Perfect for pleasing a crowd, these creamy lemon chicken thighs are simple to make, surprisingly impressive, and unbelievably tasty.
Two weeks ago, my brother was perusing the new cookbook from Ina Garten (one of our favorite Food Network stars) looking for a recipe that would be the perfect dinner for friends who were coming over that Sunday. When he came across these creamy lemon chicken thighs, his wife Julie’s eyes lit up. Julie loves anything and everything lemon. Pair lemon with aromatics like leeks and thyme and throw in something creamy like creme fraiche (like this recipe does), and you pretty much have one of Julie’s favorite meals. And this recipe proved not only satisfying for Julie, but super impressive for dinner guests as well. Little did they know it was actually super easy to make. And while perfect for a crowd, these creamy lemon chicken thighs would be just as fantastic as an easy weeknight dinner for four.
AN EASY, CROWD PLEASING MEAL
There are two simple steps to this creamy lemon chicken, and you really only need one sheet pan and one oven safe pan to make it. First you’ll use the sheet pan to bake the chicken thighs. While those are baking, you’ll make the creamy lemon sauce of course using tons of lemon juice, some of my favorites like aromatics (garlic, onion, leeks and thyme), white wine, and creme fraiche for that signature creaminess. If the pan is oven safe (cast iron is my personal favorite to use here), you can just tuck those pre-baked chicken thighs right into the sauce and throw it back in the oven to bake until it is beautiful and golden brown.
If you’re making this dish for a crowd (like we did), even your largest cast iron pan may not be big enough to hold the amount of chicken thighs you’ll need. In this case, we baked the chicken thighs in a large casserole dish, made the sauce in a separate pan and then added the sauce right into the casserole dish for the chicken’s second pass in the oven. To make things extra fancy and impressive, stud the top with some more sprigs of fresh thyme and lemon slices.
Creamy Lemon Chicken Thighs
Ingredients
- 3-4 lb bone-in skin-on chicken thighs
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1 small onion, diced
- 2 leeks, cleaned and thinly sliced
- 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
- 1/2 cup white wine
- 1/2 cup chicken stock
- 1 tsp lemon zest
- 8 fresh thyme sprigs
- 1/2 cup creme fraiche
- olive oil
- salt and pepper
For garnish
- fresh thyme sprigs
- 1 lemon, thinly sliced
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400.
- Place chicken thighs on a sheet pan skin side up and dry with paper towels. Rub with olive oil and season liberally with salt and pepper. Bake until golden and cooked through, 30 to 40 minutes.
- While the chicken cooks, make the sauce. In a large oven safe skillet, heat butter over medium heat. Add onions, leeks and garlic and saute until softened, 5-7 minutes. Add chicken stock, white wine, lemon juice, zest and thyme sprigs and simmer for 5 minutes. Whisk in creme fraiche and season with salt and pepper as needed.
- Nestle the chicken thighs into the sauce in the pan. Top with fresh lemon slices and a few more sprigs of time and bake, uncovered, for 15 minutes. Alternately, if doubling or tripling the recipe for a large crowd, you can move the pre-roasted chicken thighs to a large casserole dish, top with the sauce and bake.
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