How Long to Bake Bone-in Chicken Thighs

Want to bake the best bone-in chicken thighs? We will show you how to make them perfect in a cast iron skillet with mushrooms and cherry tomatoes! It’s so easy and done from start to finish in just 30 minutes with only 5 ingredients.

This quick chicken thigh recipe is our favorite one pot meal. We are a busy family and love one pot meals! Don’t know why I veered away from chicken thighs. Maybe it is because my mom never really cooked them when I was a kid. I was just so unfamiliar with them for that reason.

Frequently I cook a whole chicken in the oven and eat the thighs then. But I never picked up a package at the store until a few years ago. It wasn’t something that my mom made often when I was growing up so I had always just enjoyed chicken breasts, until now. These are now our favorite cuts, cheaper, more moist, and so easy to cook to tender.

How Long to Bake Chicken Thighs at 350 Uncovered

I would have a meat thermometer handy so you do not over cook chicken thighs and dry out the meat. Bake time is about 40 minutes because you will have already browned it for about 10 on the stove. If you used boneless skinless chicken thighs in the oven you could decrease by about 10 minutes since it doesn’t take as long.

Ingredient Notes

First you want to add some olive oil to your pan. This is your friend for this easy chicken thigh recipe. It will add some moisture and at the same time give the skin something to brown really nicely. To me, dark meat really needs some crunch with well seasoned skin. What we used to make this was;

• 6 chicken thighs bone in, can use boneless, but will take a bit less time to cook
• 1/4 c olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic minced/diced
• Salt
• Oregano
• 4-5 mushrooms
• 1/2 c cherry tomatoes halved is a nice touch

Do you have to brown chicken thighs before baking?

Yes, you will want to first put your thighs (by themselves) in a pan on the stovetop with a bit of oil over medium high heat for a few minutes. This will allow them to brown just a bit on the bottom. This step will lock in the juices to keep it as moist as possible. I mean your meal won’t be ruined if you don’t do this but it won’t be as tender.

Then you continue to add your veggies, throw it in the oven, and the whole thing is done in about 45-50 minutes. Seriously, you can just transfer the whole skillet full of food right into the preheated oven.

Then when done just put a trivet on the table and serve right in the pan. It looks pretty that way anyway. Quite frankly it makes it so much easier, so it’s a win win in my book. If we don’t have time to cook smoked chicken thighs this one is super easy to make and very few ingredients.

How do you know when bone-in thighs are done?

Of course oven baked chicken thighs need the internal temperature to be 165 degrees F to be safe to consume. You need to remove from the heat source and insert the thermometer into the thickest part to get the most accurate read.

Take a peek at our cast iron skillet care post to keep your pan lasting a long long time. Yes you can use another oven safe pan or pot to make this but I will tell you that a skillet like this is so versatile, I highly recommend using it to cook meats.

Our air fryer chicken thighs are quite amazing as well if you do have that countertop appliance. You get a really crispy skin outcome this way. And other similar recipes you would enjoy:

• Our pineapple chicken is super sweet, I like boneless skinless for that one so it can really soak in the juices and sauce.
• Spicy honey Instant Pot chicken cooks rather fast under high pressure and can be toned down in regards to the heat level.
• Use them in this slow cooker chicken and rice dish as a one pot bowl of yum.
• If you love our easy baked bone in chicken thighs, try our chicken soup in the crockpot too.

Want to use boneless chicken thighs, follow our baked teriyaki chicken thighs recipe here.

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