My husband loves chicken breast, but I’m not so into white meat. I’m just not as confident that they will turn out juicy but still be cooked through. I have a talent for overcooking the outside while undercooking the inside. Or I overcook the whole thing and end up with a dry slab of meat. I need a good recipe for chicken breasts to turn out well, and I’m hoping I have found one with this Creamy Garlic Chicken. I chose this recipe because I think we will both love it. Loads of creamy garlic sauce on anything has to be good!
This Creamy Garlic Chicken is dedicated to all of the gravy (and garlic!) lovers out there. Wait until you try this recipe. You’re going to want to make this every week.
The Ingredients
A quick check of my refrigerator and pantry revealed I had quite a few of the ingredients for this Creamy Garlic Chicken recipe. Most of them, in fact. I even had some leftover Parmesan cheese from the Walnut-Crusted Halibut in Lemon Wine Sauce I made not long ago. It wasn’t quite enough so I topped it off with a bit of pre-grated Parmesan (also leftover from another recipe).
My grocery list was short for this recipe: chicken breasts, heavy cream, and garlic. I usually don’t spend extra for peeled garlic cloves, but I did for this recipe. It calls for 10 whole garlic cloves, and I just knew I wouldn’t have the patience to peel them.
The Process
This recipe had a total time listed of 55 minutes, and I was very pleased that I came in just under that. Here’s how it went:
- 12 minutes to prep
- 40 minutes to cook
- 52 minutes total
This recipe specifically calls for mise en place, so I measured out all of the ingredients at the start. I tend to prep as I cook for slower moving recipes. It can make things hectic, though, so I was glad to have everything in place when I needed it.
Making the Chicken
The first part of this recipe is breading and searing the chicken. The 2 chicken breasts need to be cut into 4 cutlets before any of that can happen. Tip: You can save a little time and effort by purchasing cutlets if they are available.
Next, they had to be pounded thin. I placed all 4 cutlets into a gallon-size ziplock bag and pounded them with my meat mallet. It kept thing neat and prevented any splashing.
Once that was done, I seasoned and breaded the cutlets. I added them 2 at a time to a preheated 12″ skillet to cook for 4 minutes per side.
Making the Sauce
The first steps in the sauce call for the pan to be deglazed and the garlic cloves to be caramelized. I chose a light colored stainless steel skillet so I could see the color of the bits the chicken left on the bottom.
A dark pan, like my beloved cast-iron pan, would have made it impossible to see if they were burning.The bottom of the pan still got a bit dark, though, and I was worried it would make the sauce taste burnt. However, it ended up adding a nice smoky flavor I loved. Or maybe it was the garlic? Either way, yum!!
The rest of the sauce was slowly adding the liquids and cheese with a lot of stirring. The chicken was added back into the pan at the end to cook in the sauce for another 5 minutes. The flour breading really absorbed the garlic flavor and made the sauce cling to the chicken.
