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This Chicken and Green Beans Sheet Pan Meal is an easy and delicious dinner that the whole family is going to love! And this tasty one-pan meal with roasted lemon chicken and green beans is low in carbs, gluten-free and dairy-free!
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This Chicken and Green Beans Sheet Pan Meal is a recipe I’ve made over and over, and I’m reminding you about this favorite dinner idea for Friday Favorites this week. And this combination is such a winner for an easy family-friendly roasted lemon chicken dinner!
And I love roasted green beans so much that it’s no surprise I’d decide to use green beans with chicken in a sheet pan meal! When I tested out this recipe with Kara, we used a few techniques that really added flavor to the chicken and green beans; read about those below.
If you can find a grocer that does a good job of trimming the chicken thighs, that will make this easier to prepare, and in Utah Harmons does a beautiful job with chicken, so that’s where I got the beautifully-trimmed chicken you see in these photos. (No, they are not paying me to say that.)
What ingredients do you need for this recipe?
(This is only a list of ingredients; please scroll down for complete printable recipe. Or if you use the JUMP TO RECIPE link at the top of the page, it will take you directly to the complete recipe.)
- large bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
- fresh green beans
- extra-virgin Olive Oil (affiliate link)
- fresh-squeezed lemon juice, I used my fresh-frozen lemon juice for some of the juice
- Spike Seasoning (affiliate link), or use another all-purpose seasoning blend that’s good on chicken
- Dried Thyme (affiliate link)
- salt and fresh ground pepper to taste
- zest of one lemon
What adds flavor to the Chicken and Green Beans meal?
The techniques that added so much flavor to this recipe include marinating the chicken for a little while before you cook it, crisping the beans in ice water while the chicken marinates, and brushing the beans with some reserved marinade with lemon zest added when we added them to the sheet pan.
Can you make this sheet pan meal with chicken breasts?
I haven’t tried making the chicken and green beans sheet pan meal with chicken breasts. But if you use bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts I think it would work. For thicker chicken breasts, I’d use an instant-read meat thermometer (affiliate link) to be sure the chicken has reached the safe cooking temperature of 165F/75C. Smaller chicken breasts will be closer to the cooking time I used for chicken thighs.
How low in carbs is this chicken and green beans meal?
This delicious sheet pan meal with lemon chicken and green beans has only about 6 net carbs per serving!
Want More Easy Sheet Pan Meals?
Check out 40 Low-Carb and Keto Sheet Pan Meals for even more tasty ideas for sheet pan meals!
How to make Lemon Chicken and Green Beans Sheet Pan Meal:
(This is only a summary of the steps for the recipe; please scroll down for complete printable recipe. Or if you use the JUMP TO RECIPE link at the top of the page, it will take you directly to the complete recipe.)
- Mix olive oil, lemon juice, dried thyme, Spike Seasoning or another another all-purpose seasoning that’s good with chicken, salt, and pepper to make the marinade.
- If you find large chicken thighs, just use 4 chicken thighs; if they are smaller I’d use 6-8 chicken thighs to make four servings. Trim chicken thighs to remove undesirable parts.
- Save 3 tablespoons of the marinade for later. Put the rest of the marinade in a Ziploc bag with the chicken thighs and let chicken marinate 30 minutes in the fridge (or longer if you have time.)
- While chicken marinates, soak green beans in the salad spinner in ice water to crisp them.
- After 30 minutes, preheat the oven to 425F/220C, drain chicken, and let the chicken come to room temperature while the oven heats.
- Put chicken on sheet pan and roast chicken 20 minutes.
- Stir the lemon zest into the reserved marinade.
- Push the chicken over to the edge of the sheet pan and add the beans; then brush beans with the reserved marinade with the lemon zest added and bake 20 minutes more.
- You might check with an instant-read meat thermometer (affiliate link) to be sure the chicken has reached the safe cooking temperature of 165F/75C if your chicken pieces are thick.
- Serve hot and enjoy.
