Grilled Chicken Sandwiches with Garlic Aioli
Servings: 2 sandwiches
Ingredients
For the marinaded chicken:
- 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 1 clove of garlic, minced
- ½ teaspoon smoked paprika
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon dried thyme
- Salt and pepper, to taste
For the garlic aioli:
- ½ cup mayonnaise
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- Salt and pepper, to taste
For the sandwich:
- 2 Brioche buns or Ciabatta buns
- 2 slices of cheddar cheese or Colby cheese
- 2 leaves of lettuce
- 2 slices of tomato
- 2 slices of red onion, optional
- 4 crispy strips of bacon
Instructions
- In a large bowl, whisk together the olive oil, honey, minced garlic, smoked paprika, dried oregano, dried thyme, salt, and pepper. Add the chicken breasts and coat them evenly with the marinade. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or overnight for best results.
- When ready to cook the marinated chicken, preheat a grill or grill pan to medium-high heat.
- Remove the chicken breasts from the marinade and grill them for 5-6 minutes per side, or until cooked through and charred on the outside. Melt a slice of cheese on the tops of each breast. Set the chicken aside to rest for 5 minutes before preparing the sandwich.
- While the chicken is resting, prepare the garlic aioli. In a small bowl, mix together the mayonnaise, minced garlic, lemon juice, salt, and pepper until smooth and creamy.
- To assemble the sandwich, spread the garlic aioli on the top and bottom of each hamburger bun followed by a leaf of lettuce, a slice of tomato, chicken, bacon strips (if using), and a slice of red onion (if using). Close the sandwich with the top half of the bun.
- Serve the grilled chicken sandwich immediately and enjoy!
Notes
Make sure to allow the chicken to marinate in the refrigerator for at least an hour before grilling, but the longer the better. The chicken can even be prepped the night before and will be ready to grill for lunch or dinner.
This garlic aioli sauce is super simple and really takes the sandwich up a notch. We like to make a larger portion of it and use it to dip fries or chips. The aioli recipe can easily be doubled or tripled.
When grilling the chicken, make sure the pan is heated and just place the chicken down and don’t touch it for at least 4-5 minutes (depending on how thick the cut of chicken is). This will give it those beautiful char marks.
Variations and substitutions:
There are so many ways to change this sandwich to get many different varieties by adding different toppings, like tomato, lettuce, bacon, different cheese (cheddar, provolone, Colby, jack, Munster etc), red onion, grilled peppers.
Brioche buns or Ciabatta bread are our favorite way to serve these, but a regular hamburger bun works great, too.
Adding some cayenne or chipotle pepper to the marinade will give it some heat if you want a little bit of spice.