Honey Garlic Chicken is an epic 12 minute dinner with a 5 ingredient Sauce made using pantry staples. Juicy seared chicken breast smothered in the most incredible Honey Garlic Sauce, this is a brilliant back pocket recipe for busy nights!
Another addition to my 15 Minute Meals collection! This Honey Garlic Chicken is long overdue. The Sauce in this is a variation of my Honey Garlic Salmon which I first shared way back when I started this website, and similar to the dipping sauce for the ever popular Truly Crispy Baked Wings (no false promises here, these truly come out like they were fried!).
If I were ever to do a summary of my top 5 Most Used Sauces, Honey Garlic Sauce would probably be right at the top of the list. I love it because it requires so few ingredients that are pantry staples, and when simmered with a seared protein in a skillet so it becomes all bubbly and syrupy…. oh WOW.
It’s just DA BOMB!!! ( <– Who talks like that at my age???! I do. Only in extenuating circumstances. Excitement over crazy delicious secret-weapon sauce falls under this category.😎)
One of the reasons I think you will grow to love this recipe as much as I do is how forgiving it is. Though the recipe reads with measurements of a tablespoon of this and that, this is one where approximation works just fine. OK, so if you accidentally pour in half a bottle of soy sauce, then it will be a tad salty. 😂 But as long as it’s roughly the amount called for in the recipe, it’s going to be delish, and also it’s easy to adjust the sauce right at the end if you think the balance is out.
So unlike many recipes where I measure out the sauce ingredients before I turn on the stove, for this one I just put the bottles on the bench and measure the ingredients out straight into the pan. With the honey, I don’t even bother doing that – I squeeze it straight into the pan. 😇
The chicken in this recipe is dusted with flour before searing, and while it is an optional step, I really do encourage you to do this. The flour creates a crust that the sauce can cling to, so the chicken is smothered with the sauce. If you just sear plain chicken, the sauce just sort of slips off – which is fine, you can scoop it up with each bite. But it’s even better when the sauce is clinging to the chicken!
There’s enough Honey Garlic Sauce to squidge your veggies into as well as drizzling over your rice or mopping up with a bread roll. For a super quick meal, rinse some broccolini or other similar shaped vegetables under the tap, shake off excess water but don’t dry, wrap in cling wrap and microwave for 1 1/2 minutes. Remove using tea towels and unwrap carefully straight away.
My anti-cooking grandmother taught me this lazy veggie steaming trick. I know it’s not exactly environmentally friendly, but this no-washing-up perfectly steamed vegetables method is used frequently in the RecipeTin kitchen! – Nagi x
- 500 g / 1 lb chicken breast , boneless and skinless (2 pieces)
- Salt and pepper
- 1/4 cup / 60g flour (Note 1)
- 50 g / 3.5 tbsp unsalted butter (or 2 1/2 tbsp olive oil)
- 2 garlic cloves , minced
- 1 1/2 tbsp cider vinegar (or white or other clear vinegar)
- 1 tbsp light soy sauce (or all purpose, Note 2)
- 1/3 cup / 90g honey (or maple syrup)
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Cut the breasts in half horizontally to create 4 steaks in total. Sprinkle each side with salt and pepper.
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Place flour in a shallow dish. Coat chicken in flour and shake off excess.
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Melt most of the butter in a large skillet over high heat - hold back about 1 tsp for later.
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Place chicken in skillet and cook for 2 - 3 minutes until golden.
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Turn and cook the other side for 1 minute.
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Turn heat down slightly to medium high.
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Make a bit of room in the pan and add garlic and top with remaining dab of butter. Stir garlic briefly once butter melts.
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Add vinegar, soy sauce and honey. Stir / shake pan to combine. Bring sauce to simmer, then simmer for 1 minute or until slightly thickened.
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Turn chicken to coat in sauce. If the sauce gets too thick, add a touch of water and stir.
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Remove from stove immediately. Place chicken on plates and drizzle over remaining sauce.
1. Make this gluten free by using cornflour / cornstarch instead. It won't brown quite as evenly but once covered in sauce, you won't know the difference.
2. Light or all purpose soy sauce is suitable for this recipe. I don't recommend using Dark Soy Sauce (flavour will dominate).
3. Nutrition per serving, assuming you scrape every drop of Sauce from the pan, and why wouldn't you? 🙂
WATCH HOW TO MAKE IT
LIFE OF DOZER
The fish down at the beach taunt Dozer endlessly, splashing around and leaping out of the water. Sometimes he’ll be in the water swimming non stop chasing fish for an hour! It’s brilliant – no effort required on my part. 😎
I’m trying your recipe with molasses, garlic salt, rosemary olive oil and a splash of lemon juice. No idea what it’ll taste like so we will see!
It will be great! Just squeeze more lemon over at the end if it’s too sweet 🙂 N x
This is very good and very easy. I hardly cook, I started to cook because of my new diet, and for someone who just started to cook, I give this five stars! It was easy and simple and delicious. I brought some to work with me and all four of my co-workers enjoyed the chicken. Thank-You Nagi can’t wait to try more recipes of yours.
