This recipe for chicken piccata with lemon sauce is a throwback to my college days, when I worked at a nice local Italian restaurant as a server. 

Before then, I had never had chicken piccata, but it quickly became one of my favorite (and quite simple) recipes that I have in my repertoire.  

Generally speaking, any sort of “piccata” recipe is some kind of meat (chicken, fish, veal etc.) cooked in a versatile buttery lemon sauce with various herbs and spices.

Jump to:

• Why you will love Chicken Piccata with Lemon Sauce  
• Tips
• Ingredients
• How to Make Chicken Piccata with Lemon Sauce
• Variations
• Serving Suggestions
• Substitutions
• FAQ’s
• 📖 Recipe
• 💬 Comments

Why you will love Chicken Piccata with Lemon Sauce  

What’s not to love about lightly breaded chicken cutlets, pan fried in butter, and finished with a creamy lemon sauce?!  

This chicken dish comes out tender and juicy, it is full of fresh flavor and finished with a little pop of texture that the capers add. 

This is a stand-alone dish, but it also can be complemented by an easy side of your favorite pasta. 

I personally just love to serve it with fettuccine with a simple olive oil and garlic sauce.  

And what’s even better?? It’s done in under 30 minutes! 

Tips

In order to make this dish super quick and easy, I recommend buying chicken breast cutlets. 

Cutlets will cut back on your prep time, so that you can just dredge your chicken, cook and serve.

For extra tender chicken, you can pound it with a meat tenderizer before dredging and pan frying it.

Ingredients

The ingredients for chicken piccata with lemon caper sauce are straightforward and simple:

• 5-6 chicken breast cutlets (or 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts fileted in half)
• Flour for dredging
• Butter
• Chicken stock
• Half and half
• Salt, pepper, and garlic powder
• Fresh parsley
• Lemons
• Capers*
• Fresh parmesan

*A little note on capers:  

When I worked at that little local Italian restaurant, one of the most common questions was “what are capers?”.  

In short, I always answered that capers were a small Mediterranean berry in a brine that brought salt and texture to the dish. 

A caper technically is a flower bud from the Capparis Spinosa plant that is harvested before becoming a berry and having a hard seed inside. 

Once capers are harvested, they are pickled in a salty brine and then ready to use in your favorite dish. 

Now, the capers can be optional in this dish, if you don’t have any, but I highly recommend trying it out! 

They are not expensive, and you can use them in other dishes as well. 

Some other common dishes with capers are: fish or seafood dishes (think creamy pasta dishes like shrimp scampi or salmon with capers), crostini with various spreads, salads, and you can even top your pizza with it!

I digress, let’s get on with the recipe!

How to Make Chicken Piccata with Lemon Sauce

Let’s start with the chicken.  If you have boneless skinless chicken breasts, it will most likely be too thick so we need to filet them. 

With a sharp knife, slice the chicken breasts in half lengthwise to make 2 thin cutlets.  Now some people like it even thinner than this, so if you want to, you can take a meat mallet and pound it thinner.

This will also make your chicken more tender. But who has time for that?  It’s fine if you just use chicken cutlets, or fileted chicken breasts.

In a large non-stick skillet, or cast iron skillet, heat up 4 Tablespoon of butter plus 1 Tablespoon olive oil until hot and sizzling. 

While it is heating up, prepare your chicken. Generously salt and pepper your chicken cutlets. 

Mix the garlic powder in with your all-purpose flour. 

You can either put the flour mixture on a plate to dredge your chicken or you can put it in a gallon zip bag for easier cleanup. 

Dredge the chicken in the flour mixture.  This isn’t a heavily breaded chicken, so you can shake off any excess flour.  

Once the skillet is hot, carefully add the prepared dredged chicken into the skillet. 

Allow the chicken to pan fry without moving it too much, this will allow the chicken to get golden brown and crisp on the outside. 

Cook it for about 4 minutes on each side, then remove the chicken from the pan.  

Slowly and carefully pour the chicken stock into the pan, scraping the bottom to get all the browned bits up. 

The chicken stock should deglaze the bottom of the pan while you scrape it.  Don’t get rid of those bits! There is so much flavor there.  Once the pan is deglazed, add the lemon juice, lemon zest and capers. 

As it starts to bubble, add the rest of the butter to get that silky sheen sauce texture. After it thickens up a little, add a little splash of cream.

Note: this sauce is not supposed to be very thick, but rather, it should be more on the thin side. 

Carefully put the chicken back into the skillet and simmer it in the sauce until heated through. Make sure it does not come to a boil! 

Check to make sure your chicken is cooked all the way through.  Once it is cooked, you can add fresh parsley and fresh grated parmesan cheese before serving.

Variations

Some people do not add half and half to their lemon butter sauce.  If you want it a little thinner and less creamy, just replace the half and half with more chicken stock. 

Serving Suggestions

This simple dish only asks for a simple pasta to go with it. 

You can forgo the pasta altogether and serve it alone, but if you do want to accompany it with some pasta, I suggest fettuccine with simply a little garlic and olive oil in it.

Another lovely side dish for chicken piccata to consider would be cacio e pepe.

For a complete list of what to serve with chicken Piccata, check my list here where I share the best side dishes.

Substitutions

It is very common to use a white wine along with, or instead of chicken stock.  This is totally your preference. 

If you want to use white wine, and you have some on hand, feel free to do that instead!

You can also use boneless skinless chicken thighs instead of breasts if you are worried about it coming out tough or dry.

FAQ’s

Why is my chicken tough?  

Chicken breasts can tend to get tough if you over cook them, or if your temperature was not adequate when you pan fry it. 

Make sure the temperature of your oil is hot enough!  If it doesn’t sizzle when it hits the pan, you will most likely end up with tough, chewy meat. 

Overcooking the meat can also make it tough, I suggest using a meat thermometer to check for doneness. 

How do I make the lemon sauce less watery?

This buttery lemon sauce with capers is supposed to be more on the thin side.  Whether you use cream or not in your sauce, it shouldn’t be watery though. 

The best way to ensure that your lemon sauce comes out with a nice velvety sheen is to deglaze the pan while it is hot with either chicken stock or white wine, then after the ingredients have cooked down for a few minutes, add the butter right before putting the chicken back in the pan.  

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