Any dinner recipe that begins with "30 minutes" bumps to the top of my recipe list. There is such a feeling of relief when I know that dinner can be thrown together quickly and my kids won't "starve" to death during the process, because you know waiting for dinner to cook is the same thing as "starving."
I found this recipe on Pinterest (of course), and I have made it several times with great success. It is a great combination of sweet and sour that isn't too heavy. I LOVE lemon and chicken together so the little bits of lemon rind in the sauce are little pieces of flavor just exploding in your mouth...YUM! Plus, my husband isn't the biggest fan of chicken. I sort of burned him out on chicken when we were first married because it was cheap, and I knew how to make it. Now if I make chicken it has to be special and very full of flavor which this dish is.
The original recipe consists of a sweet glaze, but we like sauce in our house. To get the sauce, because we are saucy people, I used more lemons and brown sugar than the original recipe called for and a some chicken stock. The extra sauce was wonderful on the side of pasta we had, but wasn't too heavy. I hope you ENJOY!
30 Minute Lemon Brown Sugar Chicken
Recipe Source: Modified Slightly from Eat Live Run
2 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts
juice of 6 large lemons
1/2 cup chicken broth
3 T lemon zest
1 cup flour
2 tsp paprika
1 tsp sea salt
1.5 T canola oil
6 T brown sugar
Preheat oven to 350.
Very carefully cut your chicken breasts in half to make two thin pieces of chicken. Lay the pieces between two pieces of wax paper and pound with a meat mallet to make them about the same thickness all the way across. (Thin pieces of meat cook faster than thick pieces do).
Combine the flour, paprika and sea salt in a cake or pie pan. Drop each chicken breast in the mixture and toss to coat completely.
Heat the oil over medium high heat in a large oven proof skillet. Drop each chicken breast in the oil and brown on both sides (should take only about four minutes). Remove chicken breasts and keep warm on a plate.
Pour the lemon juice and chicken broth into the pan and stir to deglaze. Place the chicken back into the pan and sprinkle with the brown sugar and lemon zest. (If your pan isn't oven proof, use a casserole dish to finish baking the dish.)
Bake for thirty minutes, or until internal temperature reaches 165.
That looks so yummi!
ReplyDeleteI just made this for dinner tonight and it was YUMMY!!!!
ReplyDeleteYum!!!!Im sure ill enjoy preparing and serving it to my loved ones as much as i did reading your recipe :)
ReplyDeleteMaybe this is obvious, but do you sprinkle the brown sugar and lemon zest over the whole dish, or just over the chicken?
ReplyDeleteI just do it over the chicken, but either way would be fine.
ReplyDeleteThis is probably a stupid question... but what does T stand for? Teaspoon? Tablespoon?
ReplyDeleteP.S. - I don't cook a lot...
Capital T stands for Tablespoon. t or tsp is teaspoon :) Not a stupid question at all!
ReplyDeleteHow many chicken breasts would you estimate the recipe calls for? I usually just cook 2 so I am trying to figure out the ratio for ingredients. THank you!
ReplyDeleteJerseyGirl- For two pounds I typically use four chicken breasts of average size. Sometimes if the butcher block has really large pieces of chicken I use two or three. The only thing that will happen if you don't alter the other ingredients is you will have more sauce.
DeleteThis was really yummy, but I cut down on the time. I just cut my chicken breasts in half without pounding them. Then I browned them about 4-5 minutes on each side until cooked through (tested with a digital thermometer). I did put it in the oven for about 2 minutes just to let the sugar melt a bit since I'd preheated it just in case. Next time I'll probably just put the lid on after returning the chicken to the pan and sprinkling on the sugar and zest for a few minutes, thus eliminating the oven time altogether. I think I'll also half the sauce amount, since I seemed to have a lot (perhaps since I didn't bake it in the oven). Absolutely delicious! I paired it with chicken-flavored rice and broccoli. Yum!
ReplyDeleteSounds yummy and plan to cook, only question is calories or weight watcher points??
ReplyDeleteHi Diana, I have no ideas on the calories or weight watcher points. I don't figure calories on any of my dishes, nor do I have experience with the Weight Watcher program. I know there are a lot of online calculators where you can plug the information in and get the calorie estimates though.
ReplyDeletedoes your recipe (as shown) make the extra sauce?
ReplyDeleteLaura,
DeleteYes, the recipe as shown above will make extra sauce. ENJOY!
Jenn
I'm not sure what went wrong but I made this tonight and it was super sour. I had to add a lot more sugar and honey and still the lemon was just way overpowering.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous, I'm sorry to hear that your chicken was too sour and overpowering. There can be a few reasons. I have noticed that sometimes my lemon is very strong. I think it has to do with the kind of lemons, how ripe they are, how much juice is in them. Also, if you get any of the white part your lemon flavor will be full of bitterness.
DeleteDid you cut the lemon juice with chicken stock, and use brown sugar? Another option if you decide to try it in the future would be to use less lemon to suit your tastes better.
Jenn
Awesome! Thank you so much. My husband was so burned out on the same ol' chicken recipes I make. There are a lot so I figured I had made them all. This came out great. Whole new flavor. I put the breast on a bed of raw spinach before I put it in the oven. Served it on white rice. GREAT!perhaps a bit of garlic in the pan w/oil while frying.
ReplyDeleteThis was absolutely delicious! My kids and husband loved it. They said it was a keeper and to make it again.
ReplyDelete