Make it a Low-Carb meal:
This chicken and green beans meal would be great with Easy Cauliflower Rice, Air Fryer Peppers and Onions, Twice-Baked Cauliflower, Cucumber Salad with Avocado and Feta, or Cucumbers Caesar for a delicious low-carb meal.
More Low-Carb Chicken for Dinner:
Ingredients
Ingredients:
- 4 very large large bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs (see notes)
- 1 lb. fresh green beans
Marinade/Cooking Sauce Ingredients:
- 1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/3 cup lemon juice (see notes)
- 2 tsp. Spike Seasoning (or use another all-purpose seasoning blend that’s good on chicken)
- 1/2 tsp. dried thyme
- salt and fresh ground pepper to taste
- zest of one lemon
Instructions
- Trim all chicken pieces well, leaving some skin covering the top of the piece, but removing most of the skin and extra fat deposits on the back side. (I use kitchen shears (affiliate link) to do this, but if you can find a store where the chicken is well-trimmed when you buy it, that makes it a lot easier.)
- Mix olive oil, lemon juice, Spike Seasoning, dried thyme, salt, and pepper to make the marinade.
- Reserve 3 tablespoons of marinade (to be mixed with the lemon zest later) and put the chicken and rest of the marinade in a Ziploc bag or plastic container with a snap-tight lid.
- Let chicken marinate in the fridge for 30 minutes (or longer if you have time.)
- While chicken marinates, trim both ends of the green beans and put beans in ice water to crisp the beans. I do this in the salad spinner (affiliate link) so it’s easy to spin beans dry but you can crisp beans in a bowl of ice water and drain in a colander if you don’t have a salad spinner.
- When you’re ready to cook, drain the chicken, discard that marinade, and put chicken on a large baking sheet that you’ve sprayed with non-stick spray. Let chicken come to room temperature while you preheat the oven to 425F/220C.
- When the oven is ready, roast the chicken for 20 minutes.
- While chicken cooks, zest the lemon (or use the lemon zest you got earlier if you were using fresh lemons for juice). Add lemon zest to the reserved marinade.
- After 20 minutes, take chicken out of the oven and push it over to the edges of the baking sheet to make room for the beans. Put beans on the baking sheet and brush with the reserved marinade with the lemon zest added.
- Cook the chicken and beans for 20 minutes more. If your chicken pieces are large, you might want to test with an instant-read meat thermometer (affiliate link) to be sure the chicken has reached the safe temperature of 165F/75C. Serve hot.
Notes
If you find chicken thighs that don’t seem large enough to be one serving, use 6-8 smaller chicken thighs.
Be sure to zest one lemon first before you juice it. I used my fresh-frozen lemon juice for part of the juice.
I used Spike Seasoning (affiliate link), but any all purpose seasoning will work.
This recipe created by Kalyn and Kara.
Nutrition Information
Yield
4
Serving Size
1
Amount Per Serving
Calories 269Total Fat 23gSaturated Fat 3.9gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 18.1gCholesterol 42mgSodium 974mgCarbohydrates 9.8gFiber 3.6gSugar 4gProtein 9.9g
Nutrition information is automatically calculated by the Recipe Plug-In I am using. I am not a nutritionist and cannot guarantee 100% accuracy, since many variables affect those calculations.
Low-Carb Diet / Low-Glycemic Diet / South Beach Diet Suggestions:
This tasty Chicken and Green Beans Sheet Pan Meal is low-carb, Keto, gluten-free, and dairy-free. Personally I would eat it for the original South Beach Diet if the chicken was well-trimmed, although if you’re following the letter of the law South Beach doesn’t recommend chicken thighs.
Find More Recipes Like This One:
Check out Sheet Pan Meals for more recipes like this one! Use the Diet Type Index to find more recipes suitable for a specific eating plan. You might also like to follow Kalyn’s Kitchen on Pinterest, on Facebook, on Instagram, on TikTok, or on YouTube to see all the good recipes I’m sharing there.
Historical Notes for this Recipe:
This recipe for a sheet pan meal with chicken and green beans was posted in 2016. It was last updated with more information in 2024.
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