Chicken with Mustard Pan Sauce

There’s only a few chicken recipes featured on my blog and when I came across this one I thought it be the perfect addition.  I’ve made fish recipes with a honey mustard glaze so why not a chicken one?  And this one involves cooking with wine, gotta love that!

I made a few modifications to the original recipe.  It called for chicken breasts with skin, but skinless chicken breasts are much healthier and I didn’t think it would change the taste of the recipe that much.  Using skinless chicken breasts also saves time when making this dish.  How so?  The breasts with skin need to be cooked in the skillet and then baked.  With skinless chicken breasts, however, I found you can get everything accomplished in one step; no need for baking as well.  I also discovered I had all the ingredients for this dish except whole-grain mustard.  Whole-grain mustard is a course mustard.  I decided that instead of buying a new jar of mustard I would use the deli style mustard we already had since it’s course and has a lot of texture. 

Assembling this dish is pretty easy.  After the chicken breasts are fully cooked and set aside, the mustard sauce can be prepared.  Since wine is used in the sauce, if you don’t drink wine frequently or don’t want to open a bottle and drink what’s left, buy miniature wine bottles instead.  Every grocery store carries these.  They’re sold in 4 packs and are for individual servings.  Each mini bottle has about 1 to 1 ½ cups.  They’re the perfect size for cooking and I think the quality is better than the ‘cooking wine’ that’s sold in the cooking aisles.

While I was cooking, my husband commented a few times (from another room even!) on how amazing it smelled.   When we sat down and took our first bite, we both agreed that the chicken was good.   The sauce had a nice savory flavor, but I was expecting a sweeter taste, maybe because that’s what I’m used to when I’ve had mustard sauces.  I think next time I may try using honey dijon mustard to give it that sweet flavor.  What I love about this dish is that’s perfect for a weeknight dinner since it only takes 20 minutes to make.  With all that extra time you can make a nice side dish to go with the chicken.  One side dish that pairs very nicely with this meal (that I’ve made many times) is Roasted Zucchini, Mushrooms, & Onions (recipe #309788 by Lorrie in Montreal, food.com).  Enjoy!

Chicken with Mustard Pan Sauce

Adapted from Food Network Kitchens Favorites Recipesby Foodnetwork Kitchens (Amazon affiliate link)

Serves 4

Prep time: 5 mins.

Total time: 20 mins.

Ingredients:

• 4 boneless chicken breasts
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 cup white wine
• 1 ½ cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons water
• 2 tablespoons whole-grain mustard
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter (optional)
• fresh thyme (optional)
• kosher salt
• black pepper

Directions:

1. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. 
2. Season chicken breasts all over with salt and pepper.
3. Lay chicken breasts in the pan and cook for approximately 8-10 minutes.  To cook evenly, turn chicken over after 5 minutes of cooking.
4. Once cooked, transfer chicken to a plate and keep warm. 
5. Pour wine into the hot skillet.  Use a spoon to scrape any browned bits in the bottom of the pan.  Boil until almost all the wine has evaporated (approximately 3 minutes).  At this point the consistency will be syrup-like. 
6. Add the broth and bring to a boil.  A few sprigs of fresh thyme (optional) can also be added at this point.
7. Mix the flour and water together to make a thin paste.  Whisk the flour mixture and mustard into the broth and boil until the sauce thickens (approximately 1-2 minutes).
8. To give the sauce a little richness (optional), add the butter.  Whisk until butter has melted and is blended into the sauce. 
9. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
10. Place chicken on a plate and pour sauce on top before serving.