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These yummy Garlic Parmesan Chicken Skewers are perfect for the summer BBQ season. They are popping with flavor from the garlic and parm, and they are so easy to put together for an easy weeknight dinner or for your weekend get together. The best part? You can prep these in advance and just pop them on the BBQ when you’re ready to grill.
Why You’ll Love Garlic Parmesan Chicken Skewers
- Flavorful: I feel like garlic and parmesan are just the perfect combination. These Chicken Skewers are bursting with flavor from the garlic, parm, and the freshness from the zested lemon in the marinade. Perfect for summer!
- Easy: I love making skewers because they are so easy to prep and you can get them ready before company arrives, then throw them on the grill.
- Healthy: This recipe is full of lean protein, and healthy ingredients. You can feel good with serving these with a side of barbecued veg, a salad, or whatever your go-to summer sides are.
Ingredients
Garlic – Did you know that garlic is actually so good for your immunity? Not only does it taste fantastic and is essential in almost every savory recipe, but it’s good-for-you. I used four cloves in this recipe but you can go crazy and add as many as you’d like.
Parmesan – The parmesan cheese in this recipe is melted with butter and brushed on top after cooking. It adds that perfect salty and umami flavor to the chicken that is so dang good.
Chicken – Chicken is a lean source of protein which is essential in supporting muscle growth, and overall health. You can use this marinade on any cut of chicken, even drumsticks or chicken wings if you prefer to not use skewers.
How to Make Garlic Parmesan Chicken Skewers
- Marinate the chicken: Add all of the chicken marinade ingredients to a medium bowl and whisk together to combine. Add all of the frozen, knife sliced chicken breast pieces to the marinade, toss to fully coat and let sit for 15-30 minutes or until the chicken has thawed.
- Thread the marinated chicken onto the skewers, dividing evenly between the skewers.
- Heat the grill to medium-high heat, about 400F.
- Oil the grill well and when heated, place the skewers on the grill and cook, turning occasionally, for about 10-12 minutes or until cooked through (internal temperature reached 165F) and well browned.
- Remove from the grill and let rest for 5 minutes.
- While the chicken rests, melt the butter with the 6 cloves pressed garlic for the garlic parmesan sauce in a saucepan on the oven. Once melted, remove from the heat and pour into a bowl.
- Whisk the minced parsley and freshly grated parmesan cheese into the bowl of melted butter and set aside a bit of the butter mixture for dipping. Immediately brush all the skewers with the remaining garlic parmesan butter and then serve.
Tips and Tricks
- Cut In Uniform Pieces: Cut your chicken in uniform pieces to help with even cooking.
- Soak Skewers: If you are using wooden skewers, soak them in water for 15 minutes before adding meat to them. This will help prevent them from burning on the BBQ.
- Marinating Time: Marinate your meat for at least 30 minutes. Make sure that you don’t marinate longer than a few hours as the acids in the marinate can change the texture of the chicken.
Variations
If you like these Chicken Skewers, you’re going to love these other skewers you can grill up on your BBQ this summer:
- Sumac Chicken Thigh Skewers
- Marinated Tofu & Veggie Skewers
- Chicken Souvlaki
- Greek Inspired Salmon Kebabs
Best served with
How to Store Leftovers
Leftover chicken skewers are great for throwing on salads, in wraps, or on a bowl. Store them in an airtight container for up to 4 days in the fridge.
Common Questions
Chicken breasts and chicken thighs work best for a chicken skewer.
Both are great options. Metal ones are reusable which is good for less waste, and they don’t require pre-soaking before using like wooden ones do.
You can totally add veggies to these skewers or BBQ them separately. Veggies like bell peppers, onions, mushrooms, and zucchini, all BBQ nicely.
There can be a few different reasons for this. It could be that your grill isn’t hot enough, your grates aren’t clean or oiled, or you’re flipping your chicken too soon.
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Watch the Video
Ingredients
- ten 5 inch skewers
- 2 lbs chicken breasts, frozen, and cut into thin slices using a knife while frozen
For the marinade:
- ¼ cup mayonnaise
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 4 garlic cloves, pressed
- 1 lemon, zested
- 2 tsp kosher salt
- ½ tsp ground pepper
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 2 tsp honey granules
For the garlic parmesan melted butter:
- 1 stick, ½ cup unsalted butter
- 6 garlic cloves, pressed
- 3 tbsp fresh minced parsley
- ⅓ cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
Instructions
Start Cooking- Marinate the chicken: Add all of the chicken marinade ingredients to a medium bowl and whisk together to combine. Add all of the frozen, knife sliced chicken breast pieces to the marinade, toss to fully coat and let sit for 15-30 minutes or until the chicken has thawed.
- Thread the marinated chicken onto the skewers, dividing evenly between the skewers.
- Heat the grill to medium-high heat, about 400F.
- Oil the grill well and when heated, place the skewers on the grill and cook, turning occasionally, for about 10-12 minutes or until cooked through (internal temperature reached 165F) and well browned.
- Remove from the grill and let rest for 5 minutes.
- While the chicken rests, melt the butter with the 6 cloves pressed garlic for the garlic parmesan sauce in a saucepan on the oven. Once melted, remove from the heat and pour into a bowl.
- Whisk the minced parsley and freshly grated parmesan cheese into the bowl of melted butter and set aside a bit of the butter mixture for dipping. Immediately brush all the skewers with the remaining garlic parmesan butter and then serve.
Maria Koutsogiannia
Maria is the creator of FoodByMaria and your go-to Greek food expert for cozy, flavor-packed recipes. Inspired by her Mediterranean roots, she brings traditional Greek flavors, feel-good ingredients, and a whole lot of joy to everyday cooking.
33 people are discussing this recipe. Join in
Excited to make this tomorrow. Can I use yogurt instead of mayonnaise?
yes you can!!!!!
Fabulous recipe! Definately a keeper. Flavours are amazing. Thank you.
Thank you so much, Mary!
Hi Maria, thanks so much for the recipe. Can I substitute the butter for olive oil? I’m not a huge fan of butter.
yep! that would be fine, maybe just do a bit less oil!
Thank you!! 🤗
The best for delicious chicken skewers recipe!!!! It was so quick to throw together and the flavors were perfection.
thank you so much, that means so much to me!
I’m confused. In the instructions, you say to add all the marinade ingredients together in a bowl, mix them together, then add to the slices of chicken and toss to coat. But in the accompanying video, you appear to be adding everything separately to the chicken.
So which way should it be done?
Thank you.
Hey Joanna, either way is the same. As you can imagine I need to visually make the video as appealing as possible and showing the ingridents go into the bowl helps do that. They all end up in the same place. I hope that makes sense.
Can I use chicken thighs instead? Can this marinate overnight? Thank you!
YES and yes!
this recipe was fantastic!! easy to prep and extremely delicious. I am not a fan of chicken breast because I find it to dry. not this one!! perfect to prep for the week too and throw on the grill during a weekday.
YES Gloria! This makes me so happy, thank you so much!