Honey Dijon Chicken Recipe For Easy Weeknight Meal - On The Go Bites (2024)

Here’s another great weeknight chicken meal with a twist. The blend of honey, soy sauce, Dijon mustard and hot sauce gives a sweet and savory flavor profile that appeals to everyone. And to top it off this honey Dijon chicken recipe is ready in under 30 minutes and is a great source of protein!

For a quick meal and/or a low-cal meal use skinless boneless chicken thighs or breasts (thighs have more flavor but a bit more fat). Or for more flavor use bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs, they will take a little longer to bake than the skillet boneless chicken.

Great accompaniments are Basmati rice and sheet pan baked broccoli and tomatoes. If you choose this easy meal combination you’ll want to get the rice going first so that it cooks while you are prepping the rest of the dinner. This post has been updated December 2017 with improved instructions and pictures.

Handy tip, when measuring the ingredients for the marinade use a measuring cup. Brush the inside of the measuring cup lightly with oil so that most of the honey easily pours out of the measuring cup. Start with the honey to 1/2 cup, then add the soy sauce, Dijon mustard and Sriracha sauce. Now you only have one measuring cup to clean.

Why Chicken Thighs and Not Chicken Breasts?

It’s a matter of preference. I’ve always been a thigh lover because the meat is more flavorful and stays juicier than chicken breasts, and to top it off thighs are less expensive. For this weeknight honey Dijon chicken recipe, the chicken thighs only take 15 minutes to cook. To reduce the time you can use chicken breast and cook about 10 minutes, but you will probably still end up with rather dry chicken. Can you tell I’m a fan of chicken thighs and not breasts?

When you open the chicken thighs you’ll see that they are folded under themselves. You need to unroll them and lay the chicken thighs flat. This will make the chicken cook more evenly and faster.

Another optional step is to place the chicken in a heavy plastic bag and lightly pound the thicker part down to about ¼” to ½” to make the whole piece of chicken an even thickness. I rarely do this unless one end of the chicken thigh is really thick and the other end thin.

Weeknight Meal 101, How Can I Simplify This Recipe?

For those looking to reduce time or ingredients, here’s a suggestion. For the honey Dijon chicken recipe you have several choices. As far as the ingredients you can skip the Sriracha sauce if you don’t like the bite of the heat, or replace it with your favorite hot sauce.

The honey can be substituted with maple syrup.

If you are pressed for time, the skinless, boneless chicken thighs will cook faster than the traditional bone-in skin-on chicken pieces.

You can also make this honey Dijon chicken recipe a complete meal. If rice isn’t your thing, then use small potatoes. You’ll start with Yukon gold or small red potatoes, (halved or quartered depending on size), toss with some olive oil on a baking sheet on one side of the pan. Add some broccoli and cherry or grape tomatoes on the other side of the pan, toss with some olive oil, salt and pepper. Return the whole pan to the oven for 20 minutes at 400 degrees.

If you are cooking for two, reduce the chicken thighs to 2-4 pieces. Reduce the marinade to 1/4 cup honey, 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard, 1 tablespoon of soy sauce and 3 teaspoons Sriracha.

There you go, now you have a complete meal in under 30 minutes. The honey Dijon chicken recipe has great protein with a starch and nutritious vegetable. Eat up!

I Don’t Have Sriracha, What’s a Good Substitute?

You can use any hot sauce you have on hand. Most hot sauces have a lot of vinegar in them, but for the small amount called for in this honey Dijon chicken recipe it shouldn’t make a difference. The Sriracha is mainly there for heat.

If you have cayenne pepper in your spice rack then you can skip the Sriracha and hot sauce and substitute the Sriracha with 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper. There will be negligible difference.

Meal Prep

You can meal prep the leftovers so that you will have pre-made dinners or lunches to go. Fill these (big portions) or these (more average size meal size) with the cooled leftovers, label and freeze for up to 3 months. No more keeping leftovers for 2 days and then tossing them. This meal prep is great for grab and go lunches or when there is only one person eating dinner one night. You’d be surprised how the leftovers are eaten by everyone in the family when they are portioned as individual meals instead of the chicken in one container, vegetable in another container, etc. If you like the containers above just click on their link, I really like these trays because they can be frozen and microwaved, seal tight and are reusable several times over. Or if you prefer.