Grilled Adobo Chicken Tacos

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Flavorful Mexican Chicken Adobada Tacos! Juicy chicken tacos marinated in a spicy adobo sauce, grilled, and served on corn tortillas with lime, herbs, and onion for the perfect weeknight recipe.

Cook Time15

Marinating Time15

Total Time30

Course: Main Dish

Cuisine: Mexican

Servings: tacos

Calories: 184kcal

Author: Eden Westbrook

Equipment

Ingredients

Adobo Sauce Marinade

water to rehydrate the chilies
3 dried guajillo chilies stemmed and seeded
2 dried ancho chilies stemmed and seeded
5 chipotles in adobo use less for more mild adobo
8 garlic cloves peeled
1 tablespoon dried Mexican oregano
½ teaspoon cumin seeds
1 whole clove
1 teaspoon coriander seeds
2 tablespoon whole annatto seeds
1 teaspoon whole black peppercorn
2 tablespoon kosher salt
¼ cup apple cider vinegar
½ cup orange juice

Adobo Chicken Tacos

8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
corn tortillas
your favorite toppings and sides

Instructions

Make the Adobo Marinade

Pour water into a saucepan, enough to cover your dried chilies, and turn the heat to medium. Rehydrate the stemmed and seeded chilies for about 5-10 minutes. Discard the water.
water, 3 dried guajillo chilies, 2 dried ancho chilies
If using whole spices, use a spice grinder or high powered blender to pulverize the spices into powder. **If not, use already-powdered spices!
1 tablespoon dried Mexican oregano, ½ teaspoon cumin seeds, 1 whole clove, 1 teaspoon coriander seeds, 2 tablespoon whole annatto seeds, 1 teaspoon whole black peppercorn, 2 tablespoon kosher salt
Add the chipotles, garlic, apple cider vinegar, and orange juice to the powdered spices in the blender and blend until the mixture is smooth. It'll be somewhat thick, but we don't want it to be chunky.
5 chipotles in adobo, 8 garlic cloves, ¼ cup apple cider vinegar, ½ cup orange juice

Marinate the Chicken

In a large mixing bowl or gallon sized zip-top bag, add in the chicken thighs and pour the marinade over them. Really coat every nook and cranny, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, then either let it marinate for fifteen minutes to an hour on the counter OR marinate up to overnight in the fridge.
8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs

Make the Adobo Chicken Tacos

Oil your grill grates with high heat oil or nonstick cooking spray and preheat the grill to medium high - high (around 400℉ to 450℉/ 204-232℃).
Once grill is hot, use tongs to carefully place the chicken thighs on the grill grates. Close the lid and let cook for 5-7 minutes, depending on how thick your chicken thighs are. After the 5-7 minutes, flip them with tongs and let cook for another 5-7 minutes. Don't worry about char, we want that on the chicken.
With clean tongs, carefully remove the chicken thighs from the grill onto a plate and cover with aluminum foil to rest for a couple of minutes before chopping the chicken into bite sized pieces.
Serve the chicken hot in pan-warmed tortillas with toppings like salsa roja or pico de gallo, fresh cilantro and chopped onion, and sides like refried beans, rice, cotija cheese, avocado slices, etc.
your favorite toppings and sides, corn tortillas

Video

@sweetteaandthyme
🌮Grilled Chicken Adobo Tacos. Its 101 degrees right now. You couldnt get me to turn on my oven if you paid me…okay maybe if you were paying well. #foodtiktok #dinnerwithme #bigbackactivities #dinnertime #cookingtiktok #cookingvideos #cookingathometiktoktv #tacos #chickentacos #cooking #easyrecipe #grilling #kitchenhacks
♬ sonido original - SONIDOS LARGOS

Notes

Storage and Reheating

Store in the fridge: store leftover chicken in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days
Freeze + Thaw: put all the leftover chicken into a freezer safe zip top bag and freeze for up to 6 months
Reheat: rewarm the chicken in a skillet over medium heat until warmed through or in the microwave until hot.

Variations

- If you want a mild version of the adobo instead of spicy, use only 1-3 chipotles in your adobo. While guajillo and ancho chiles aren't spicy, the chipotles are.
- Swap the boneless thighs for chicken breasts, just chop the breasts in half so they cook quicker.
- Use whatever protein you want! Adobo is classic on pork but it's delicious on beef and even marinating tofu.
- Swap the corn tortillas for flour tortillas, if you like.
- Swap the orange juice for pineapple juice and turn this into chicken al pastor tacos!
- You can cook the chicken on a cast iron skillet over medium high heat until fully cooked.

Pro Tips

- You can find achiote paste and adobo sauce at your local big box grocery store in the hispanic aisle. Make your life even easier!
- Oil your grill grates really, really well. Otherwise your chicken will stick and rip apart when you pick it up.
- Freezer Meals - this is a fantastic recipe to have as a freezer meal, ready to thaw, heat, and east when you just don't feel like cooking. Double everything and either freeze the raw marinating chicken to thaw and grill when ready, or grill the marinated chicken, chop it up, bag and freeze for later.

Nutrition