Fragrant Thai Basil Chicken is simple, fast and flavorful! Perfect for weeknight dinners, ready to serve in under 30 minutes. Video. Looking for more? Check out our 40+ Best Chicken Breast Recipes and our 50+ Easy Dinner Ideas! ✨
Re-examine all that you have been told… dismiss that which insults your soul.
Walt Whitman
This Thai Basil Chicken stir fry is couldn’t be any easier! It’s common on most Thai restaurant menus (aka pad krapow gai) but can easily be made at home. This is the kind of food I am craving lately, tasty and satisfying but doesn’t take much effort.
Using ground chicken (or ground turkey) makes this recipe even faster. You could certainly chop up whole chicken thighs or breasts if you prefer, or use crumbled tofu. Traditionally this is made with Thai holy basil which is also known as tulsi basil, and is available fresh, at some Asian Markets. Thai basil is easier to come by and works great in this recipe. And yes, you can use regular Italian basil! TIP: When using regular basil, I like to add just a pinch of ground anise to the stir fry. If you love it spicy definitely go for the red Thai chilies! Fresno chilies have great flavor and though not as spicy as the Thai chilies, they still have a good kick!
Thai Basil Chicken | 45-sec Video
Table of Contents
Why You’ll Love Thai Basil Chicken
- Easy to make– this dish really comes together fast, it is not complicated. Use ready ground chicken for quick prep. Dinner can be on the table in under 30 minutes.
- So tasty– the combination of ingredients just give the perfect balance. Your taste buds will be delighted 🙂
- Healthy– making it yourself leaves the potential for clean ingredients! We like that.
Ingredients in Thai Basil Chicken
Thai Basil Chicken IngreDient Notes
- Chilies– fresno or Thai (spicier!)
- Ground chicken-or sub ground turkey , ground beef, or crumbled tofu
- Sweetener– coconut sugar or honey, or sugar
- Soy sauce- or tamari, or GF Liquid Aminos
- Thai basil leaves– or Holy Basil (Tulsi) if you can find it; regular basil will work too
See the recipe card below for a full list of ingredients and measurements.
How to make Thai Basil Chicken
STEP ONE: If serving with rice, start that now. Chop all your veggies.
STEP TWO: Heat up a skillet or wok to med-high heat. Add oil and shallots, and stir for 2 minutes.
Add garlic and hot peppers and stir for 2 minutes more until shallots are lightly brown on the edges. Scoop out into a bowl and set aside.
STEP THREE: Without cleaning out the pan, add oil, turn the heat to high, and add ground chicken, black pepper, and salt. Stir fry a couple of minutes until the chicken is cooked and starting to brown.
Sprinkle coconut sugar, soy sauce, and fish sauce over the chicken and stir until incorporated.
STEP FOUR: Add the red bell pepper and the shallot mixture. Cook about a minute, just enough to warm everything and just barely soften the red bell pepper slices. Mix in the basil leaves and turn the heat off.
Serve over jasmine rice. Season with more soy sauce or chili flakes if desired.
Leftovers will keep up to 4 days in the refrigerator, and can be reheated in a saute pan or microrwave.
Thai Basil Chicken
We haven’t tried it, but scrambled tofu or Crispy Tofu would probably be pretty tasty in place of ground chicken!
They are from the same family but Thai basil has a strong flavor with underlying tones of anise and spice where as sweet basil has a sweet, pungent, peppery flavor.
Ground chicken is made from both breast and thigh meat and also may contain some skin. You can finely chop chicken yourself from both thigh and breast meat.
More Recipes You May Enjoy
- Instant Pot Thai Curry Chicken
- Thai Fish Curry
- Coconut-Poached Thai Chicken Salad
- Thai Pineapple Curry
- 20 Delicious Easy Thai Recipes!
Hope you enjoy and let us know what you think!
Love this recipe? Please let us know in the comments and leave a 5-star ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating below the recipe card.
