small, check tips
- ½ cup Yogurt or Sour cream, check tips
- 1 to 2 teaspoon Kashmiri red chilli powder check tips
- ½ teaspoon Turmeric powder
- 1 to 2 teaspoon Tandoori chicken masala garam masala or kitchen king masala
- 1 tablespoon Lemon juice optional only if yougurt is not sour
- 1 teaspoon Salt
- 1 tablespoon Kasuri methi dried fenugreek leaves, optional
Instructions
Chicken Marination
- In a mixer jar or blender, add coriander seeds, cumin seeds, ginger, garlic, green chilies, and yogurt, and blend to a smooth paste. To this, add red chile powder, turmeric powder, tandoori chicken masala, lemon juice, salt, kasuri methi, and mix well. Taste check and adjust the spices at this time.2 tbsp Coriander seeds, 1 tsp Cumin seeds, 6 to 8 cloves Garlic cloves, 1 inch Ginger, 2 to 3 Green chillies, ½ cup Yogurt, 1 to 2 tsp Kashmiri red chilli powder, ½ tsp Turmeric powder, 1 to 2 tsp Tandoori chicken masala, 1 tbsp Lemon juice, 1 tsp Salt, 1 tbsp Kasuri methi
- Alternate option: instead of grinding or blending, you can simply add spice powders and ginger garlic paste, and skip the green chilies as well.
- Add the chicken thighs to the marinade and mix well.4 Chicken Thighs, Boneless
- Also, add onion, tomato, and capsicum to this marinade and mix well. (optional)2 Red onions, 2 Green bell pepper, 4 Tomatoes
- Cover and refrigerate for a couple of hours or overnight.
Making of chicken tikka
- Preheat the oven to 500F.
- Skewer the marinated chicken and chopped veggies onto the skewers. I have used eight 12-inch skewers. I typically start with an onion, followed by a green bell pepper, tomato, onion, and chicken. I repeat this four times on each skewer.
- Place the prepared skewers in a 9-by-13-inch pan, lining them up along the shorter edge. This ensures we have sufficient heat circulation around the skewers, and all the drippings are caught in the pan, making for easy cleanup.
- Once the oven is preheated, change to broil mode. Brush the chicken with oil and transfer it to the oven. Broil on the highest setting available in your oven (approx 4 to 6 inches from the heating element.4 tbsp Oil
- The total broil time is about 14 to 16 minutes till the chicken is cooked through. Flip the skewers halfway through cooking, and brush with more oil if needed. This ensures the tikkas develop uniform dark spots that are the signature of the yummiest tikkas.
- Serve tikkas with mint chutney, over a bed of rice, on naan, or as a side with drinks, and enjoy!
Notes
- If using fresh ginger, garlic, green chilies, and whole spices, grind them with yogurt to form the marinade; otherwise, simply use the ginger-garlic paste and spice powders to avoid grinding.
- If you do not have an oven, you can prepare chicken tikka on a stove top. For this, heat a non-stick pan over medium heat and add 2 tablespoon of oil. Once the oil is hot, add chicken (in two batches) to the pan and leave it undisturbed for 8 minutes, and then flip and cook for another 6 to 8 minutes.
- In the stove top method, you can skip adding vegetables, or if you prefer, you can saute in a similar fashion as described above.
- You can also make the tikka on a gas flame at home, just like we did our paneer tikka.
- Adjust the amount of red chile powder to taste.
- Vary all the spices as per your taste.
- Yogurt, sour cream, buttermilk, or Curd tenderizes the meat, as a result of which cooked meat is juicier and easily falls apart.
- Check the full recipe for chicken tikka masala.
Nutrition
Note: We originally posted this chicken tikka recipe in August 2019. It has now been modified in June 2026 with Expert Chef Tips, FAQs, Storage Instructions, etc.
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Krystle says
This has amazing flavor. The chicken was super juicy too. Will make again!
Clarice says
This is one of my favorites though to be honest, I haven't tried making one at home. We just order this from our fave kebab place. Would love to try your recipe. It's going to be my first time so wish me luck.