Creamy Chicken and Cauliflower
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Tender, juicy golden-brown chicken cooked in a heavenly cream sauce with roasted cauliflower + baby spinach!
I’ve been trying to find ways to sneak in some veggies into my dinner. And this time, I’m sneaking in some perfectly roasted cauliflower florets and all the baby spinach for those extra greens.
With juicy, tender golden brown chicken swimming in that Parmesan-garlicky-cream-sauce, the veggies also soak up all that saucy goodness. Even the pickiest eaters won’t know what hit them.
You can serve with crusty bread (can’t have that sauce go to waste) along with a fresh sprinkling of Parmesan, if desired. The leftover wine can also go a long way here.
Creamy Chicken and Cauliflower
Ingredients
- 5 cups cauliflower florets
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 6 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 2 medium shallots, diced
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme leaves
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1 ¾ cups chicken broth
- ¼ cup dry white wine*
- 4 cups baby spinach
- ¼ cup freshly grated Parmesan
- ½ cup half and half
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Lightly oil a baking sheet or coat with nonstick spray.
- Place cauliflower in a single layer onto the prepared baking sheet. Add olive oil; season with salt and pepper, to taste. Gently toss to combine.
- Place into oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until golden brown.
- Season chicken thighs with 3/4 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper.
- Melt butter in a Dutch oven over medium heat. Working in batches, add chicken, skin-side down, and sear both sides until golden brown, about 2-3 minutes per side; set aside. Drain excess fat, reserving 2 tablespoons in the Dutch oven.
- Add shallot, and cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 3-5 minutes. Stir in garlic and thyme until fragrant, about 1 minute.
- Whisk in flour until lightly browned, about 1 minute.
- Stir in chicken broth and wine, scraping any browned bits from the bottom of the Dutch oven. Return chicken to the Dutch oven.
- Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, covered, until chicken has completely cooked through, reaching an internal temperature of 175 degrees F, about 15-20 minutes. Remove chicken and keep warm.
- Stir in spinach, Parmesan and half and half until the spinach has wilted, about 3 minutes. Stir in cauliflower until heated through, about 1-2 minutes. Return chicken to the Dutch oven.
- Serve immediately.
Notes
Did you make this recipe?
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Even my picky kids who are not eating cauliflower appreciated it and give it 10/10. Recomend!
This was a hit.  I had boneless skinless chicken thighs and some sad cauliflower.  I added mushrooms.  I don’t love cooking with cream but we had some from pizza last week.  Next time, I would add more herbs, roast some fennel and maybe some Dijon mustard. Â
2 adults exhausted after work enjoyed this, we don’t have kids.  Husband ate it on a bed of greens for texture. Â
This seems like a good base recipe to improvise.  I’m wondering if you could do coconut milk and switch the thyme to basil?  And no flour? Â
I’d love to hear if someone successfully tried coconut milk? I had the same thought.Â
This is positively delicious, and quick and easy to make on a weeknight. I added mushrooms, because let’s face it, everything is better with mushrooms. Will definitely make again soon. Would love more recipes with roasted cauliflower.
Rave reviews! Soooo delicious. My guy absolutely loved it and he praised each bite, and he’s a major foodie and excellent chef himself.Â
I took advice here and added more spinach and sautéed mushrooms, and I still had plenty of sauce (though I only cooked 5 thighs.) This would be great over rice or noodles.Â
A huge advantage to home cooks like me is that the recipes I find here are ALWAYS forgiving. Add something, delete something you don’t have, cook a little too long and you’ll still hit it out of the park.Â
Serving this recipe will be a proud moment for you, as well.Â
Thank you, dear Chungah and Damn Delicious staffers. You will always be my cooking gurus.Â
I want to preface this by saying that I LOVE this site and I love all the recipes that I’ve used on this site and I will continue to turn to this site whenever I need to make something delicious! That said, I was a teeny tiny bit disappointed with this recipe. Maybe it’s a “me” thing and I’m just not a fan of chicken thighs being soupy? But it didn’t turn out as creamy for me as I had hoped and it was actually quite runny and almost soupy. My gut was actually telling me to go with heavy cream instead of half and half and I’m sure that would have made all the difference, but I wanted to be healthier and went with half and half as per the recipe and it was a little too runny for my taste and made the chicken sort of mushy. Anyway, again, the flavor was still great and this site is great! Just wanted to include this review just in case there are others who might have a weird thing with wet chicken/skin! If you’re not weird like me then absolutely go for it! 🙂Â
Made it exactly as described including the stock for wine substitute listed. Added gnocchi to the plate as a side and it was amazing with the sauce! Hubs and 14 yo gave it 9/10, 16 yo gave it 7.5/10 cause it’s heavy and very filling (not a bad thing in my opinion). My suggestion is to prep all your ingredients, start browning the chicken then pop the cauliflower in the oven so it all comes together at the same time.  I used a very small head of cauliflower and ran out because everyone loved it. This is going in my  regular rotation! Easy enough to add more and expand the recipe for meal prep too.Â
5 Stars! Have made this several times and always gets great reviews. Thank you for this delicious meal recipe.
WE all loved this one! Super easy and I added a whole head of broccoli in addition to the cauliflower. I also doubled up on the spinach so it was super veggie! I used sour cream instead of the cheese and cream and it worked well. Also added paprika and some chili flakes for more flavour.
Thank you for commenting about extra veggies. It gave me the confidence to add more, and not a bite went to waste.Â
I love all these skillet chicken thigh recipes. They are on regular rotation in my meal planning. the roasted cauliflower was a nice addition. yum!
I am wondering if I can leave out the parm cheese without losing the flavor of the dish?
This was delicious! I made it with boneless skinless thighs since that’s all I found at the store and served over farro from Trader Joe’s.
Can the cream be substituted with Greek yogurt?Â
Absolutely delicious! Â This will become a regular on my menu!
This was amazing – putting on my favorites for the familyÂ
This turned out delicious! The whole family enjoyed it. My teenagers didn’t mind the wine. I didn’t use the full amount of wine and made sure it cooked off. I used heavy cream bc that was all I had. Will make again soon but a double batch as there were no leftovers.Â
Another hit dish! This was really damn delicious! Made it gluten free using GF all purpose flour and added mushrooms because my cauliflower was small. thank you for a yummy dinner enjoyed by all!
I took your advice on adding mushrooms, and it was fabulous.Â
This dish was fantastic…I almost never make cauliflower, but this was so so good. Served it over rice and the sauce was delicious. Will definitely make this again.Â
I need a little more flavor to my dishes, so I added more garlic, salt and pepper. It was good and I got my veggies in for the day.
will this recipe work with chicken breast? it looks so yummy and i hope chicken breast because my son doesn’t like the texture of chicken thigh. thanks
did you try chicken breast? I think the baking time would be reduced.
I made this last night, it was delicious ! The only changes I made was sprinkling a little smoked paprika along with the salt and pepper on the chicken before browning. There was plenty of sauce , next time I will make a little rice to serve with it so that we can enjoy it even more.
Just plated this meal. Two bites in and I had to stop to leave a comment. It’s fantastic!!! The only thing I did differently was that I used boneless skinless chicken thighs because that’s what I had on hand. I just used the lowest numbers in the cooking time ranges. It’s perfect. And the baguette to sop up the sauce is a must!!! Thanks for a great recipe!
Made this dish today 1/28/23. It was really good but I had a small problem. After I cooked the cauliflower everyone had to try it it was so good, so the final dish was a little short. BUT still amazing.
Can this recipe be made with boneless skinless chicken breasts?
Yes I’ve done it several times!