Move Over, Steak—This Saucy Chicken Diane Is My Favorite Weeknight Fancy Meal

Sauce is the best part of any meal: this is the thesis I will use for my future (imaginary) TED Talk, thank you for coming. Not that I believe there are dissenters—reasonable people agree that sauce can make the simplest protein into something special. What is eggs Benedict without the rich Hollandaise, or Thanksgiving turkey without gravy?

Having a few fancy-but-easy sauces in your back pocket that are flexible enough to work on beef, chicken, pork, or vegetables makes it easy to take a simple dinner up a notch.

Why I Love Diane Sauce

In the nineties, I worked through college at a very chic and exclusive French restaurant. While the menu was loaded with classic cuisine, the dish the staff always reached for (and could afford) was the crêpes. Each day, a different savory crêpe made its way to the specials, but the highlight was always the sauce. 

The crêpes came draped in a rich, dark, and indulgent dressing that the savory fillings melted into. That was Diane sauce, traditionally reserved for the famous steak Diane. The ingredients married so well you’d have had trouble discerning any one element, and the resulting sauce had just enough silky richness without being overwhelming. 

I’ve recreated this sauce at home for thirty years since that restaurant job, but most often, I skip the steak in favor of a much lighter protein: chicken. By “bathing” chicken breasts in the sauce while cooking, this chicken Diane recipe keeps them moist, tender, and delectable.

Key Ingredients

It’s hard to imagine putting together the ingredients of this sauce—Cognac, butter, stock, and heavy cream—and not have it turn out delicious. Here are a couple of keys to making this sauce a success: 

• First, don’t use overly flavored or salty stock. You can choose to use the traditional beef stock for this sauce or switch to chicken stock, since the base is chicken. I like to make my own using Better Than Bouillon. Since the sauce cooks down and reduces, you don’t want it to get overly salty or harsh. If anything, lean lighter on your stock, rather than darker.
• Because this recipe calls for deglazing the pan you use for your chicken, I do recommend using the Cognac. The alcohol makes scraping the fond off the bottom of the pan easier. If you don’t drink or don’t want to use alcohol, though, you can replace the Cognac with 1/3 cup extra broth plus 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar.

The Right Pan to Use for Chicken Diane

Fond is the crispy, browned bits of food left in the pan as a result of cooking proteins like meat or poultry, which gives flavor to the sauce. While it’s not impossible to create fond in a nonstick pan, it’s certainly harder than using a stainless steel pan.

For that reason, choose a regular pan, without coating, for this recipe. And don’t be afraid to place your chicken breasts in the pan without any fat. The chicken will initially stick to the pan, but at the point when it’s time to turn it over, you’ll find it will have released from the pan’s surface.