Chicken Breasts with Mushroom Cream Sauce (2024)

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Published: November 12, 2015 Last Updated: August 10, 2023

Made with a cream sauce that's actually healthy!

Chicken breasts. They so easily become the same uninspiring, flavorless, last-minute resort, piece of poultry. That’s a lot of rather harsh adjectives, I know. This seared Chicken Breasts with our Mushroom Cream Sauce combines fresh thyme, fragrant mushrooms and your own cream sauce to make an incredible chicken dish which could be serve over brown rice or mashed potatoes. Once you taste the rich blend of cream sauce and these umami mushrooms, you’ll never be able to go back to canned sauces.

How To Get The Tender-est of Tender Chicken Breasts

This is where chicken breast dishes often fall flat. Compared to other cuts of chicken, the breast doesn’t offer that much flavor really. For this chicken and mushroom recipe, cooking your chicken properly to ensure only the tender-est of results takes on a new level of importance. First, pat dry your chicken with kitchen towell. If you have the time, let it sit out of the refrigerator for twenty minutes. Sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper. This will help form a crust.

Let’s get controversial. When you’re ready to start cooking, heat up your pan and add olive oil to the chicken itself and not to the pan. This is what some chefs say at least. Place chicken into the dry pan and leave it alone for 4-5 minutes. Your chicken will tell you when it wants to be turned by releasing from the pan easily. If it is not releasing from the pan easily then it isn’t ready. Alternatively, coat your whole pan with olive oil and cook each side of the breast for 1 minute on high until it’s golden on the bottom.

Searing your breast and only covering it with lid once the chicken has been browned is important so that meat’s juices are sealed in, ensuring a tender finish. Browning your meat first will also give you that lovely crisped, caramel exterior. After 20 minutes, the first sign that your chicken is fully cooked is that if you cut into it, the juices will run clear.

Looking for more classic chicken recipes? We got you. Check out this Chicken Florentine Casserole or this Slow Cooker Lemon Chicken. What about this Slow Cooker Chicken Chili?

Wonder Why Most Cream Sauces Taste So Good At Restaurants?

Butter and salt. That’s it. It’s a well known chef secret that these two additions are what make sauces feel so indulgent. While I do not refute that butter, salt, and full-fat cream make incredible sauces, they often leave me feeling bloated. Heavy cream can also overpower the subtler nuances of the other ingredients. In this recipes, we wanted the earthy mushrooms and fresh thyme to really shine. I also don’t always want to reschedule my whole afternoon because my lunch has sent me into a food-induced couch coma.

Although we haven’t included this in the recipe, let me first share with you my secret addition to these kinds of creamy sauces. Instead of adding butter, achieve that level of indulgence with a swig of cognac. After preparing your cream sauce, add 1/4 cup of cognac. Allow to simmer for a few minutes before serving. White wine also works with the advantage of being a lovely pairing when you sit down to eat this Chicken and Mushroom Cream Sauce. Want that acidity but don’t have any alcohol? A squeeze of lemon also works fantastically to cut through the sauce’s creaminess.

Next up, the mushrooms. White, brown, portobello, cremini, oyster, shiitake or porcini – the world is your oyster… mushroom. Oh dear. My point is use what you have, use what you can find. If you only have access to one variety like the baby bella mushrooms we have suggested, that works too. One crucial point regarding the sliced mushrooms. Do not salt them yet, I repeat, do not salt them. Adding salt prematurely will prevent your mushroom from browning up all lovely in your pan.

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