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!
Thank you for this recipe. My family loved it! My meals went from below average to DELICIOUS. Keep them coming!
it was surprisingly really good, and so easy to make! i’ve had garlic soy chicken cravings all week since my fav Korean restaurant stopped delivering and decided to do something about it, and every with my terrible track record in the kitchen, it came out amazing! 100% recommend, thanks so much Nagi!
😍So easy & yummy. I always headache with what to cook with my chicken breast. This recipe make the chicken breast meat tender & juicy😋😋. My family love this so much! Tq Nagi.
This is sooo good!!! I will say after reading some reviews I doubled the sauce recipe so there was plenty.
Delicious AF!
Nagi,
Thank you very much!
You have literally thought me how to cook! your recipes are so easy to follow! Each page is greatly laid out. A short intro to the dish, Some notes on why its so good. Picture of ingredients, whats good to serve it with. The short demo videos are massively helpful.
I love the “how many servings slider.” Detailed ingredients list. Very clear instructions, including times. Also, I love the notes at the end, I actually learn a lot from them.
I never cooked before this summer. (I’m 27! 😬)
Cooked a meal from your website every week over the summer for my parents, and each one was a knock out! even better than I’ve had in restaurants.
How you could take me from not being able to cook, to cooking amazing food is just incredible!
Thank you, to you and Dozer
I couldn’t have agreed more.
Every Picture makes the food look so delicious too! 😋
I’m not the type of person who cooks often. I loved that this recipe was simple. The only thing I would say is to not try to brown the chicken in butter, it burns. Also, when I make next time, I am going to cut the chicken into chunks, it cooks faster. The sauce has an amazing flavor but since it is made with honey it reduces and isn’t much of a “sauce” so next time I make I am going to double the ingredients. I served over plain white rice. Tasted AMAZING !
My first visit to your website & I hit a homerun for dinner tonight with this recipe!! Definitely will make again!
This was ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS!!! This is definitely a keeper recipe. Easy to make and soooo good! Thank you for sharing. I made no changes at all to the recipe. You have to try this one for sure.
So easy and so yummy! Even my picky 7 year old gobbles this recipe up! I always at least double this recipe, one of my go to’s… I’d even serve it to guests!
Wahoo! Winner winner chicken dinner!! N x
So easy and so yummy! Even my picky 7 gobbles this recipe up! I always at least double this recipe, one of my go to’s… I’d even serve it to guests!
Quick & SO delicious!! I will definitely make this again!!
I have a large family is it possible to bake this recipe too?
My family loved this. Thank you it always feels great to make something so good and shared with loved ones.
Thanks Nagi, quick and easy and delicious, definitely a make again.
That’s great to hear Robyn! N x
Thank you! This recipe was delicious! My family loved it and I will definitely make it again!
Delicious, quick, and easy! I didn’t have soy sauce so I used terriaki. The taste was faboulous; not overly sweet and the finished product was as delicious to the eyes as it was on the tongue!
Omg… this was definitely the tastiest chicken I’ve personally made. I’d give it more stars if I could!! I also added brown sugar and red chili flakes to mine. But ugh! It would have been good either way
Hi Nagi, this might sound like a silly question but is it possible to freeze the chicken once cooked please? (Living alone means trying to freeze extra servings of most things that I cook)
Yummmmo!! Even though I managed to overcook the chicken, it still tasted lovely. I will definitely make it again, but won’t overcook it next time. My son loved it – & he’s fussy. Thanks again Nagi
This is now going to be on our weekly meal rotation. So quick, so easy, the perfect Mid-week meal. Loved the simple cucumber salad too. Wonderful combination. Thank you again Nagi xo