Creamy Garlic Chicken

You absolutely won’t believe how delicious this creamy garlic chicken recipe is. With little besides kitchen staples, you have a decadent weeknight dinner that’s also fit for company!

Ingredients

This decadently delicious meal is made with ingredients you likely have on hand for the most part. A few spices and seasonings along with flour, olive oil, and butter. Chicken broth and (optional) white wine. And, of course, plenty of garlic. Grab some chicken breasts, cream, and Parmesan cheese, and you’ve got dinner.

I played around with a few versions of this recipe and finally settled on this one. One of the things I like about it is that the garlic comes from two sources – garlic powder on the chicken and whole cloves of garlic in the sauce. Ten to twelve cloves, in fact. You might think that’s a lot, but they lose their bite and cook to a wonderfully mellow garlicky flavor while they simmer in the sauce.

Another thing that I like about my version is that the sauce is finished with a little Parmesan cheese. It helps give the cream more dimension, becoming almost an alfredo sauce. 

Can I Use Chicken Thighs Instead?

If you’d like to use chicken thighs instead of breasts, that totally works and, like with my Easy Garlic Butter Chicken, not much about the recipe has to change. Use boneless skinless chicken thighs and unroll each thigh so that it is a flat cutlet. You probably won’t need to pound them thinner, just cook them unrolled like that. They will possibly take a minute longer per side to cook through. Everything else in the recipe is the same.

Substitution For White Wine

The recipe below says to use 1 cup of chicken broth or 3/4 cup chicken broth + 1/4 cup of dry white wine. So you can just use chicken broth if you don’t want to use any wine. However, the other thing that you can do is add a tiny bit of acidity to the chicken broth, which will mimic the acidity of the wine, and add a bit more complexity to the sauce.

To do so, pour 1 cup of chicken broth into a bowl. Stir in 2 teaspoons of lemon juice or white wine vinegar.

Substitution for Cream

I know that a lot of people don’t like to cook with cream, or don’t tend to have it on hand. If that’s you, there are alternatives you can use. The thing to know about when trying to substitute something in for cream, is that a lot of dairy products can curdle if heated to a high heat and/or if the are in contact with acidic ingredients. The issue is the amount of fat in the dairy. Dairy with higher amounts of fat are less likely to curdle. The curdling doesn’t make the dish unsafe to eat, it just looks bad. We therefore want to avoid it, but if it happens, it’s not the end of the world.

In this case, the best substitute for the cream is sour cream. Add a cup of sour cream and follow the recipe as written. I just would probably not use the wine (or above wine substitute) because the sour cream already has that touch of acidity.

Note that your best bet is full-fat sour cream, not a reduced fat version or any kind of yogurt, because those are more likely to curdle. If you do want to use one of those, you would make sure the chicken is fully cooked first, then take the skillet off the heat, wait 5 minutes, then stir in your sour cream or yogurt and do not re-heat the sauce.

I don’t recommend milk in this recipe, although, whole milk would be okay, as would evaporated milk, and half and half, which is a cream with less fat content than heavy cream. They could curdle if heated too high or if there is too much acidity in the dish, so I would skip the wine or wine substitute. Also, make sure the chicken is fully-cooked before adding the dairy, and then only just heat it through after adding it. Don’t bring it to a boil.

Similarly, non-dairy milks like coconut milk and oat milk can curdle if they have contact with acidic ingredients or if they are over-heated. So if this is the kind of milk you’d like to use, follow the same instructions as for the whole milk above.

How To Make Creamy Garlic Chicken

To make it more tender and delicate, pound the chicken breasts to about 1/2-inch thick before getting started. I’ve found that they cook more evenly and are less likely to dry out if you pound them to an even thickness. 

Season the chicken with that garlic powder, salt, and black pepper. For this recipe I also lightly dredge the chicken in flour, which gives it nice texture and helps thicken the sauce.

The butter and oil gets heated in a large pan, then the chicken gets cooked until lightly browned, about 3 minutes on each side. Set the chicken aside on a clean plate while you start the garlic sauce.

Add the whole garlic cloves to the pan and cook for a couple minutes, stirring occasionally so they lightly brown. Add the chicken broth and optional dry white wine to the pan and let cook for a few minutes.

Add in the heavy cream and bring the sauce to a boil. Turn down the heat to simmer until slightly thickened. Stir in the Parmesan cheese, taste, and add additional salt and pepper if desired.

Finally, add the cooked chicken breasts to the pan of sauce for a few more minutes. This will heat the chicken back through and finish thickening up the cream sauce. 

All in all, after a bit of prep (the hardest parts are pounding the chicken and peeling the garlic), it takes about 20 minutes to cook this amazing meal.

Serving Garlic Chicken With Cream Sauce

Because the sauce reminds me of alfredo sauce, I really enjoy serving this garlic chicken over pasta. It’s also delicious with orzo, rice, or even mashed potatoes. Basically, I highly recommend serving with something that helps you enjoy every drop of the delicious sauce because you won’t want any to go to waste. 

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