Paprika Chicken with a Simple Pan Sauce

This paprika chicken holds a special place in my heart! This chicken recipe is so simple, yet so full of flavor! Paprika and lime upgrade regular old chicken and give it show stopping color and flavor. The chicken alone is absolutely fantastic, but when you make the simple pan sauce, it goes from simple weeknight meal to something really special!

While we’re going to call it paprika chicken for blogging purposes, in my family, this chicken goes by Jimmy Chicken. Named after my late Godfather, Jimmy. Jimmy could whip up an absolutely restaurant quality meal for our families to enjoy while the adults reminisced about the old days and us kids got into various kinds of mischief in the Colorado mountains.

There are CORE memories rooted in this recipe. While this paprika chicken recipe has never been written down…until now… it didn’t stay in Colorado. My Mother made her version Jimmy Chicken at least once a month for us growing up. We never tired of it! I knew it had to be a part of Honey, I’m Hungry! After a few back and forth messages with my Mother we landed on what we recall as the original Jimmy Chicken recipe, we got it written down for you! This recipe is near and dear to our hearts, I hope your tastebuds will enjoy it as much as ours.

Keys to Success

• Don’t get the heat too high – Because you’ll be using the pan you used to cook the chicken and brown bits (also known as, fond if you want to be chefy) left on the bottom of the pan, you don’t want the bottom of the pan to burn. Medium heat is perfect!
• Don’t forget to turn the heat down – when making the pan sauce, don’t forget to turn the heat down! If your pan is too hot, your sauce could break. Nobody wants a broken sauce.
• Massage that chicken! You want every millimeter of that chicken coated in the marinade. The plastic bag is the perfect vessel to make sure you get everything covered in the delicious paprika lime marinade.
• Serve immediately – Some recipes are for making ahead of time, and some are not. This paprika chicken comes together so quickly there’s no need to make it ahead of time. Save this recipe for when you’re going to cook and serve.
• Thin chicken is key – If you don’t have a meat pounder/tenderizer, you can place the chicken under a layer of plastic wrap and use a rolling in to flatten the chicken. Heck, you could even use an aluminum can of baked beans or the like! This is a fantastic way to get out any anger or aggression after a tough day. Get a head start on the process by buying the thin sliced chicken breast at the grocery store.

How to Serve Paprika Chicken

Growing up, we ate Jimmy Chicken with steamed broccoli or Zucchini. There may or may not be a couple of stories about me sneaking my broccoli to the dogs under the table to avoid eating it. Yes, I got busted eventually, but it was a good run while it lasted. While the side of veggies this made for a complete meal for us kids, I like enjoy a little differently as an adult.

I love this chicken over a bed of rice with the pan sauce poured over the top and garnished with a lime wedge and scallions for a little extra brightness and crunch. I think the way I like to serve this dish…without vegetables…is a rebellion against the unwanted veggies of my childhood. HA!

If I were to pair a veggie with this dish today, zucchini or summer squash would be my go to. While I like to spoon the sauce over the top, you could also add the chicken back to the pan and coat each breast in sauce before serving as well. We’ve made this recipe ours, now you can make it yours.

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