Very delicious dish and so easy to make. Nagi you have been a lifesaver when it comes to cooking. I am enjoying cooking again and can’t wait to have a look each day for something new to cook.
I have made so many of your recipes now and every single one of them has been absolutely delicious.
Thank you for all your effort and making these available to us. You are an extremely talented women. xo
🙂
Thank you for the compliment Mihi! And thank you for trying my recipes! N xx
Hi Nagi,
This recipe is Simple and Deliciooouus 👍👍👍,
i put 8 cloves of garlic and half tbs chilli flakes yummy.
Love the simple of your recipe and all the ingredients so easy to get.
Thank you😉
8 CLOVES!!! 😳😳😳 😂😂😂
I made this recipe and my kids are it all and asked that I make it more often.
Thank you
Made this for dinner tonight, and it was a hit. Definitely a keeper for quick and easy weeknight meals. May add some chilli flakes next time.
Glad you enjoyed this Jenny!!! Thank you for taking the time to leave feedback! N x
We had this for dinner tonight. It got rave reviews! My tweaks included cooking in sesame oil for the flavor, adding more garlic, and some red pepper flakes for some nice heat.
I’m glad you enjoyed this Kathy! Thank you for letting me know 🙂 N x
Made this tonight. My hubby was helping make dinner because my back is out. He did great. He was surprised how easy and super quick it turned out. I tried rice wine vinegar and it didn’t work. Well I dug out the cider vinegar and it gave it a nice essence. My husband gave it a 10.
He would gladly make it again. I’m going to try with shrimp next time.
Ooh yes to shrimp! It will be amazing with shrimp!! N xx
Thanks for this easy to follow, easy ingredients & delicious recipe .
I am counting protein, fats and carbs ony nutrition plan. One serving seems to have a lot of protein. A 4oz piece of boneless chicken breast has 25 grams of protein. Where does the other 12 grams of protein come from?
Hi Jean! The nutrition service I use says there is 35g per 125g piece of breast 🙂 N x
I always get nervous trying new recipes because I have a picky audience. This was delicious and will go right into our rotation of favorites. We had this with roasted zucchini, tomatoes and corn and brown rice. So good and easy enough that I can do it on a week night! Night time I might add a pinch of red pepper flakes and sesame seeds! Thanks! I’m a new fan!
Glad you enjoyed it Erin!! Thanks for letting me know! N x
This recipe was delicious, FAST, and easy to follow especially because of the video! I like everything saucy so I doubled the sauce recipe. I will be cooking this again in the future.
That’s great to hear DJ!! Thanks for letting me know you enjoyed it! N x
Love moist chicken… Will try this this week! Thank you!
Hope you tried it… and LOVED IT Judy! 🙂 N x
Hi ,
I made this last night. It was too good. The way u describe it , makes it so easy!
I have become a fan of yours!
Thanks and Regards
Poonam
Wonderful to hear Poonam! Thank you for letting me know you enjoyed this – N x
Helloo
Is it really enough with 5minutes in total to get chicken breast ‘ well done’???
Thxxx love ur recipes😘😘
The chicken breasts were cut in half to make them thinner.
You’re right Nagi – it is definitely DA BOMB! So delicious! I inhaled it! Thank you! X
Wonderful! So glad you enjoyed this Danielle, thanks for letting me know! N x
I just made this for lunch and it was soooo good. I used maple sirup instead of honey and eyeballed soy sauce and white balsamic vinegar. I didn’t dredge the chicken in flower because I like my sauces a bit runnier (and to be honest I forgot about it too), but the sauce still thickened and coated the meat nicely. It was so delicious. Juicy meat, great sweet and savoury sauce. This will be my new go-to recipe whenever I want something quick and healthy. Will also try this with salmon or other fish. As as side, I had steamed kohlrabi with parsley. This made it low-carb too! Thanks for your amazing recipes!
Wonderful! So glad you enjoyed this Barb, thanks for letting me know! N x
Made this last night…AMAZING!! Definitely need to double the sauce, I did and it was enough to pour on the rice! YUMMY!!! This will be on the menu for years to come!
Wonderful! So glad you enjoyed this Brenda, thanks for letting me know! N x
Tried this out for the first time tonight. HUGE hit. I used 3 chicken breasts and probably doubled the sauce recipe…while it was cooking both my teenage boys started satelliting the kitchen. I added some red pepper flakes, and some green onions at the end. Everyone agreed this is a keeper. Thanks for sharing!!! Perfect Monday dinner after work recipe.
Wonderful to hear Lisa! Thank you for letting me know you enjoyed this – N x
Thinking about substituting dry white wine for the vinegar next time. Thoughts? I bet it would be yummy! I tried it as written, and when I asked my husband how he liked it on a scale of 1 – 10 — he gave it a ten!!
Hi Diane! What I would do is deglaze the pan with white wine before adding the Sauce, still using the vinegar 🙂 YUM! N xx