Man-Pleasing Chicken

My friend Joy mentioned on Facebook recently that she made this recipe called "Man-Pleasing Chicken" for dinner, and graciously linked to the recipe for all of us FB stalkers who were interested. I read the recipe, the raves about it, and decided that the combination of ingredients was exactly something that my man would love! I've made it twice now, and it is easy enough and good enough to be in the regular rotation. 

Man-Pleasing Chicken

Ingredients:

1.5 lbs. chicken breast (approx. 2-3)

1/2 cup brown mustard

1/4 cup maple syrup

1 TBS red wine vinegar

fresh rosemary

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Line pan with aluminum foil (this will help you with your clean up, I promise!). Sprinkle salt and pepper over chicken, and arrange chicken in pan. In separate bowl mix together mustard, maple syrup and vinegar. Pour over the chicken, and turn the chicken to coat thoroughly. Place in preheated oven and bake for 40 minutes. At the halfway point, baste the chicken with the sauce. Use meat thermometer to make sure chicken is cooked thoroughly to 165 degrees internally, and avoid cutting into the meat. Once chicken is cooked, remove from oven and allow to rest for five minutes. Baste with more sauce before plating, and sprinkle with chopped fresh rosemary for an extra burst of flavor.

Additional notes: you can find the original recipe here. We prefer chicken breasts to thighs, so that is what I used. I also substituted spicy brown mustard (what I had on hand) for the dijon, and red wine vinegar for the rice wine vinegar. We have served it with and without the rosemary, and though it is a pretty touch, it is not essential to the meal. I have frozen chicken breasts in this sauce and then defrosted it before cooking, and that worked very well.

Confession: I hate condiments of all kinds-ketchup, mustard, and mayonnaise. However, the combination of flavors makes the 'mustard-ness' of this recipe hard to detect, and I like that. Nathan loves this chicken, our friends that have shared this meal with us love it, my kids even like it! Oh, and as an extra benefit, the chicken tastes really good leftover, which many chicken meals do not. Enjoy!