Chicken in mustard sauce is one of those weeknight dishes you come back to often: one pan, six ingredients, thirty-five minutes. The mustard goes in twice, at the start to season the meat and at the end to bind the sauce. Moutarde de Meaux® Pommery®, with its whole seeds, holds up well to cooking and keeps its rounded aromatics right through to the plate.
Serves: 4 • Prep: 10 minutes • Cooking: 35 minutes • Difficulty: very easy
Ingredients
3 tablespoons Moutarde de Meaux® Pommery®
8 free-range chicken thighs, skin on
2 shallots, chopped
200 ml thick crème fraîche
100 ml dry white wine
100 ml chicken stock
1 tablespoon olive oil and 15 g butter
2 sprigs of tarragon or thyme
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Method
The first coat of mustard. Pat the chicken dry and brush it with one tablespoon of Moutarde de Meaux® Pommery®. Season with salt and pepper, and rest for ten minutes if you have time.
Brown the chicken. Heat the oil and butter in a casserole. Lay the pieces skin side down and let them colour for 6 to 7 minutes without touching them, then turn for 3 minutes. The skin should be deeply golden and crisp. Set aside.
The shallots. Lower the heat, add the shallots to the rendered fat and sweat for 2 minutes, scraping up the caramelised juices.
Deglaze. Pour in the white wine, raise the heat and reduce by half, then add the stock and the herbs.
Simmer. Return the chicken to the pan, skin side up. Half-cover and simmer gently for 20 minutes.
The sauce. Lift out the chicken and keep it warm. Off the heat, whisk in the crème fraîche, then the remaining 2 tablespoons of mustard, without letting it boil again.
Serve. Return to very low heat for 2 minutes to thicken, adjust the seasoning and spoon the sauce over the chicken. Serve with rice, tagliatelle or homemade mash.
💡 Perfect pairing: For a milder, slightly sweeter sauce, replace one spoonful of wholegrain mustard with Pommery® Honey Mustard — a particular favourite with children.
Our tips for perfect mustard chicken
Use thighs. They stay moist after twenty minutes of simmering and give the sauce plenty of flavour.
Leave the meat alone while it browns. Six minutes untouched, and the skin turns golden and crisp, with good caramelised juices in the pan.
Mustard in two stages. At the start for the meat, at the end for the sauce: that double gesture is what gives the dish its depth.
A sauce that no longer boils. Once the mustard is in, very low heat is enough to thicken it while preserving its aroma.
Our chicken with Moutarde de Meaux® Pommery®
This chicken in mustard sauce recipe is a pillar of French family cooking: quick, economical and always welcome. The wholegrain mustard sauce plays the leading role, with its whole seeds and an acidity that answers the cream. Made at the gates of Meaux by the Chamois family, Moutarde de Meaux® Pommery® gives this French mustard chicken its gentle heat and rounded aromatics. Explore our Pommery® old-fashioned mustards.
