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Why You’ll Love My Recipe
Sweet, sticky, and simple, this bourbon chicken recipe is perfect for an easy weeknight dinner. Serve it over a plate of steaming rice or your favourite pasta dish and some roasted vegetables.
For more great ways to use bourbon, why not try this Chocolate Bourbon or Rum Balls Recipe, or this recipe for a Boulevardier Cocktail? Serve this chicken with some Dirty Rice or Mushroom Rice for an easy meal.
Reader Review
Another home run the family loved. Imho idiot-proof so new cooks, DON’T BE AFRAID TO MAKE THIS! I made this a printed but instead of putting it over white rice I made a combination of “brown rice” (made of hearts of palm), forbidden rice, and peas. So it was very light and healthy.
Karlynn’s Recipe Notes
- Skill Level: This is an easy recipe.
- Total Time: Making this chicken will take approximately 40 minutes from start to finish.
- Variations: Increase or reduce the amount of red pepper flakes to adjust the level of spice in the sauce. Play around with the other seasonings too. Try using a ginger/garlic paste or some homemade Cajun Seasoning to add even more flavour. Try garnishing this chicken with chopped green onions and some sesame seeds for crunch and colour.
- Tools Needed: For this recipe, you’ll need, a whisk, a medium bowl, a large frying pan, a cutting board, and a sharp knife.
What You’ll Need For Ingredients
Chicken: This recipe calls for boneless skinless chicken thighs, but you could also use chicken breasts. If you decide to use any bone-in chicken, you’ll need to adjust your cooking time accordingly.
Bourbon: The rich, oaky element of bourbon is what we’re looking for here, rather than alcohol content, since the alcohol gets cooked off. If you don’t enjoy that particular flavour profile, you can try a different type of whiskey. A decent tequila would also hit some of the same flavour notes. If you’d like to avoid alcohol altogether, use a bit of liquid smoke.
Sauce: This combination of simple ingredients makes a sticky, sweet, and complex sauce. You can adjust the thickness to your own liking by playing with the exact amount of cornstarch that you use.
How To Make Bourbon Chicken
This is a brief overview of the recipe. The full list of ingredients and step-by-step instructions are in the recipe card below.
- Whisk together sauce ingredients in a medium bowl and set aside.
- Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper.
- In a large saucepan, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Fry chicken pieces until browned on all sides. Drain excess oil.
- Pour sauce into the pan and stir until chicken is fully coated. Cook on medium heat for 10-15 more minutes.
- Thicken if desired. Serve hot over rice or noodles.
Karlynn’s Tips and Tricks for Making Bourbon Chicken
Thickening the Sauce: If the sauce isn’t as thick as you’d like, add some cornstarch slurry and whisk slowly until sauce is the consistency you want. Only add this if the existing sauce didn’t thicken properly and use only as much as you need or you may dilute the flavour of the sauce. If you’d like even more sauce, go ahead and double the recipe before you do any thickening.
Serving Suggestions: This chicken is perfectly suited for serving with rice, but it would also work beautifully with noodles. Try making some Egg Noodles or Buttery Mushroom Rice and spooning your bourbon chicken overtop of that. Or serve it with some Make Ahead Mashed Potatoes and Sautéed Green Beans. So many great options. Have fun.
Storage Instructions
Fridge: Once the chicken is fully cooled, you can store it in a sealed container in the fridge for 2-3 days. Reheat in the microwave when you’re ready to eat it. You could also try premixing a batch of the sauce and storing it for a day or two before you make this chicken.
Freezer: You can store leftovers in a sealed freezer safe container in your freezer for 3-4 months. Take it out and reheat it in the microwave. This would be a great recipe to batch cook and freeze in individual portions for meal prep purposes.
More Delicious Chicken Recipes
Looking for more easy recipes for chicken?
Try this Basic Crock Pot Buffalo Chicken.
Mushroom Soup Chicken & Rice Casserole is an easy meal all in one dish.
Chicken Piccata is another fun recipe to change up your chicken rotation.
There you go, everyone. A delicious, sticky and sweet bourbon chicken to serve with your favourite rice. Try it out and let me know what you think.
Happy Cooking!
Karlynn
Bourbon Chicken
Equipment
- saucepan
Ingredients
- 8 chicken thighs , boneless, skinless and cut into one inch pieces
- salt and pepper
- 2 Tablespoons olive oil
Bourbon Sauce
- 1/4 cup bourbon
- 1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
- 1/4 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup chicken broth
- 1/4 cup apple juice
- 2 tablespoons ketchup
- 3 garlic cloves , minced
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger, grated
- 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- 1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- cornstarch slurry
Instructions
- Whisk together the ingredients for the bourbon sauce and set aside. Adjust any of the seasonings to taste at this point.
- Sprinkle salt and pepper over the chicken thigh pieces.
- Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Fry the chicken thigh pieces until browned on both sides. Drain any excess oil and fat.
- Pour the sauce into the pan, stirring it to coat the chicken completely. Cook on medium heat for another 10-15 minutes until the chicken has cooked all the way through.
- If the sauce hasn't thickened to your liking after the chicken is cooked, prepare the cornstarch slurry and slowly whisk into the hot sauce until it thickens to your liking.
- Remove from the heat. Serve over rice.
Notes
- Only use the cornstarch slurry if the sauce hasn’t thickened. This could be due to water content or juice from the chicken thighs
- If desired you can DOUBLE the sauce recipe easily for tons of sauce!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Margaret says
I can’t wait to try this! Have to run to store this afternoon so I can cook it for dinner tonight.
Mary Kiley says
Can vinegar and brown sugar or another whiskey be substituted for the Bourbon?
Emilia says
Another home run the family loved. Imho idiot-proof so new cooks, DON’T BE AFRAID TO MAKE THIS! I made this a printed but instead of putting it over white rice I made a combination of “brown rice” (made of hearts of palm), forbidden rice, and peas. So it was very light and healthy.