Chicken with Mushroom Cream Sauce
A French bistro-style pan sauce of browned shiitake mushrooms, cream, Dijon, and Parmigiano that turns weeknight chicken into a centerpiece.
Yield: Serves 4 · Active: 25 min · Total: 30 min · Year-round, and especially cozy in fall, when wild and local mushrooms are at their peak · Cuisine: French bistro · Best eaten: midday or early evening
Ingredients
Chicken
2 boneless, skinless pasture-raised chicken breasts, halved horizontally into 4 cutlets
Baja Gold sea salt and black pepper
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 tbsp grass-fed butter, divided
Mushroom cream sauce
8 oz shiitake mushrooms (or cremini, oyster, or a mix), sliced
3 garlic cloves, minced
Optional: 2 sprigs fresh thyme, leaves stripped
½ cup chicken bone broth
1 cup grass-fed heavy cream
1 tsp Dijon mustard
2–3 tbsp freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
Chopped fresh parsley, to finish
Swaps:
Chicken thighs: Use 1½ lbs boneless thighs, and simmer them in the sauce until they reach 175°F.
Deeper flavor: Soak 4–5 dried shiitake in the warm broth for 20 minutes, then slice them and add them with the fresh mushrooms, and use the soaking broth in the sauce.
Method
Season. Pat the chicken dry, and season generously with salt and pepper.
Sear. Heat the olive oil and 1 tbsp butter in a large cast iron skillet over medium-high heat. Brown the chicken 2–3 minutes per side, until golden. It won’t be cooked through yet. Move it to a plate.
Brown the mushrooms. Lower the heat to medium, and add the remaining 1 tbsp butter. Add the mushrooms, and cook 5–6 minutes, stirring now and then, until browned. Add the garlic and thyme (if using), and cook 30 seconds, until fragrant.
Build the sauce. Pour in the broth, and scrape up all the browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the cream and Dijon, bring to a boil, and boil 2 minutes to thicken slightly.
Finish the chicken. Lower the heat to a simmer. Return the chicken and any juices to the pan, and spoon the sauce over it. Simmer 5–8 minutes, until the chicken reaches 165°F.
Add the cheese. Take the pan off the heat, and stir in the Parmigiano. Taste, and add salt and pepper (the broth and cheese add salt, so taste first).
Serve right away, scattered with parsley.
Serve It With
Roasted broccoli (from my Roasted Brassicas), cauliflower purée (from my Velvet Vegetable Purées), mashed potatoes, or zucchini noodles, to soak up all that sauce.
Storage
Refrigerator: up to 3 days. Reheat gently, without boiling, so the sauce doesn’t separate.
Nourishment Notes
The pan sauce — the browned bits left in the skillet after searing aren’t something to scrub away; they’re the foundation of the sauce. When you add the broth and scrape them up, they dissolve into the sauce and carry all that deep, roasted flavor. That’s why a hot cast iron skillet makes such a difference.
Shiitake mushrooms — B vitamins, copper, selenium, and lentinan, a beta-glucan studied for supporting the immune system. Shiitake are also rich in guanylate, a compound that amplifies umami, making glutamate taste up to several times more savory. That’s why they give this sauce a depth that button mushrooms can’t, and why dried shiitake (with even more guanylate) are such a good trick.
Dijon mustard — the small step that makes this a French sauce à la moutarde rather than a plain mushroom cream sauce. Made from brown mustard seed and white wine or verjuice, Dijon brings acidity and a sharp bite that balance the cream. It’s the same idea behind the classic French bistro dish poulet à la moutarde.
Pasture-raised chicken — complete protein, niacin, B6, selenium, and choline.
Grass-fed cream and butter — vitamins A, D, E, and K2, plus butyrate.
Parmigiano-Reggiano — calcium, protein, and vitamin K2, and naturally low in lactose from its long aging.
Garlic and thyme — allicin and thymol, aromatic compounds studied for their antimicrobial effects.
As a circadian food, this rich, comforting dinner is best eaten early in the evening, so your body has time to digest.
For your cycle: Satisfying protein and fat, plus B vitamins and selenium, make this a comforting meal in the luteal phase, and a lovely one in any phase.
Sourcing
Chicken — pasture-raised and non-medicated, from a local farm or White Oak Pastures
Mushrooms — organic shiitake, from a farmers’ market or a local mushroom grower
Bone broth — homemade, or Bonafide Provisions or Kettle & Fire
Heavy cream and butter — grass-fed and organic; vat-pasteurized cream (avoid ultra-pasteurized)
Parmigiano-Reggiano — DOP, aged 24 months or more
Dijon mustard — organic, like Delouis Fils or Maison Orphée
Garlic, thyme, and parsley — organic, from a farmers’ market
Extra virgin olive oil — organic, single-estate, harvest-dated, in dark glass
Salt — Baja Gold sea salt
— Anna aka Food Marshall