Looking for a delicious weeknight dinner? This lemon honey butter chicken is tasty and uber simple to make! Paleo, animal-based, gluten-free.
An easy weeknight meal that you can marinate at lunch time.
I enjoy making really simple meals, usually with a meat, vegetable like sweet potatoes or potatoes, dairy of some sort and fruit. This has been working super well for me recently. I was dealing with a good deal of intestinal discomfort and some other issues, and this type of animal-based diet has taken the discomfort away.
After awhile of eating the same foods over and over, I tend to get bored and want something different flavor-wise in my rotation. This lemon honey butter chicken is deliciously tangy, salty and sweet. It hits all the different flavor profiles and is such a welcome change from eating plain foods all the time. Plus it’s remarkably simple to make for even the busiest of weeknights.
The eassy steps to making lemon honey butter chicken:
To make this simple recipe, you will need the following ingredients:
- Chicken breast, sliced thinkly
- Lemons, both the juice and slices for garnish
- Honey
- Butter, melted
- Seasonings of your choice – I used salt and parsley. Pepper, garlic powder and/or Italian seasoning also work well here.
Add the lemon juice, honey and melted butter together in a large bowl. Add in the chicken and stir to coat the chicken evenly. Cover with a lid and marinate for several hours. I like to prepare this at lunch so that by around 6 pm it is super flavorful and ready to be baked or pan-fried.
Remove chicken from the marinade and add to a baking dish for cooking in a preheated oven, or add chicken to a preheated pan with oil added to pan fry. Top with seasonings of your choice, some of the marinade and lemon slices, if desired.
Bake until cooked to 165F (74C) internal temperature. Remove from oven or stove and allow to cool before serving.
I recommend doing at the very minimum one hour of marinating, although 4+ hours is better. You can marinate chicken in the refrigerator up to 24 hours ahead of when it will be cooked. So if you are super busy in the morning or at lunch time, simply marinate it the night before!
It may in some people, but the amount of honey is minimal here, especially if you do not add some of the marinade when cooking it. You can substitute the honey for a lower-carb sweetener if this is a concern.
Yes, you can! I recommend marinating the chicken and then freezing it. You could also marinate, bake and then freeze the chicken, if you want a really quick meal for the future where you can simply defrost and reheat.
If you give this lemon honey butter chicken a try, please let me know what you think in the comments below. Also be sure to follow me on Facebook and Pinterest so you don’t miss a recipe!
You may also enjoy:
Lemon Honey Butter Chicken
Ingredients
- 1 lb chicken breast
- 2 Tbsp salted butter melted
- 3 Tbsp honey
- juice of one lemon
- salt, pepper and parsley to taste
- 1 lemon, sliced into rounds for garnishing each piece of chicken optional
Instructions
- Slice chicken breasts thinly, and add to a large dish for marinating.
- Mix melted butter, honey, juice of one lemon and salt, pepper and parsley in a small bowl. Whisk together to combine, and pour over the chicken breasts.
- Cover dish and marinate for a minimum of one hour, but up to 6 hours is preferred.
- When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350F (170C).
- Remove chicken breasts and place into a baking sheet. Top with rounds of lemon, if desired. Drizzle each piece with some of the marinade for additional flavor while cooking.
- Bake until the internal temperature is at least 165F (74C). Allow to cool for 5 minutes before serving.
