An elegant French-inspired chicken dish easy enough to make on a weeknight, and show-stopping enough to serve to company!
See that?
That’s pure culinary enchantment, friends. And a perfect Valentine’s Day dinner idea. Because French food is automatically romantic and inviting.
This is an adaptation on a French classic: tender chicken nestled into a savory mustard and herb sauce. With prosciutto. A very Italian ingredient. Sooo, this is really more of a French-Italian fusion dish, but the prosciutto is important–it’s salty character really brings out all the flavors of the dish. Don’t have proscuitto? No worries, use bacon or pancetta instead.
If you like the flavor of mustard, you will really enjoy this dish because it uses both a classic dijon and a grainy mustard. The chicken gets coated in it and it’s also used in the sauce. Don’t worry, it’s not overpowering at all, though!
Thyme is another main ingredient here. I don’t cook with thyme very often, mostly because I never have it on hand, and because the dried version is overbearing to my pallette. In this case, the fresh thyme blended beautifully in the sauce, so if you have any reservations about using thyme, leave those aside and try the recipe as-is. I think you’ll love it!
A few more important notes about this dish:
- There are a few steps involved, but none of them are difficult, so don’t let the somewhat lengthy instructions below derail you from making this recipe. It’s a lot of “cook this in the pan, remove it, now add something else, remove it, now add it all back together”.
- I used a mixture of both chicken breasts and boneless skinless chicken thighs, but you can use what you want.
- You will need a skillet with a lid for this dish.
- Cooking nerd here, but one of my favorite steps in this recipe is deglazing the pan! It allows you to get all of the flavor off the bottom of the pan and into the sauce.
- If you can tolerate dairy, add 2 tablespoons at the end right before serving for a creamier sauce. Honestly, I didn’t miss it and don’t think it needed it, but I’ll leave it up to you!
- This dish is best served HOT and fresh!
Chicken with Mustard and Prosciutto
Ingredients:
For the chicken “marinade”:
- 2 lbs chicken (I used breasts and boneless, skinless thighs)
- 1/4 tsp smoked paprika (or sweet)
- 1/4 tsp sea salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
For the sauce:
- 1/2 cup diced prosciutto (or bacon, or pancetta)
- 1 Tbsp olive oil
- 1/2 cup diced onion
- 1 tsp fresh thyme, chopped
- 3/4 cup chicken broth (low-sodium)
- 2 Tbsp grainy mustard
1). In a large bowl, combine the chicken “marinade” ingredients well. Add the chicken and coat evenly in the mixture. Set aside.
2). Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the diced prosciutto, stirring frequently until it starts to crisp up and brown slightly. Remove from the skillet and put in an empty bowl.
3). In the same pan, add 1/2 tbsp olive oil over medium heat. Add the onions and stir until soft and translucent. Add the thyme and after a minute, remove from the skillet to the bowl with prosciutto.
4). To the same pan, add the other 1/2 tbsp olive oil over medium-high heat. Once hot, add the chicken for a few minutes until browned on one side, then flip and cook a few minutes more. Remove from the skillet onto an empty plate.
5). Time to deglaze the pan! Add the broth to the hot, empty pan and scrape all of the crispy brown bits off the bottom of the pan using a flat edged wooden spoon. Add the chicken, onions, and prosciutto back to the pan. Cover and cook on medium-low for 15 minutes. Be sure to turn the chicken a few times. Check to make sure it is cooked through before proceeding to step 6.
6). Remove the chicken from the pan to stir in the grainy mustard into the sauce. Add the chicken back to the pan, give it a few quick turns in the sauce, and serve!
Servings: 6. Approximate Nutritional Information per Serving: Calories: 246 Carbs: 2g Fat: 11g Protein: 38g Fiber: 0g Sugar: 1g Points+: 7 Recipe adapted from here. Adapted recipe courtesy of Audrey’s Apron.
Audrey's Apron 