Spicy Coconut Ground Chicken

This 20-minute recipe pairs ground chicken with spices, hot chili paste, honey, and coconut milk to make a protein option that’s loaded with flavor. With 27 grams of protein and just 230 calories per serving, this chicken is perfect for meal prep.

And as an added bonus, there’s no vegetable chopping or prep required! Just throw everything in the pan, give it a stir every now and then, and get ready for a treat!

I’ll run you through the recipe below and answer a few ingredient substitution questions along the way. You can find a printable recipe card at the bottom of the post and a comment section below that. If you have any additional questions about this recipe, drop ’em there.

Step 1: Cook the ground chicken with paprika, garlic powder, ground ginger, salt, and optional ground coriander. 

There’s not much to say about step 1. I opted for dry spices for convenience but if you want to use fresh garlic and ginger (you little show pony), I say go for it. You could also skip the ground coriander and add some fresh cilantro when serving.

A little bonus tip for this recipe is to be sure and brown your ground chicken. Like I mentioned in my turkey sausage breakfast skillet recipe, browning the meat creates an extra layer of flavor. And speaking of ground turkey, it will work fine for this recipe.

If you’re having trouble finding ground chicken in your grocery store, you may be able to ask the meat department to grind you some from fresh chicken breast. It’s worth a shot! You could also go with whole chicken breast or thighs by using my spicy coconut pressure cooker pulled chicken recipe.

Step 2: Add gochujang (or a hot chili paste) and honey to the cooked ground chicken.

Gochujang is a spicy and slightly sweet chili paste that’s common in Korean dishes (like my Korean-Style Ground Beef). You can find gochujang in most grocery stores these days but if you’re having trouble finding it, other hot chili pastes should work okay.

If you want to wing it without any chili paste, you’ll probably want to add some more spice via chili flakes and something like soy sauce for the umami. While I’ve been told sriracha is not a viable replacement (and I totally agree), it’s better than nothing if you want to try this recipe without a grocery run. You could also try something like Swerve brown sugar + a hot sauce like I used for my low carb firecracker ground chicken.

As for the honey, substitutions might include brown sugar (or zero-calorie Swerve Brown like with my Nashville Hot chicken nuggets, maple syrup from my Japanese BBQ chicken, sugar free pancake syrup, or worst case—granulated sugar.

I wouldn’t recommend omitting the honey (or some type of sweetener) altogether as it will help balance out the spice level and flavor profile.

Final Step: Add coconut milk and cook until magical.  

This step is entirely up to you and how you plan to serve your ground chicken. As you can see in the photos, I went with a thicker mixture to serve over rice. If you wanted to reserve some liquid, you could remove from the heat after 4-5 minutes (top right photo below).

There’s no right or wrong here. Though if you’re tracking your nutrition intake, the weight of your four servings will vary slightly with more/less liquid remaining.

If you need accuracy, I always recommend weighing your finished recipe and dividing the total weight by the number of servings you’d like. You can learn more about this in my guide on how to use a food scale for cooking.

How to Serve Your Ground Chicken

I’m curious to see how creative readers get with this recipe but until then, the easiest pairing will be some type of rice. If you wanted to reduce the carbs, I have a few ideas to spruce up boring cauliflower rice.

• Pan roast broccoli before cooking the ground chicken and add at the end like in my spicy honey ground chicken and broccoli recipe or make air fryer broccoli like in my orange chicken meal prep bowls.
• You can mask the cauliflower-ness by mixing half cauliflower rice with a “real” rice like in my high volume rice blend.
• Since lime and cilantro go great with the chili and coconut, you could use the cilantro lime cauliflower rice from my firecracker bison rice bowls.
• Use a bit more coconut milk to make a coconut cauliflower rice.
• Swap the rice for quinoa like in my sesame ground beef and quinoa bowls.

And then there’s always the option of slightly lower carb rice products like Right Rice or Banza’s chickpea rice. In fact, I used the cilantro lime Right Rice in my ground chicken and rice enchiladas.

You can also add extra volume to your rice bowls with things like the cucumber crunch salad in my sesame ginger chicken crumbles recipe.

Be sure to let me know what you come up with for pairing ideas. That’s all the notes I have for you. Bone apple tea!