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These easy oven-baked zucchini chips are thin, crispy, and perfect for pairing with all your favorite dips!
There is so much you can do with zucchini, from Zucchini Boats to Zucchini Cakes. But I think these oven-baked zucchini chips might just be my favorite. Who knew you could turn zucchini into crispy chips for snacking?!
While you won’t mistake these for potato chips, they are an excellent swap for when you’re trying to cut back on carb-heavy snacks and work some extra veggies into your life. They’re paleo-friendly, keto, naturally gluten-free, vegan, and they pretty much fit perfectly into every possible diet since they’re only made with zucchini, oil, and salt.
The next time you find yourself with an abundance of zucchini to use up, you know what to do with it: make zucchini chips!
What You’ll Need
While you only need 3 ingredients for this recipe, you can also add seasonings, flavored salts, etc.
- Zucchini – Look for one that is large but not too large. The baseball-bat-sized zucchini you harvest at the end of August is not going to work here!
- Olive oil
- Kosher salt
How do you make thin sliced zucchini?
I highly recommend using a mandoline slicer; if yours has thickness settings, set it to 2, otherwise, aim for 1/8-inch. It’s very difficult to cut thin, uniform slices of zucchini with a knife.
How to Make Oven-Baked Zucchini Chips
This is one of those recipes that comes down to technique. Follow these instructions closely and you’ll have perfectly crisp zucchini chips!
Prepare. Preheat your oven to 225ºF and line two large baking sheets with silicone baking mats or parchment paper.
Blot the zucchini dry. After you slice your zucchini, place the slices on a sheet of paper towels. Place another paper towel on top and press down to absorb any excess liquid.
Oil and season the zucchini. Line the zucchini slices on the prepared baking sheet. Don’t overlap them, but they can be very close, as they’ll shrink when they bake. Brush the slices with oil, then sprinkle them with salt.
Bake. Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake the zucchini for 2+ hours, or until they start to brown, feel dry, and seem crisp.
Cool. Let the zucchini chips cool on the baking sheet, then serve.
Can you make zucchini chips in a dehydrator?
Yes, zucchini chips can be made in a dehydrator, but you’ll need to follow the directions for your food dehydrator to make them. This recipe was developed for making baked zucchini chips in the oven.
Tips for Success
Again: technique is everything here. These tips will help you nail it.
- Cut thin, uniform slices. Thinly sliced zucchini rounds are a must. Thick slices won’t get crispy, and if your slices are uneven, you’ll have some chips that are burnt while others are still soggy.
- Be conservative with the salt. Use less salt than you think; the zucchini slices will shrink in the oven, so they can easily get too salty.
- Don’t walk away. Once you’re nearing the 2-hour mark, you’ll need to keep a close eye on the chips to make sure they don’t burn.
- Don’t rush them. Bake the zucchini chips until you see that most liquid has cooked off. If you don’t do this, the zucchini will stick to the parchment paper or your chips will be soggy. You’ll also need to let the zucchini chips cool on the pan before removing them.
How to Store
Keep zucchini chips in an airtight container at room temperature for no more than 3 days.
Serving Suggestions
Here are some of my favorite dips for pairing with zucchini chips:
- Beet Hummus
- Homemade Tzatziki Dip
- Street Corn Hummus
- Herbed Tahini Spread
If you love zucchini chips, you may like these recipes with zucchini:
- Roasted vegetables
- Zucchini Turkey Meatballs
- Zucchini Noodle Cashew Stir Fry
- Zucchini Brownies
- Zucchini Chicken Meatballs
Easy Oven-Baked Zucchini Chips
Ingredients
- 1 large zucchini
- 2 tablespoon olive oil
- Kosher salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 225 °F (107 °C). Line two large baking sheets (I used two 17" baking sheets) with silicon baking mats or parchment paper.
