This easy chicken piccata recipe provides crispy, juicy chicken breasts in a tasty lemon butter white wine sauce with capers. It’s so beautiful, delicious, and easy that it’s ideal for celebrations and crazy weeknight dinners. Prepare your favorite pasta while the chicken cooks, and you’ve got it made in the shade.
If you’re finding yourself feeling a little bored with the standby chicken meals lately, then this is the perfect dish to add to your repertoire.
It’s super flavorful and, despite how easy it is to make, it looks and smells incredibly fancy when you plate it. It’s the perfect way to treat someone you love to a special home-cooked meal.
What Makes Piccata Celebratory
The Italian word piccata has a variety of meanings. Larded and seasoned are two of them, and both have a bearing in this recipe. However, the meaning that best applies is pounded flat. Pounding chicken breasts thinner allows them to cook evenly for tender juiciness in the middle of the chicken breast without drying out the edges.
The lemon butter sauce with capers gives plain chicken an elegant touch and delightful savoriness. Add a plate of al dente pasta, whether you prefer linguine, penne, or angel hair, and you have a restaurant-quality dinner for a cozy dinner at home.
How to Make Easy Chicken Piccata
- Butterfly or pound the chicken breasts, dredge them in seasoned flour, fry them, and set them aside.
- Sauté the onions and add wine and butter to make the sauce.
- Add the cooked chicken back to the sauce, garnish with parsley, and enjoy.
Tips and Tricks
- Capers are optional in chicken piccata, but they’re definitely a great addition. Most grocery stores carry small jars, so you don’t have to worry about having too many in the fridge. Taste one first, and go easy on them if you’ve never had them before, because they’re intense.
- Adding white wine to this recipe lends another subtle layer of flavor. I usually go with a good-quality white wine, like Pinot Grigio or Chardonnay. But you can replace it with broth if you don’t want to use alcohol.
Make-Ahead and Storage Instructions
You can make chicken piccata one day ahead and heat it on the stove in the sauce when you’re ready to serve it. Keep in mind that it will lose some of the crispiness.
You could also make the chicken and sauce ahead of time and store them separately in the fridge. On the day of serving, heat the chicken in the oven while heating the sauce on the stove. Assemble and enjoy.
You can store leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 2-3 days or in the freezer for 3-4 months. I love chopping the leftover chicken and heating the sauce, chicken, and pasta in a saucepan with some chicken broth. Feel free to add more veggies for an impressive chicken noodle soup.
What Goes With Italian-Style Chicken
Chicken piccata tastes best, in my opinion, served over a nice plate of pasta. It’s also pretty amazing with basmati rice, homemade garlic bread, and a Greek salad. A chilled glass of orange Chardonnay is a perfect wine pairing. The orange refers to the color, but it does enjoy a slight citrusy freshness.
More Celebration-Worthy Chicken Recipes
Watch How to Make It
[adthrive-in-post-video-player video-id=”oghrZY9g” upload-date=”2022-01-08T03:34:51.000Z” name=”Easy Chicken Piccata” description=”This easy Chicken Piccata recipe is crispy, buttery chicken breasts dredged in a well-seasoned flour mixture, pan-fried, and simmered in a tasty lemony white wine piccata sauce with capers. It’s so beautiful, it’s delicious, AND it’s easy to make – what’s not to love?” player-type=”collapse” override-embed=”false”]
This blog post was originally published in May 2019 and has been updated with additional tips, new photos, and a video.
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Prep: 15 minutes
Cook: 20 minutes
Total: 35 minutes
Italian
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Slice the chicken breasts in half lengthwise, pat them dry, then season them with salt and pepper to taste.
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Whisk the flour, Italian seasoning, onion powder, and garlic powder in a medium shallow bowl. Dredge the breasts in the flour mixture, and shake off excess.
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Heat a tablespoon of butter and oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat.
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When the butter has melted, add the chicken and pan-fry for 3-4 minutes, then flip and cook for 2-3 minutes (how long depends on the thickness of the slices). Work in batches if using a small skillet.
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Transfer the chicken to a plate and set aside.
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Melt the other two tablespoons of butter in the same pan, and saute the onion and garlic for a minute or two until the onion is soft and translucent.
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Add the wine, chicken stock, and lemon juice, and bring to a boil, scraping up any brown bits from the bottom of the pan for extra flavor.
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Cook until the wine almost evaporates, stirring occasionally, for 3-5 minutes. Then reduce the heat to low, stir in the capers.
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Add the remaining butter, allow it to melt, and stir it into the sauce.
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Do a taste test, then adjust salt and pepper as needed.
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Return the chicken to the pan, including its juice, and simmer 3-5 minutes.
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Garnish with parsley if desired and serve immediately with pasta and parmesan cheese.
- Freezing the chicken breasts for about 10-15 minutes before slicing them firms them enough to make the process easier.
- To salt to taste, start with ¾ teaspoon per pound of chicken. Taste the sauce at the end, and add more if desired.
- If you’d like a thicker sauce, simmer it a little longer or add a cornstarch slurry (½ teaspoon cornstarch with a teaspoon of water) and stir constantly until the sauce bubbles and thickens.
- Please keep in mind that nutritional information is a rough estimate and can vary greatly based on the products used in the recipe.
Serving: 1fillet| Calories: 440kcal (22%)| Carbohydrates: 24g (8%)| Protein: 41g (82%)| Fat: 18g (28%)| Saturated Fat: 7g (44%)| Polyunsaturated Fat: 2g| Monounsaturated Fat: 7g| Trans Fat: 0.4g| Cholesterol: 134mg (45%)| Sodium: 1178mg (51%)| Potassium: 840mg (24%)| Fiber: 2g (8%)| Sugar: 2g (2%)| Vitamin A: 671IU (13%)| Vitamin C: 17mg (21%)| Calcium: 56mg (6%)| Iron: 3mg (17%)
Course: dinner, Main
Cuisine: Italian
