This easy, make-ahead Grilled Tahini Chicken is fast enough for a weeknight but fancy enough for company.  Grilled chicken thighs covered in a creamy tahini sauce take only 15 minutes to prepare.  No grill?  Make them in a grill pan or under the broiler. Dairy free, gluten free, soy free, and nut free, too!

You guys have heard me talk about my love of tehina/tahini before.  It’s become a true staple in our kitchen. 

I love the subtle, nutty-ish taste, how easily it switches from sweet to savory, and especially that I can still cook with it and use those leftovers in my son’s nut-free preschool lunch.

So today I’m sharing a recipe that I’ve been making on repeat all summer: grilled tahini chicken.  We like it plain or served over a green salad, or with a side of three ingredient grilled potatoes.  Today, I’m sharing a version served over a tomato, cucumber, and quinoa salad.

Things I especially love about this grilled tahini chicken:

• It’s fast (no real marinading required; more on that below). 
• It’s easy to make ahead of time (more on that below, too). 
• It’s healthy and perfect for those with dietary restrictions (dairy-free, soy-free, paleo, and Whole30 compliant if you skip the quinoa salad and serve with grilled vegetables or a salad). 
• And of course, most importantly, it’s delicious.

What is Tahini?

Every time I post a tehina recipe, I get comments asking what it is, or people saying they had no idea you can use it for anything other than hummus.  So… let’s discuss.

Tahini, also called tehina or tahina based on geographic location, is a paste made from ground, hulled sesame seeds. 

Think peanut butter, except made from sesame seeds instead of peanuts.  It’s an important part of Middle Eastern and Eastern Mediterranean cuisine.

If you hear tahini and think hummus – yes! But you can also do so much more with it. 

Much like peanut butter, it can go both sweet and savory.  Just like you’d put sesame seeds on a deli roll or a bagel or press into raw ahi tuna… ooooor eat sesame cookies or Chinese sesame dessert balls, tahini goes both ways, too.

You can use tahini as a sauce for grilled meats or vegetables.  It’s a perfect condiment for falafel or shwarma or drizzled on top of sweet potatoes.  But it’s also delicious in cookies, brownies, carrot cake, or basically anywhere you might put peanut butter.

Quick Grilled Chicken

Now let’s talk about this tahini chicken!  It’s easy.  And most importantly, it’s fast. 

You know all those recipes that call for marinating your meat for many hours before cooking them?  And then you forget to do it and question if you should just give up altogether?  In today’s kitchen chemistry, we’re going to talk about why marinating doesn’t even matter in the end.

Kitchen Chemistry

Recipes often call for soaking meat in a marinade for an extended period of time.  But no matter how long you do this, the marinade doesn’t actually penetrate deeper than an 1/10th of an inch.  Meat is mostly made up of water — about 75%.  But marinades are usually oil based (in this case, oil from the tehina) and water + oil don’t mix (water molecules are more attracted to each other than they are to oil molecules).  So skip the long marinades (unless it’s brining, which is important for certain cuts of meat) and just brush some of the sauce on the meat as it cooks and extra to drizzle on top once it’s done! (Read more on this here.)

Because we’re not doing a long marinade for this, everything comes together really quickly. 

Stir together the tahini, some olive oil, lemon juice, lemon zest, garlic, za’atar, and smoked paprika.  Add in a few tablespoons of water to thin it down to a drizzle-able sauce consistency.  Spread some on your chicken thighs and toss on the grill.  Easy-peasy.

Plus, once made, this will last for a good 3-4 days in the refrigerator (and it’s delicious cold!) so it’s easy to make over the weekend and enjoy later on during the week.  Make ahead meal prep for those crazy busy weeknights!

No Grill? No Problem!

Grilling is my favorite way to make this tahini chicken, and it’s how my recipe instructions are written below.  But if you don’t have a grill (or you want to make this in the dead of winter), you can use a grill pan or broil the chicken in your oven.

To broil, cover both sides of the chicken with the prepared tahini sauce and place it on a wire baking rack (like a cookie cooling rack) on top of a foil-lined baking sheet. 

Turn the oven broiler to high with a rack positioned ~6 inches below the broiler.  Broil for 10-12 minutes, flipping halfway through cooking, until the thickest part of the chicken registers 160 °F.

Serving Ideas

One of the things I love so much about this tahini chicken is how versatile it is.  The tahini sauce is delicious and pretty much any vegetable/grain is delicious under a nice smothering of it.  We’re big fans of this chicken served with a simple side of grilled vegetables or over a pile of fluffy rice.

In colder weather, it’s great served with roasted sweet potatoes (perhaps on top of this sweet potato kale chickpea bowl?).  In the summer, we love it on a tomato, cucumber, and quinoa salad (like this simple one from Real Simple).

Other ideas that pair perfectly with this grilled tahini chicken include:

• Roasted Eggplant and Smoked Almond Dip (as a salad on the side)
• Honey Glazed Moroccan Eggplant
• Tomato Basil Tortellini Salad
• Grilled Asparagus and Feta Salad
• Spicy Grilled Okra

So, in summary: healthy, allergy-friendly, easy, make ahead, and delicious.  Basically, grilled tahini chicken is the perfect dinner.  Even my 3-year old agrees.

Recommended Tools to Make Grilled Tahini Chicken

• Mixing Bowls: My favorite set of mixing bowls, perfect for everything in the kitchen! (And dishwasher and microwave-safe, too.)
• Whisk: A heavy-duty durable whisk is essential in the kitchen.
• Pastry Brush: Use a pastry brush to brush the sauce over the chicken while it’s on the grill.
• Instant Read Thermometer: The very best way to ensure your chicken is perfectly cooked is to check the internal temperature.
• Tahini: Since tahini is the start of the sauce, we want to use the best quality tahini we can find. This, friends, is Soom Tahini – never dry or crumbly, it’s by far the best tahini I’ve tried and all I keep in my kitchen now.

More Tahini Recipes:

• Flourless Chocolate Tahini Cake
• Brownies with Salted Tahini Buttercream
• Sweet Potato Kale Chickpea Bowl
• Tahini Shakes
• One Pan Tahini Chicken with Brussels Sprouts and Potatoes
• Chocolate Chip Tahini Blondies