Orange-Honey Glazed Chicken Breasts
Source of Recipe
Cook's Illustrated
Recipe Introduction
Glazed chicken breasts should have perfectly rendered skin, moist meat, and a complexly flavored glaze. But more often than not, they turn out with dry meat, flabby skin, and a cloying, sticky coating. Browning the skin solved the flabbiness issue, and a light cover of flour on the chicken provided a good grip for the glaze. And for a sweet sauce that didn't taste like candy, we ditched the usual sticky ingredients and used orange juice, which gave us the perfect balance of sweetness and acidity.
Serves 4.
When reducing the glaze in step 4, remember that the skillet handle will be hot; use an oven mitt. To make sure the chicken cooks evenly, buy breasts that are similar in size—about 12 ounces apiece. If the glaze looks dry during baking, add up to 2 tablespoons of juice to the pan. If your skillet is not ovenproof, brown the chicken breasts and reduce the glaze as instructed, then transfer the chicken and glaze to a 13 by 9-inch baking dish and bake (don't wash the skillet). When the chicken is fully cooked, transfer it to a plate to rest and scrape the glaze back into the skillet to be reduced.
List of Ingredients
1 1/2 cups orange juice plus an additional 2 tablespoons
1/3 cup light corn syrup
3 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon distilled white vinegar
1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes
Table salt and ground black pepper
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
4 bone-in, skin-on chicken breast halves (about 12 ounces each), ribs removed, trimmed of excess fat and skin (see note above)
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
1 medium shallot , minced (about 3 tablespoons)
Recipe
Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 375 degrees. Whisk 1 1/2 cups orange juice, corn syrup, honey, mustard, vinegar, pepper flakes, 1/8 teaspoon salt, and 1/8 teaspoon pepper together in medium bowl. Place flour in pie plate, then season chicken on both sides with salt and pepper. Working with one chicken breast at a time, coat chicken with flour, patting off excess.
Heat oil in ovenproof 12-inch skillet over medium heat until shimmering. Add chicken breasts skin-side down; cook until well browned and most of fat has rendered from skin, 8 to 14 minutes. (If after 3 minutes you don't hear definite sizzling, increase heat to medium-high. If after 6 minutes chicken is darker than lightly browned, reduce heat slightly.) Turn chicken and lightly brown other side, about 5 minutes longer. Transfer chicken to plate.
Pour off all but 1 teaspoon fat from pan. Add shallot and cook until softened, 1 to 2 minutes. Increase heat to high and add orange juice mixture. Simmer, stirring occasionally, until syrupy and reduced to 1 cup (heatproof spatula should leave slight trail when dragged through glaze), 6 to 10 minutes. Remove skillet from heat and tilt to one side so glaze pools in corner of pan. Using tongs, roll each chicken breast in pooled glaze to coat evenly and place skin-side down in skillet.
Transfer skillet to oven and bake chicken until thickest part of breasts registers 160 degrees on instant-read thermometer, 25 to 30 minutes, turning chicken skin-side up halfway through cooking. Transfer chicken to platter and let rest 5 minutes. Return skillet to high heat (be careful-handle will be very hot) and cook glaze, stirring constantly, until thick and syrupy (heatproof spatula should leave wide trail when dragged through glaze), about 1 minute. Remove pan from heat and whisk in remaining 2 tablespoons orange juice. Spoon 1 teaspoon glaze over each breast and serve, passing remaining glaze at table.
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