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One of my most popular recipes, these chicken zucchini poppers are easy to make, but the best part is the creamy cilantro sauce! Ground chicken and shredded zucchini combine into small patties and are pan-fried, making a high-protein meal with veggies in under 30 minutes.
Quick Look: Chicken Poppers with Zucchini
- Cooking time: A 20 minute meal, although a 30 minute chill time is recommended to let the flavors combine.
- Servings – This will serve 4 people for a main dinner recipe, or makes several snacks for lunches.
- Main ingredients: Ground chicken, zucchini, garlic, oil, and mayo and cilantro for the dipping sauce.
- When to serve: An easy weeknight meal with vegetables included, perfect for school lunches for kids, or a high protein snack! This recipe is great for meal prep and can be adjusted to a smaller patty for a bite-sized appetizer.
- Dietary information: This recipe is Mediterranean diet friendly. It can also be migraine diet-friendly, lactose free and gluten free. It’s also low carb diet, Whole30, and keto friendly.
- Why you’ll love it: These chicken poppers are so versatile because they can make a great, healthy dinner, an easy meal prep lunch, and are perfect for packing for school lunches too. It’s especially fun to dip in the cilantro sauce, which adds a ton of flavor.
These chicken and zucchini poppers have quickly become one of the most popular on my website and it’s pretty much because of the creamy cilantro sauce. Lovingly known as “THE SAUCE” with Dizzy Cook readers, I’ve had people just make it as a dip for chips, vegetables, chicken, beef…and some just eat it with a spoon. It’s that good.
Got leftover zucchini? Don’t miss this zucchini pasta, zucchini bars, or zucchini and corn pasta.
Table of Contents
Ingredients
The ingredients for the poppers are extremely minimal and simple. This is because I wanted the flavor of the chicken poppers to compliment the sauce. They’re meat to be served together. Please note this is just details on what to look for when grocery shopping, with amounts in the recipe card below.
For the chicken poppers:
- Ground chicken – Use an air-chilled ground chicken breast or chicken thighs, with at least 7% fat for better flavor. Air-chilled chicken absorbs less moisture in processing, making the chicken patties brown much more nicely with a better flavor when cooking.
- Zucchini – About 2 small zucchini equal 1 1/2 cups grated. Zucchini contain a lot of water so you want to make sure that gets squeezed out before cooking. This could be substituted with summer squash as well.
- Oil – Olive oil or avocado oil would work well to cook these in. I recommend a higher heat olive oil like Graza or similar.
- Seasonings – Garlic, chives, salt and pepper round out the ingredients for the chicken poppers. If chives aren’t readily available, they can be substituted with green onion.
For the creamy cilantro sauce:
- Cilantro – The cilantro flavor is present without being overpowering. However, if you hate cilantro, I recommend substituting basil. This creamy basil dressing is a great recipe for it.
- Mayonnaise – If I’m in a rush, I’ll use Sir Kensington’s Organic which is widely available at Target and Whole Foods. Or you can make your own.
- Cottage Cheese – I use Daisy brand, but you can also omit this if you want the recipe to be dairy free. It definitely is worth adding for extra creaminess and flavor, but not absolutely necessary. Even if you hate cottage cheese, like I do, you won’t even notice it once it’s blended. Trust me.
- Distilled white vinegar – Added for a little acidity.
How to Make Chicken Zucchini Poppers
Step 1 – Start by grating the zucchini with a cheese grater. Do this over a paper towel so you can just fold up the paper towel around the zucchini and squeeze out all of the liquid. If you’re a big juice fan, you can save the juices for a smoothie.
Step 2 – Mix the zucchini, ground chicken, and spices together and form into small patties. Chill these on a sheet pan or plate while you make the sauce.
Step 3 – Combine the cilantro, mayonnaise, cottage cheese, white vinegar, and spices in a small food processor or in a tall glass if using an immersion blender. You can chop the cilantro very finely and mix everything together if you don’t own a food processor, but the flavor combination definitely works best this way. Blend till everything is fully combined into a thick green dip. Chill until you’re ready to serve so the flavors have time to combine together.
Step 4 – Using a large, nonstick pan, heat olive oil over medium high heat. Add chicken popper patties and sear for 4 minutes, flipping when golden brown. Cook another 4 minutes on the opposite side, till completely cooked through. If you have a meat thermometer the temperature should reach 165 degrees F. If you’re cooking a big batch and have a smaller pan, cover the poppers with foil and place in a warm oven while you make the rest.
Serve the poppers with sauce for dipping!
Recipe Tips
- Don’t skip squeezing the water out of the zucchini. If you do, the patties will be too moist and won’t form together well.
- Don’t skip making the sauce. The people in the comments who didn’t like this recipe did not make the sauce with it. The chicken zucchini popper recipe was formulated to be paired a sauce for dipping or topping for the best flavor. If you hate cilantro, there are more sauce suggestions below!
- Use ground chicken with fat. One that’s totally fat-free or with minimal fat can be more dry and bland.
Chicken Popper Sauces
Some people have a gene that makes cilantro taste like soap, so I love to give other options for dipping. The basic chicken popper recipe lends itself to pairing very well with many different kinds of sauces!
