Chicken Shawarma with Garlic Sauce | Air Fryer or Skillet | Lite Cravings Recipes (2024)

A quick, weeknight take on the classic Lebanese dish, Chicken Shawarma with Garlic Sauce is a packed full of flavor and easy to make!

It’s no secret around here that I’m a sucker for a good chicken marinade. And I’m pretty much obsessed with sauces. Peruvian Chicken with Green Sauce is a reader favorite, Skinny Alfredo Sauce has gone viral on Pinterest, and Citrus Marinated Chicken (El Pollo Loco Copycat) has been a meal-prep staple for me for years.

The flavors in this dish are out of this world, making it my new favorite. Smoky, tangy, slightly spicy, with a sharp kick of garlic flavor. Heavenly!

What is Chicken Shawarma?

Shawarma is a traditional Middle-Eastern street food, typically prepared on a spit and roasted for hours. The vendors will thinly shaved the meat off of the spit and serve with pilaf, pita, and some sort of garlicky sauce.

I wanted to both lighten up and speed up the process. I use chicken breasts, marinated for hours to lock in flavor. Then, I either BBQ or air for for perfectly charred and tender chicken.

Plan ahead for a quick meal

Both the marinade and the garlic sauce get better and better as they sit in your refrigerator. For that reason, this makes for an ideal meal prep!

You could get away with making the sauce and marinating the chicken as close as 2 hours before you want to cook up the chicken. The flavors won’t be quite as deep, but it will still come out great.

This is combo really is best when both the chicken and sauce marinate overnight. I like to put it all together on a Sunday evening for a super quick dinner on Monday night. It takes just under 15 minutes to cook up the chicken. While that’s going, I’ll chop my veggies. Dinner is done! And then I have leftovers for lunches the rest of the week.

Serving Suggestions

• Chicken and Rice Plate: One of my favorite restaurants is local Lebanese café. I always order their chicken shawarma plate. So to recreate that at home, I pair this chicken with my Simple Rice Pilaf and a side salad of parsley, tomatoes, and cucumber, tossed with a little balsamic vinegar. Simple and delicious!
• Pita Wraps: The chicken and sauce combo is great for a wrap. Just add some lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers–whatever veggies you like! This is a great way to use up leftover veggies.

• Chicken Shawarma Salad with Creamy Garlic Dressing: Or just skip the pita and turn that beautiful garlic sauce into a dressing! Add a bit more almond milk to thin out the sauce a bit, then drizzle over the chicken and your favorite salad ingredients. Avocado would be fabulous with that spiced chicken!

By the way, if you end up liking this recipe, you MUST try my Halal Cart Chicken Bowls!

I’d love to hear from you if you make this recipe! It makes my day when you share your pics on Instagram and tag me (@litecravings). Don’t forget to use #litecravingsrecipes to make sure I see it. If I don’t get a chance to scroll through my tags quickly enough, I won’t see your post. I always make a point to look through the hashtags, though, so I’ll see it there!