Enjoy this healthy 30 Minute Cashew Chicken recipe for a quick weeknight dinner. It’s easy, keto-friendly, and the kids always love it! Serve perfectly over our Instant Pot Brown Rice or Coconut Rice!
Do you ever get overwhelmed with real food? I sure do, which is why I make SMALL goals and work on them one at a time.
A few years ago I made it a foodie goal to have soup for dinner once a week because it’s inexpensive and healthy (primarily when you use homemade chicken stock).
Then my goal was to quit sugar. With the exception of the occasional batch of cookies, the required Christmas sugar cookies, and homemade kombucha, we’ve done this too.
A recent goal was to incorporate more fast meals into our meal plan, like my 15 Minute Kung Pao chicken recipe, and now this 30-minute cashew chicken.
Don’t get me wrong – it’s not that I don’t love cooking. I wouldn’t be a FOOD BLOGGER if I didn’t. But there are some seasons and some nights that are just too full to spend hours upon hours in the kitchen.
Some nights I need something REALLY fast. Something that can be made with what I have, relatively quickly and without much fuss. There are bonus points if the recipe is easy enough for Mr. Crumbs to follow too, which is why I LOVE this cashew chicken!
30 Minute Cashew Chicken
Let’s talk about why this recipe is so great, shall we? I mean, beyond the fact that it’s a super easy dinner to make, it’s also…
- Ready in under 30 minutes. You literally toss everything together and bake! That’s it!
- Healthy. Lean chicken, mixed vegetables, and crunchy cashews are baked in a delicious sweet, and spicy sauce!
- Keto-friendly. Just substitute the cornstarch (thickener) for almond flour.
- Better than takeout! Not only is it quick, easy, and filled with fresh ingredients, you don’t have to worry about the fillers, preservatives, and sodium common in takeout food.
Ingredients for Cashew Chicken
With 4 main ingredients (and only a few ingredients for the sauce), this recipe is simply delicious!
- Chicken Breast
- Vegetables
- Cashews
- Sauce (including chicken stock. Here’s how to make your own).
The sauce is where the magic happens! Somehow a very ordinary list of pantry staples becomes delicious saucy goodness when you combine it all together with cornstarch.
How to Make 30-Minute Cashew Chicken
Once you have your chicken pounded out, sliced, and your sauce whisked, this recipe comes together so quickly…especially if you choose to use frozen veggies.
Step 1. Combine chicken, vegetables, and cashews in a greased 9×13 glass pan.
Step 2. Add onions.
Step 3. Whisk together the sauce mixture in a small bowl, and pour over chicken, vegetables, and cashews.
Step 4. Bake for 25-30 minutes until chicken is done and roasted cashews are golden brown.
Step 5. Garnish with green onions and sesame seeds.
Serve warm over Instant Pot Brown Rice or Coconut Lime Rice! YUM!
Note: Keep leftovers stored in the refrigerator for 3-4 days.
FAQs
As I mentioned, we’re using chicken breasts in this recipe. You’ll pound them out to thin little cutlets, so they cook evenly, and can be cut with a fork or poked with a chopstick.
Have you ever seen knives at a Chinese restaurant? Didn’t think so.
I used a combination of what I thought should go in a ‘stir-fry-ish’ recipe based on what I had in the kitchen. That turned out to be green bell peppers, carrots, frozen peas, and frozen green beans.
Next time I think I’d like to try cauliflower or red bell peppers, just to add more color besides green. Some recipes call for water chestnuts, which would be tasty as well! Really though, anything you have will work. You can use fresh or frozen or a mix of both like I did.
You bet! Cashews are filled with protein, vitamins, minerals, and healthy fats! Nutritionists at Harvard say that nuts are great for our health and may even contribute to a longer life.
Can I Make Substitutions in the Sauce for Cashew Chicken?
This is a totally forgiving sauce. If you splash too much soy sauce or use up the last bit of homemade apple cider vinegar the previous week and it’s white distilled until payday…it’s all good!
Did the honey pour out too quickly, or do you have Frank’s rather than sriracha? No worries.
- Substitute away, my friends, and enjoy the differences. I’m 99% sure it won’t matter and you’ll love this dish anyway.
Note: I have seen some cashew chicken recipes call for store-bought hoisin sauce, oyster sauce and chili garlic sauce, even brown sugar rather than honey.
- If you have these flavors on hand and you’d like to experiment, I’m sure this recipe will still taste delicious. Just be sure to double-check that the sauces are free of preservatives. Let me know what flavor combinations you come up with!
More Simple Recipes
- Ridiculously Easy Potato Skins
- Soft Pretzel Recipe
- Simple Sweet and Sour Chicken
- Easy Spicy Salmon Tacos with Slaw
Chicken Meal Prep Plan
Sign up to get instant access to my Chicken Meal Prep Plan, complete with recipes and shopping list!30 Minute Cashew Chicken
Enjoy this healthy 30 minute cashew chicken for a quick weeknight dinner. Chicken and cashews with plenty of veggies and a thick, sweet and savory sauce.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 30 minutes
- Total Time: 35 minutes
- Yield: 4-6 1x
- Category: Main Meals
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: American
Ingredients
- 1 lb chicken breasts, pounded out to ¼” thick and cut into 2” strips
- 4 cups vegetables, fresh and/or frozen (I used a combination of bell peppers, carrots, green beans, and peas)
- ⅔ cup cashews
- 3 green onions, white and green parts sliced
- ½ cup chicken stock (try my homemade recipe)
- 4 Tbsp soy sauce (I use liquid aminos)
- 2 Tbsp apple cider vinegar (try my homemade recipe)
- 1 Tbsp sriracha sauce
- 2 tsp minced garlic
- ¼ cup cornstarch
- 2 Tbsp honey
- 2 tsp sesame seed oil
- 1 tsp sesame seeds to garnish (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F.
- Spray a 9” x 13” glass pan with cooking spray or grease with a butter wrapper.
- Place the chicken pieces in a single layer in the pan.
- Top with the cashews and 4 cups of vegetables.
- Add all the white onions and about half the green onions on top. In a small bowl, whisk together the ingredients for the sauce: stock, soy sauce (or liquid aminos), vinegar, sriracha, cornstarch, honey, garlic, and sesame seed oil.
- Pour over the vegetables and chicken.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes, until the sauce, is bubbly and the chicken is cooked through.
- Let cool slightly for about 5 minutes for the sauce to thicken.
- Garnish with sliced green onions and sesame seeds. Salt and pepper to taste.
Notes
- Store leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 3-4 days. I don’t recommend freezing prepared cashew chicken, because the cornstarch in the sauce will separate out. You can freeze many of the ingredients ahead of time though, and even starting from scratch, this easy weeknight chicken dinner comes together fast!
Nutrition
- Calories: 354
Overall this was good and pretty easy, which is what I was looking for. The flavor was a little more spicy and tangy than I was expecting from a cashew chicken recipe. The only change I made was to cut the Sriracha in half, and I doubled the sauce because I always add extra veggies and we like it saucy! Next time I would also reduce the vinegar but otherwise it’s very good as is! The last issue I had was that the veggies dried out a bit and didn’t fully cook in the time recommended, so I ended up covering in tin foil and baking an additional 20 minutes or so. This would probably not be an issue with frozen veg but I used fresh. Next time I think I would start with it covered in foil, or cover it part way through. Enjoyed this though, and the ease of all the flavors, meat and veg in one pan! Will make again.
Did you use raw or toasted cashews?