- Slice your zucchini on a mandolin. Mine had 1, 2, or 3 for thickness and I used 2.1 large zucchini
- After you slice your zucchini, place the slices on a sheet of paper towels and take another paper towel and sandwich the zucchini slices and press on them. This helps draw out the liquid so it’ll cook a bit faster.
- Line up the zucchini slices on the prepared baking sheet tightly next to each other in a straight line, making sure not to overlap them.
- In a small bowl, pour your olive oil in and take a pastry brush to brush the olive oil on each zucchini slice.2 tablespoon olive oil
- Sprinkle salt throughout the baking sheet. Do NOT over-season, in fact, it’s better to use less salt initially because the slices will shrink; so if you over-season, it’ll be way too salty! You can always add more later.Kosher salt
- Bake for 2+ hours until they start to brown and aren’t soggy and are crisp.
- Let cool before removing and serving.
- Keep in an airtight container for no more than 3 days.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
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Can you use a air fryer for the chips
I haven’t tried it that way and I feel like it *might* be too strong/powerful and burn them. However, I know some air fryers come with a dehydrator option so that would work.
I hate most vegetables, but need to eat more. These are delicious! I used spray olive oil on the parchment, and on top of the slices, and also added a light sprinkle of garlic powder and my oven took a little more than 2 hours to crisp, but I could have eaten the while zucchini but I shared with hubby. Thanks for the idea!
What a great idea to use the spray. Much faster than brushing individually with the pastry brush. Thanks for sharing that.
If I don’t have enough baking pans what can I do with the left over cut up zucchini while I wait for the first batch??
Just let it hang out on paper towels or parchment paper
I made these. They were delicious but mine shrank to like smaller than dime size so two pans full was only a hand full of chips. Did I maybe cut the slices too thin?
It’s normal for them to shrink that much, especially if your zucchini has more liquid! You could try to make the slices slightly thicker next time but it might take longer to cook.
HI Julie, I found your recipe on Pinterest and I am going to try these zucchini chips. I printed your recipe.
I wanted a recipe not your life story to find the recipe.
it’s called a blog. the recipe is also free. just takes a little scrolling, which clearly you were capable of doing since you found the comments section to write something completely unnecessary. if you want straight recipes, go buy a cookbook.
@Julie Wampler, Julie: 1, Troll: 0!
@Julie Wampler, it’s YOUR recipe and blog. Ignore the trolls and let them scroll. on.by…..I’m making zucchini chips today ;)
Hi,
I am hoping to make these but am seeing two different calorie designations on your site. At the top of the recipe it states that 50 chips are 54 calories. In the nutrition facts below the recipe it states that 10 chips are 50 calories. I am hoping that 50 chips is 54 calories.
Hi, so sorry! The nutrition facts below are correct. Those are calculated by my nutritionist.
Hi. Made these and loved them. Cut them super thin. My advice… here in nyc there a ton of cheap veg places. Next time I’ll buy organic bc there’s basically one ingredient. Use end part (that attaches to the plant and you’d toss) as a handle. You’ll get a few exta chips. To extract water, I laid them out on a double paper towel them same on top, baking sheet on top of that filled with water to weigh it down. If you don’t extract the water, no amount of oil will crisp them. Finally, know your oven. Mine is a new fancy one but runs hot so I cooked at 200. Tiny bit of truffle oil at end – really, really good! Thanks.
My zucchini chips turned out great. A couple of comments: The zucchini slices shrink to 25% of their slicing size, so buy/grow big zucchinis. I baked them of a cookie grill as someone suggested so both sides were browned. That worked well except that the zucchini slices shrank so much that they fell through the holes in the cookie drying grills, so , again, buy big zucchinis. We sliced up 4 zucchinis and it made a pile of zucchinis slices. After baking 4 zucchinis we didn’t have enough for 4 people, which surprised us. We salted the zucchinis while baking and that worked out well. We will try this recipe again trying to tweak it into perfection!
Can you use an Air Fryer? Do you cook for less time in one if you do use it?
I’ve never tried this in the air fryer. My initial thoughts: it would burn too quickly.