- Basil dressing (most similar to this creamy cilantro dip, but uses basil instead)
- Gluten free ranch dressing
- Honey mustard ranch
- Creamy curry dressing
- Easy homemade Chick-Fil-A sauce
Storage & Reheating Information
- Refrigerator – These will store in an airtight container for up to 3 days. If you don’t intend to use them by that time, I recommend just throwing them into a freezer bag. If they’re cooked, they shouldn’t stick together.
- Freezer – You could also freeze the raw patties between sheets of wax paper. Just defrost overnight in the fridge and pat with a paper towel if there is excess moisture.
- Reheating – To reheat chicken poppers, microwave in 30 second increments for about 1-2 minutes. Or wrap the patties in foil and place in the oven at 350°F for about 10-15 minutes.
Chicken and Zucchini Recipes
For more recipes like these chicken zucchini poppers, check out these posts. And if you have leftover zucchini, I highly recommend these stuffed zucchini.
Pasta
Creamy Corn Pasta with Zucchini
Love this recipe? Please leave a 5-star 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 review in the recipe card! Don’t forget to tag me @thedizzycook on Facebook and Instagram, and follow along on Pinterest for more great recipes!
Chicken Zucchini Poppers
Video
Ingredients
- 1 pound ground chicken, can use chicken breast or ground chicken thighs – higher fat content recommended
- 1-2 medium zucchini squash (about 1½ cups shredded)
- 3-4 garlic cloves, minced, or 1 ½ teaspoons garlic powder
- 2 tablespoons fresh chives, chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon fresh black pepper
- 1-2 tablespoons avocado or olive oil
Creamy Cilantro Sauce
- 1 cup fresh cilantro
- 1 small garlic clove (or more depending on preference)
- 1/3 cup mayonnaise
- 1 tablespoon cottage cheese
- 1 tablespoon distilled white vinegar
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Combine cilantro, garlic clove, mayonnaise, cottage cheese, and vinegar in a food processor or in a tall glass with an immersion blender (my personal favorite) and blend till combined. Place in the fridge to thicken and let flavors combine for at least 30 minutes, season with salt and pepper to taste.
- With a cheese grater, grate the fresh zucchini squash onto a paper towel or kitchen towel. Sprinkle with a small pinch of kosher salt and squeeze to remove excess moisture. Place the shredded zucchini into a large bowl with ground chicken, garlic, chives, 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt and 1/4 teaspoons fresh black pepper. Form mixture into 2-3 inch patties, you should have 8-12 total. They should resemble flattened meatballs.
- Add oil to a large skillet and bring to medium high heat. Cook chicken patties on each side for 4 minutes until browned on both sides and cooked through. If they're not quite cooked through but getting really brown, place a lid over top the skillet and turn down the heat to medium for 2 minutes.
- Serve warm with the dipping sauce or top each popper with a little bit of the sauce.
Notes
- Please note – The sauce is essential to the overall flavor. If you make it without the sauce, you may need to add more of your favorite seasonings.
- Cilantro sub – Use roughly 1 cup of fresh basil leaves or a combination of half basil and half parsley.
- Chives sub – If you can’t find fresh chives, substitute green onion.
- Ground chicken thighs – I prefer ground chicken thighs, which are more flavorful and juicy than ground chicken breast, but both will work for this recipe. It helps the flavor to have chicken breast with more fat (like 93/7)
- Dairy free, paleo, and Whole30 – Omit the cottage cheese and replace it with mayo. Cut back on the vinegar to 1-2 teaspoons to taste. Mixture might be a little more thin.
- For an egg free mayo, see my Aquafaba Mayo recipe.
- Store in the fridge or in the freezer for long term (see post for defrost instructions).
- If you don’t have a food processor or immersion blender – Just chop the cilantro finely and mix everything together by hand. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Sorry I found this very tasteless. I will not be making again.
Would you be willing to elaborate to help me understand? Did you skip the sauce with it?
So flavorful, you wouldn’t guess it’s very healthy! One of my favorite go to quick meals.
Thank you, Sharon!
Loved these. Took me longer than 15 minutes to make since I cut the stems off the fresh cilantro. I also added hemp hearts to the mix. Will make these again for sure.
Interesting with the hemp hearts! Thanks for sharing!
I made these for mu husband and I. They turned out grate. I don’t really care for cilantro so substituted basil & it turned out great. The sauce was really delicious. Will definitely make again.
Great sub! 🙂
Can you substitute ground turkey for the chicken?
Sure, it may just be a little more dry cause there is usually less fat.
These chicken zucchini poppers were amazing, and the sauce took them over the top. They were super easy to make and were packed with flavor before topping with the delicious sauce. Looking forward to making them again. I have added these to our rotation for go to meals.
These look really easy and like a great meal prep option! What would you suggest serving them with? Rice or a salad maybe? I’m new to cooking and trying to fill out the meal a little.
Thanks in advance!
Hey! You could do something easy like this butter lettuce salad or they’d also be really good with these mashed potatoes. I think you could do rice too and just make a little more sauce or double the recipe to pour on top. Plain green beans would be great too!