This Instant Pot Lemon Butter Chicken is cooked quickly in just 30 minutes thanks to the Instant Pot! Juicy chicken breast is covered in a decadent lemon butter sauce that tastes perfect over pasta, with rice, or simply on its own!
When I first bought an Instant Pot I was very intimidated by it, I actually let it sit almost a whole year before I actually tried it out. Once I got started though, it was a game-changer! I started with beginner-friendly recipes like my Instant Pot Beef Stew (my top recommended first-time Instant Pot recipe) and continued to experiment with recipes like today's chicken and lemon butter sauce.
(If you're new to the Instant Pot, check out my Instant Pot 101 post here!
Ingredients
- chicken breast
- onion
- garlic
- salt and pepper
- parsley
- paprika
- lemon juice
- butter
- cornstarch
Step by step
First, please forgive my inside-the-Instant-Pot photography, obviously I have a learning curve going on there! I thought it would be helpful for others who might not use their Instant Pots a lot because I found them a little intimidating at first as well.
This Instant Pot Chicken recipe starts with using it on the Saute setting to caramelize the onion and get a really good flavor to the butter base.
After that, add the chicken and sear it on both sides to make sure it stays nice and juicy and gets all that good flavor in it.
Once the chicken is seared, we switch over to the pressure cooking portion which has the chicken done in just 8 minutes if thawed, 15 minutes if you are starting from frozen. (I prefer to start from thawed but we all have those days we forget to take the meat out of the freezer, don't we?!)
After the meat is cooked you thicken up the sauce and serve it with your choice of starch.
Serving suggestions
My boys love this chicken and sauce over pasta, it's also great with mashed or scalloped potatoes, my favorite slow cooker rice, or mashed cauliflower or zoodles to stay lower carb. It's also great with a buttery slice of Texas toast on the side!
This Instant Pot chicken and lemon butter sauce
If you try this recipe please comment and rate it below, I love hearing from you!
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Instant Pot Chicken with Lemon Butter Sauce
- Prep Time: 10 min
- Cook Time: 8 minutes
- Total Time: 18 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
- Category: dinner
- Method: pressure cooker
- Cuisine: American
Description
Flavorful chicken in a buttery lemon sauce, perfect for serving over pasta, zoodles, rice or potatoes! Ready in just 30 minutes, this Instant Pot chicken recipe is a weeknight staple.
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons butter
- ½ red onion, diced
- 3 teaspoons minced garlic
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon parsley
- ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
- ½ teaspoon paprika
- juice of two lemons
- ¾ cup beef broth or beef bone broth
- 3-4 chicken breasts (about 2 lbs)
- 3 tablespoons cornstarch
Instructions
- Turn the Instant Pot to Saute mode and add butter, onion, garlic, and spices. Allow butter to melt and cook until onions are translucent and tender.
- Add chicken breasts and sear on 4 minutes each side or until outside is golden brown.
- Pour broth and lemon juice over chicken and shut Instant Pot lid. Turn to Pressure cooking mode for chicken. Set to 15 minutes if chicken was frozen, or 8 minutes if chicken was thawed. When finished cooking allow steam to release naturally, this should only take about 5 minutes.
- Remove chicken to plate. Return Instant Pot to Saute mode.
- In a small bowl mix cornstarch with about ¼ cup water and slowly add to liquid while stirring with a wire whisk. Bring to a boil then turn off heat and allow to thicken.
- Serve over pasta, zoodles, rice, or potatoes as desired.
Notes
Each serving is 3 Weight Watchers Freestyle Smart Points.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 8 oz chicken breast
- Calories: 375
- Sugar: 2.5 g
- Sodium: 779.7 mg
- Fat: 12 g
- Carbohydrates: 12.8 g
- Protein: 52.2 g
- Cholesterol: 180.7 mg
Keywords: instant pot lemon chicken
I hope you enjoy this easy weeknight dinner recipe, I know at my house any time I can get dinner on the table in 30 minutes or less is a success!
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Renee says
Just curious: Why use beef broth for a chicken and lemon dish. It seems to me that that would taste bad. (?) I have another recipe for lemon rice risotto that I make with a grilled lemon chicken and it uses chicken broth. I'm just curious why you use beef broth for this recipe? Thanks.
Melissa Riker says
You can definitely use chicken broth if you prefer, it just made it a little more savory to use beef.
Ashley says
Instant hit! I doubled the recipe using frozen chicken and did 30 min on poultry to make sure the chicken was completely cooked. Came out juicy and falling apart with loads of broth to make the sauce. So good!
★★★★★
Melissa Riker says
awesome, I'm so glad you liked it!
Di says
I made this today and it was delicious… The only change I made and would make in the future is that there’s way too much cornstarch. Instead of using 3 tablespoons I would use one because using the 3 tablespoons with the water the gravy ended up being like jelly. I added more beef broth and it was fine…..So the next time I would use maybe 1 tablespoon if not maybe only 2 teaspoons of cornstarch. But other than that it was delicious.
Rita says
I just made this tonight. I tweaked it adding wine, italian seasoning and pecorino Romano cheese on top. Also threw in frozen broccoli. Yum!
★★★★★
Melissa Riker says
Sounds like delicious add ins!
Brandy says
This is a great recipe, though I did employ some minor changes due to the amount I needed to make. I used chicken legs because that is what I had available, and was cooking for 7 people. (almost 2 legs a person.) In using them though, I had to sear the chicken in batches of 4, so after the first set of four were browned, I removed most of the onions/garlic from the pot, making sure to scrape the bottom to keep it from sticking, and adding just a bit more butter to help keep the mix from sticking, I cooked the others in about four batches, adding a bit of the onion mixture in each batch. I will say I did have to stop and clean out the bottom of the pan after the second batch because it was charring and didn't want that flavor in the dish. Not sure if it was due to differences in Instapots, or if it was just mine. I also doubled up on the beef broth, (used the concentrated liquid kind of beef bone broth). Paired it with white rice cooked in chicken bone broth, and it was very delicious. Definitely one to make again!
Melissa Riker says
So glad you liked it, thanks for sharing your adjustments for feeding a crowd!
Katie says
Dumb question but if it’s frozen chicken do you still sear it?
★★★★★
Jenna Bishop says
I had this same thought. Does frozen chicken sear?
★★★★★
Michele Sutin says
This was great. Next time I will add the garlic and parsley right before pressure cooking instead of the beginning.
Melissa says
This is addictive, I can't wait to make it again!
★★★★★
Emma says
This turned out great!!!
rabia says
can we use red pepper instead of black
★★★★★