Easy Chicken Francese Recipe

A delicious restaurant quality dish with a buttery, lemon pan sauce. This chicken is terrific served over hot pasta.

Chicken Francese, (Chicken French), is a popular restaurant quality dish you can make at home with tender chicken cutlets nestled in a buttery, lemon pan sauce.

It’s about this time each year I start craving all things lemon. Lemon is a great way to brighten up the day with a little sunshine on a plate. The dreary days of winter are here but that doesn’t mean our dinners have to be dreary too! Queue this delicious, easy, wonderfully different chicken dish your whole family will love.

Use skinless, boneless chicken breasts or store-bought chicken cutlets for this recipe.

Chicken cutlets are a great quick dinner tool. The cutlets cook through in about 10 minutes leaving a tender, moist, thin breast that soaks up plenty of flavor from the buttery, lemon wine sauce. If you can’t find prepared cutlets in your local grocery store make your own by slicing boneless breasts in half. For easy preparation and slicing, freeze the chicken breasts for about 15 minutes before cutting in half. Don’t worry if each cutlet is a little different size, there’s no need for them to be perfect.

‘Francese’ means French in Italian, however this lemony chicken dish is an Italian-American creation.

The basis for this recipe was brought to America by Italian immigrants, and may have been created as a less expensive alternative to Veal Francese. Recipes for Chicken Francese are similar to another popular dish, Chicken Piccata. Chicken cutlets are dredged in seasoned flour, dipped in eggs, then back in the flour before pan frying until golden brown. The sauce is made in the same pan with a full 1/4 cup of fresh lemon juice, butter, dry white wine and chicken broth. This dish requires the right amount of salt to bring out all the flavors, so be sure to check the seasoning before serving.

The buttery lemon pan sauce is great served over pasta.

Serve Chicken Francese with a simple steamed vegetable and plenty of hot spaghetti for a complete, satisfying meal. Garnish with sautéed thin sliced lemons, chopped parsley and fresh ground black pepper for picture perfect Chicken Francese! 

Ingredients

For the chicken:

• 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (or 6-8 chicken cutlets)
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

For the sauce:

• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
• 1/4 cup minced sweet onion
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup dry white wine
• 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice (about 2 juicy lemons)
• 2 cups low-sodium chicken broth (or chicken stock)
• salt and pepper to taste
• minced fresh parsley leaves, for garnish
• sliced lemon, for garnish

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