Chicken Bryan

Is there a restaurant that has a dish you always order?

One of my very favorites is an entrée called Chicken Bryan at Carraba’s. Does anyone else love it? It’s moist grilled chicken that is topped with goat cheese and a sun-dried tomato butter sauce with basil. Tastebud extravaganza right there, people!

I love it so much that a couple of years ago I decided to try my hand at replicating it. I looked online for any copycat recipes and came up with something that is very delicious and very close (if not exact) to what they serve.

This is a chicken recipe that my whole family loves and is great for serving guests. We had two college interns from our church over last month and I served this to them. They gobbled it up!

One of the best things about this dish is that it takes only 30 minutes to prepare. So you can have delectable, restaurant-quality food pretty quick plus you are controlling what ingredients go in it.

Get your ingredients together.

Pat your chicken breasts dry, add the oil, and spread around. Then salt and pepper and put on a preheated grill.

Put two tablespoons of butter in the skillet and once it’s melted add your garlic and onion. (I cheated and used minced onion this time.)

Cut the remaining ten tablespoons butter into small pieces. Put them back in the refrigerator to stay cold for later.

 

Once your onion is translucent, add your chicken broth and lemon juice. (My chicken broth was in a jar because I make and freeze my own.)

Let this simmer on medium-high heat until it’s reduced to half. (Check on your chicken breasts on the grill and flip!)

At this point your house is beginning to smell heavenly and don’t be surprised if occupants come and ask, “What’s for dinner?” It happened here!

Turn the heat down to very low and let it cool a bit. Then add the pieces of cold butter and let them slowly melt. The sauce should stay the rich, yellow color of butter and not turn clear or your heat is too high. I do mine over low heat (actual "low" setting).

Bring your chicken in off the grill, and add the softened goat cheese. I like to put my meat I take off the grill in the microwave, not to cook but to rest and retain heat before I serve it.

After all the butter has melted, add the sun-dried tomatoes, basil, salt, and pepper.

Serve the goat cheese-topped chicken with the sun-dried tomato sauce. This is wonderful served with creamy garlic mashed potatoes so that all the bits of awesauceness can be scooped in with the potatoes and eaten. I also usually serve a Greek salad with it.

When I served this to our guests recently I did not add the goat cheese on top but served it on the side in case one of them did not like that kind of cheese. I also serve the sauce on the side.

Chicken Bryan
printable recipe here

Chicken part:
4-6 chicken breasts
Extra virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pepper
8 ounces goat cheese, softened to room temperature

Sun-dried tomato sauce:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic
1 tablespoon finely chopped onion
½ cup chicken broth (original recipe calls for dry white wine but we don’t buy alcohol)
¼ cup lemon juice
10 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
¼ - ½ cup sliced sun-dried tomatoes, depending on your preference
¼ cup chopped fresh basil OR 1 ½ tablespoons dried basil
½ teaspoon kosher salt
½ teaspoon white pepper

Preheat your grill (or you can bake the chicken if you don’t have a grill). Pat the chicken breasts dry with paper towel. Drizzle about two tablespoons olive oil on them. Rub it all over the breasts then sprinkle with the salt and pepper. Grill chicken on indirect heat for 15-20 minutes. (Keep the grill lid closed!)

Divide the goat cheese evenly for however many chicken breasts you are using. Do this now so it’s at room temperature for when it’s needed.

In a large skillet over medium heat, sauté the garlic and onion in the two tablespoons butter until transparent. Add the chicken broth and lemon juice. Increase the heat to medium-high and simmer until the juices have reduced to half. Reduce heat to low and make sure it’s cooled down. Add the cold butter pieces one at a time. You are creating a hot, emulsified butter sauce with the liquids and butter. Add the sun-dried tomatoes, basil, salt, and pepper. Break up the sun-dried tomatoes into smaller pieces if desired. Stir to blend all the ingredients.

Place your cooked chicken on a platter and top with the goat cheese. Let the meat rest a couple of minutes while the goat cheese begins to melt. Serve the sun-dried tomato sauce on top.

Note on ingredients: Sometimes in my laziness I substitute dried minced onions for the freshly chopped onion. Fresh basil is best, but I don’t always want to spend the money on it, and it’s not always doing well in my herb garden so I use dried; that’s why I included a measurement for that option. If you don’t have white pepper then you can use black. White pepper is just a tad bit hotter than black but is preferred often in light-colored sauces for aesthetic reasons (aka, so you don’t actually SEE black specks of pepper in your sauce).

Indirect heat? If you are not familiar with this term or method then let me tell you how to grill any meat perfectly! If I’m grilling 3-4 chicken breasts, then I will turn three burners on high to preheat with the lid closed. After preheating, I’ll  turn the middle burner on low-medium and the two outer burners on high then add the meat and close the grill lid. The chicken cooks indirectly keeping it from burning but heat circulates inside perfectly cooking the chicken. This is the best way to grill thicker pieces of meat (steaks, roasts, etc.).

Do you have a favorite recipe that is quick but company-worthy? Please share it with us below in the comments! I love trying new recipes.