If you’re talking fast-food chain tenders + nuggets, the difference will likely be the meat that the tenders/nuggets are made with. Chicken tenders are made with strips of breast meat, while nuggets can be made from different parts of the chicken that have been chopped and formed into a small round nugget. When it comes to OUR recipes, though, the main difference between tenders and nuggets is size and breading. Chicken tenders (sometimes called chicken strips) are long, thin strips of breast meat, while nuggets are smaller chunks of chicken breast meat. As far as the difference in breading goes, our tenders utilize cornflakes for crunch, while our nuggets are breaded more traditionally and are slightly less crunchy!