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Thai Basil Chicken
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 25 minutes
- Yield: 4 servings 1x
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Stir-fry
- Cuisine: Thai
- Diet: Gluten Free
Description
Fragrant and savory this Thai Basil Chicken recipe is simple, fast and flavorful! Perfect for weeknight dinners or an easy delicious lunch. Ready to serve in under 30 minutes.
Ingredients
- 3 shallots, cut in thin slices
- 5 large garlic cloves roughly chopped
- 3–6 Fresno chilies or Thai chilies (spicier!), cut into thin rings
- 2 tablespoons avocado oil or peanut oil, divided
- 1 pound ground chicken (or sub ground turkey, or crumbled extra firm tofu)
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons coconut sugar or honey, or sugar
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce or GF Liquid Aminos
- 1 tablespoon fish sauce
- 1 red bell pepper sliced in bite-sized strips
- 1 cup Thai basil leaves -or Holy Basil (Tulsi) if you can find it, regular basil will work too
- pinch of ground anise seeds if using regular basil (optional)
Instructions
- If serving with rice, start that first.
- Heat up a pan or wok to med-high heat. Add 1 tablespoon of oil and the shallots, stir for 2 minutes.
- Add garlic and hot peppers stir for 2 minutes more until shallots are lightly brown on the edges. Scoop out into a bowl and set aside.
- Without cleaning out the pan, add 1 tablespoon of oil, turn the heat to high, add ground chicken, black pepper, and salt. Stir fry a couple of minutes until the chicken is cooked and starting to brown. Sprinkle coconut sugar, soy sauce, fish sauce over the chicken and stir until incorporated.
- Add the red bell pepper and the shallot mixture. Cook for about a minute, just enough to warm. Add basil leaves and turn the heat off.
- Serve over jasmine rice. Season with more soy sauce if desired.
Notes
To make vegan, try crumbled tofu or make this Crispy Tofu.
Nutrition
- Serving Size:
- Calories: 511
- Sugar: 6.8 g
- Sodium: 924.3 mg
- Fat: 17.1 g
- Saturated Fat: 3.6 g
- Carbohydrates: 63.6 g
- Fiber: 4.9 g
- Protein: 31.7 g
- Cholesterol: 96.3 mg
Amazing balance of flavours! Once again, well done!
I substituted soy curls, cooked in vegetarian chicken broth and then cooked as per instructions, for the chicken.
I think next time around (because there definitely will be a next time cooking this) I am going to double the sauce quantity so the rice can really soak up all these amazing flavours.
Glad you gave this a go Barry! The soy curls sound great.
This dish is the first Feasting at Home recipe we tried. It was so good that we’ve been huge fans ever since. We grow Thai basil in the summer and freeze some for the winter. Frozen is not quite the same but it works.
An easy, flavorful and healthy dish. What could be better?
Nice to hear this, thanks Monique! What is your technique for freezing fresh basil?
Soooo good!
Great to hear!
I have not had a lot of Thai food _ which I regret. I didn’t know what to expect from this recipe – I was a little easy on the salt or maybe it was acid. Other than that – I could see this dish as a regular part of my dinner routine. Easy, healthy, flavorful.
Glad you gave it a try Cherie!
We enjoyed the flavor, which seemed much cleaner than Thai from a restaurant, but the recipe, as written, left me with questions. The ingredient list call for 2 T of oil, and the instructions specify that oil should be added before sauteeing the shallots and garlic (step 2) and again before adding the chicken before the pan (step 4). How much oil should be added each time? Also, if the red bell pepper is added after the chicken is cooked (step 5) and sauteed for only a minute, they’re virtually raw when served. Is that the intention? Finally, though I added the basil after turning off the heat, as directed, it turned black. I’d appreciate your suggestions so that I can improve the process next time. Thanks.
