Air Fried Buffalo Chicken Strips: Healthy Comfort Food

Guys, you NEED an air fryer.  Like yesterday. It’s such a versatile little kitchen gadget! Today we are making my favorite type of chicken in the air fryer- buffalo style!  I’m obsessed with buffalo style anything. The saucier the better! This recipe  for air fried buffalo chicken strips is a healthier alternative to your typical fried buffalo chicken strips. It’s made with very little oil but you still get all the flavor and the perfect crunch!

I was a bit skeptical about cooking meat in the air fryer but these came out great. I’m a bit of a psycho about making sure meat is cooked all the way so I wanted to find a balance of not contracting food poisoning and not gnawing on overdone chicken leather. My suggestion is to cut your chicken open when you think it’s about done to verify it’s no longer pink. I mean no brainer right? But I’ve bitten into an undone piece before and it’s not fun.  Lesson learned. With fish, it’s much easier to gauge when it’s ready. I made a chili lime tilapia in my air fryer and it was perfect in about 14 minutes.

I think what makes this recipe even better is the sauce I use. I recently found one from Whole Foods (brand name is Wing Time) and it’s amazing! I also use Frank’s Red Hot mixed with ghee and it works really well too. You can obviously use whatever your preferred sauce is or make your own. This is another thing that’s so customizable.  If you don’t like saucier strips then use less sauce or you can even use the buffalo sauce as a dip instead of coating the chicken with it.

I used to use an air fryer by Farberware and loved it! I bought it from Wal-Mart but you can also find them on Amazon. I know use a digital one from Gourmia and I love it even more! The air fryer is what gives it that nice crispy texture outside without all the oil.  I’ve also used my air fryer to crisp up baked wings like my Whole30 Buffalo Wings and it works perfectly! Brussel sprouts , kale chips , buffalo cauliflower and crispy potatoes are also delicious dishes I have made in this thing! When I first got my air fryer, I searched YouTube videos to try and figure out the best way to coat chicken. The one thing I kept seeing suggested was to use a dry-wet-dry technique to create the coating.  That’s what I have always done and it hasn’t failed me yet!

When you are measuring out the amounts of dry and wet ingredients, you can really use as much or as little as you would like.  I use enough to coat the amount of chicken I have and for what fits my dietary needs in terms of carbs.  So the recipe here is for what I use specifically, but feel free to adjust to more or less as needed.

Now on to the recipe for these air fried buffalo chicken strips!

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