Honey Garlic Chicken is an epic 12 minute chicken breast recipe with a magic 5 ingredient Honey Garlic Sauce! This is a terrific back pocket quick dinner idea for busy nights that’s made with pantry staples. It’s quite amazing how so few ingredients can transform into such a tasty sauce for chicken!
BONUS: This can be made with any protein – beef, pork, lamb, shrimp/prawns, even tofu!
Honey Garlic Chicken Breast
This sauce for chicken breast is a variation of my Honey Garlic Salmon which has been popular with readers for many years.
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. 😎)
Terrific quick chicken breast recipe
Though I personally have a preference for chicken thighs over chicken breast (better flavour, juicier!), I find myself putting chicken breast in my shopping trolley week after week.
Thus over the years, I’ve built up a wide variety of quick and easy chicken breast recipes – and this Honey Garlic Chicken is one of my favourite quick dinners that I find myself making over and over again.
What you need
See? I told you that you’d have everything! 😉
How to make Honey Garlic Chicken Breast
Split chicken breast in half – so 2 breasts makes 4 pieces;
Dust chicken with flour (gives the chicken a slight crust so the sauce clings to it better!)
Sear chicken, add butter, garlic, vinegar, soy sauce, honey.
Simmer until the sauce thickens. Turn chicken to coat in the amazing honey garlic sauce.
And THAT’S IT!
Want to BBQ it? Use this Grilled Honey Soy Chicken recipe instead.
Notice how the sauce is clinging to the surface? That’s because we dusted the chicken with flour so when it’s pan fried, it creates a crust.
What to serve with Honey Garlic Chicken Breast
There’s enough sauce to drizzle over veggies and soak into rice or whatever you serve it with. The flavour is strong enough such that you don’t need loads – a bit goes a long way!
It’s pictured above with Cauliflower Rice (tossed with a squeeze of lemon, parsley, salt and pepper) with Cucumber Salad on the side.
Even though it’s got soy sauce in the Honey Garlic Sauce, this doesn’t taste specifically Asian-y. But it’s versatile enough that it will go just as well with Fried Rice as it will with a Macaroni Salad or even Mac and Cheese. Yes really! Try it once and you’ll understand (it only takes 12 minutes, you’ve got the time!!) – Nagi x
Honey Garlic Chicken breast recipe
WATCH HOW TO MAKE IT
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Honey Garlic Chicken Breast
Ingredients
- 500g / 1 lb chicken breast , boneless and skinless (2 pieces)
- Salt and pepper
- 1/4 cup flour (Note 1)
- 3 1/2 tbsp (50g) unsalted butter (or 2 1/2 tbsp olive oil)
- 2 garlic cloves , minced
- 1 1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar (or white or other clear vinegar)
- 1 tbsp soy sauce , light or all purpose (Note 2)
- 1/3 cup honey (or maple syrup)
Instructions
- Cut the breasts in half horizontally to create 4 steaks in total. Sprinkle each side with salt and pepper.
- Place flour in a shallow dish. Coat chicken in flour and shake off excess.
- Melt most of the butter in a large skillet over high heat – hold back about 1 tsp for later.
- Place chicken in skillet and cook for 2 – 3 minutes until golden. Turn and cook the other side for 1 minute.
- Turn heat down slightly to medium high.
- Make a bit of room in the pan and add garlic and top with remaining dab of butter. Stir garlic briefly once butter melts.
- Add vinegar, soy sauce and honey. Stir / shake pan to combine. Bring sauce to simmer, then simmer for 1 minute or until slightly thickened.
- Turn chicken to coat in sauce. If the sauce gets too thick, add a touch of water and stir.
- Remove from stove immediately. Place chicken on plates and drizzle over remaining sauce.
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
Honey Garlic Chicken breast recipe originally published February 2018, it has since been improved with new photos and video but no change to recipe (I wouldn’t dare, readers love it as it is!).
More quick and easy chicken breast recipes
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!
You know it’s good when you look over to see your husband licking his plate at the end of a meal lol. Thanks for another wonderful recipe.
Absolutely delicious and so easy to make! Very hard to please all of my 5 children but We all loved it! My daughter turned 10 today and she chose this recipe! Great choice 👌🏻 A new family fav! Thanks for sharing xx
Hi,
You say “click on the heart, to save the recipe” Where is the hart on this page that I need to click? I have lots of recipes I want to save but can never see a heart on the recipe page!
Hi Stuart, It’s at the bottom right of the page where the flying hearts usually pop out from 🙂
Only used light olive oil to cook this simple dish with and it still turned out superb. Will definitely make it again but with a little less honey for less sweetness and calories.
Really really good dish! Family loved it.
How much oil should I use? Most of the leftover sauce was just 80% oil and unusable.
OMG, I saved this recipe a while back. I needed something quick last night and thought of you recipe, my husband and I fell in love with it the chicken was so tender and moist. It as become one of my go to for a quick weeknight dinner.
Thank you so much for sharing.
Wahoo!!! That’s great Marie!! N x
Great dish, sauce is amazing and really compliments the chicken. Made it twice already and will again this weekend when brother and sister in law visits. Thanks
I JUST found your page and I can’t wait to try so many of these recipes. So many of these are recipes that I think my somewhat picky family will gobble up. Your step by step instructions and instructional pics are amazing. I’m so excited to get started!
this was a big hit on our vacation, we enjoyed it as much as our friends did. I’m cooking it again today. You are my favorite chef Nagi. I am a confident cook now, thanks to you. I enjoy reading your posts, love and enjoy your style of writing!
So delicious – both my husband and I loved it. The chicken was tender and flavorful. I served it with coconut and brown bean rice and it was a hit! Will definitely make again.
Really good!
Delicious! Recipe is definitely a keeper.
I wanted chicken for my family dinner, but I had know idea how to cook it or really how to cook chicken in general,then I found this. It was really simple and it came out great, which is surprising because everything I cook turns out bad. My family loved it and my little brother, who barley eats meat willingly, actually eat two WHOLE pieces of chicken. I highly recommend this for an easy but impressive meal for the family.
Wow this so good and super easy!!! Definitely added to my favorites, thank you!!
Fam LOVED IT including me & can def see me using the sauce with a lot of things!!
Really good & easy!!
Thanks!!
I made this for dinner tonight and holy cow that was DELICIOUS. The sauce is absolutely amazing and Im glad I doubled it because I put that all over my plate!!!
Made this tonight, with a few minor changes. I cut the chicken into smaller pieces, dredged in flour, dipped in egg, then flour again. Lightly deep-frying until golden. Made the sauce separately, (tripling the recipe due to the amount I was making) and added a little brown sugar. I tossed the chicken in the sauce and served with lo mein stir fry and it was DELICIOUS. So simple. The only change I will make next time is to swap rice vinegar for the apple cider. I think this would give it a more authentic taste. Thanks for the simple recipe, it was a hit!
This has become one of my go to meals. My family absolutely love it. I make it using chicken tenders (I’m not great at splitting the chicken breast). I also double up on the sauce.
Wonderful and quick. I will definitely make again, but will probably double the sauce #gravylover
I totally understand that Penny – I’m all for extra sauce!! N X