Hi Susan, I made the recipe more specific about how much oil and when to add it. The red bell pepper is meant to be warm and tender crisp. Feel free to add it sooner if you want it cooked more. The basil will turn dark but still tastes really yummy. Any heat will make it turn color. You can add it to the top of the dish just before serving if you find that more appealing. 🙂
Wow, this was phenomenal!! I wasn’t able to find Fresno chilies, so I substituted half a jalapeño. I also had to use regular basil without ground anise, and it still was an absolute winner. This one is going into our regular rotation. Thanks for the great recipe!
Great to hear Chelsea!
Same here! I order this a lot at the little Thai place in town. This was fantastic even with these substitutions!
Fantastic! Made this tonight, I had to use regular basil so added the pinch of anise.
So glad you enjoyed Marjorie!
I made this for dinner tonight and we enjoyed it. Thank you for a tasty recipe to add to the dinner rotation.
Glad you enjoyed!
This was terrific—and came together almost as quickly as stated (I usually take much longer!). Made it a few nights ago and then couldn’t find the recipe again until now. I tried. Highly recommend.
Awesome to hear! thanks!
So packed with flavor! I was concerned that it would be bland. Quite the opposite! This will become a staple, and I like the lettuce leaf idea. Didn’t have Fresno chilies and subbed jalapeños and tasted better than in a restaurant!
So great to hear Larisa!
First time trying this after growing my own thai basil. I added snow peas and used monk fruit for the sugar to make it Keto with the GF. Going to make it again.
Glad this worked for you!
So much flavour for little effort! Used the stir fry in lettuce wraps – Delicious!!
Lettuce wraps sound perfect!
This dish was excellent. It will be made again and again.
Great to hear Sue! Glad you liked it!
So quick and delicious! Make extra so I could have it lunch this week. All your recipes are just fantastic!
Thanks Melissa, so glad you are enjoying!
I just think you nail spices every time! You are my favorite online food guru! Xoxo
Aww…Thanks Marly!
So good I made it twice in one week! Super easy to make. If you can prep your veggies beforehand it makes things even easier/quicker. I used coconut aminos instead of soy sauce and and sweet peppers instead of bell peppers. This will definitely be added in my regular rotation.
So happy you enjoyed Sarah!
This is my go to when we eat at our local Thai restaurant. To me Asian food always seemed so complicated to replicate at home but now I see it can be done!
Yes! Totally doable! Let us know what you think. 🙂
This recipe is delicious with ground chicken or thinly sliced chicken breasts; I have made it several times and it’s one of my husband’s favorites. Thank you Sylvia and Tonia!
This is so good to hear Karon!
My girlfriend made this for my cousin, who is visiting, and me last night and we were blown away. “Better than restaurant quality,” he said. Honestly probably the best homemade Thai dish I’ve ever had! The only changes she made were an extra half teaspoon of salt and omitted the red peppers 🌶️. I’m more of a baker myself but I’m going to try making this using tofu next.
Awesome, great to hear Austin!
Very tasty! I used thin strips of chicken breast, about 2 Tbspns of Chili Crisp instead of the Fresno/Thai chilis, and regular basil. I served it with rice Pad Thai noodles. This was delicious!
Sounds perfect Kate!
I just loved this recipe – Imade wraps and added some lettuce and feta.
This is so versatile and quick. I used what i had in the fridge.
Perfect!
SOOOO DELICIOUS. Literally took me 20 minutes to wrap up. I swapped the chicken for tofu and it was so so so good.
I also added some roasted peanuts on top for extra crunch.
Awesome Faye!
This was so tasty. Thank you.
Awesome Mary Beth!
I made this last night (with a few alterations to fit what I had + my diet restrictions), and it was INSANELY delicious. I used Quorn chick’n pieces instead of real chicken, added shitake mushrooms and baby bok choy. I used Tulsi and fresh regular basil, and I didn’t have fish sauce, so I used Tamarind paste and worcestershire sauce, plus coconut aminos. Oh, and I used a whole head of garlic, ha ha. I cooked my rice in Thai culinary broth from Wegmans. Honestly, one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.
Wow, Love all the adjustments!
Delicious! Our kids loved it too. Highly recommend.
Yay! Great to hear.