This creamy ranch chicken recipe is comforting and delicious with juicy pan-seared chicken breasts in a zesty and flavorful cream sauce. Serve it with some mashed potatoes, rice, or egg noodles to soak up all that rich gravy.
Today we’re making some creamy ranch chicken that’s an easy skillet meal with simple ingredients but incredible flavor. Ranch seasoning is the star of the show and elevates the humble chicken breast giving you savory comfort food with a ton of sauce to go around. Spoon it over mashed potatoes, serve it on a bed of white rice, or ladle it generously over a bowl of warm buttered egg noodles.
It’s a simple, must-try recipe if you’re looking for a way to dress up plain chicken. The chicken is seasoned and pan-seared in some butter until crisp and golden. A creamy ranch sauce is made from a combination of chicken broth, milk, ranch, sour cream, onion and garlic powder, and Italian seasoning. Serve this at the dinner table for a ranch-flavored meal the whole family will enjoy, like this well-loved bacon ranch pasta salad.
For more chicken recipes with a delicious sauce, try this chicken Lazone, creamy mushroom chicken, honey garlic chicken, or slow cooker chicken and gravy.
How To Make Creamy Ranch Chicken (1 Min Video)
Ingredients in Creamy Ranch Chicken
CREAMY RANCH CHICKEN RECIPE TIPS
- Chicken – Pound the chicken breasts to an even thickness so it cooks evenly. A mounded center usually means the ends will be drier by the time the thicker part finishes cooking. You can use a meat mallet and place the chicken breasts between some plastic wrap, parchment paper, or in a Ziploc bag.
- Two-hand seasoning method – The easiest way to minimize hand washing while seasoning meat is to use the dry and wet hand method. Use your dominant hand to sprinkle seasoning onto the meat and use your other hand to pat in seasonings and flip the chicken.
- Seasoning – Work the salt and pepper into the chicken breasts by massaging them in.
- Butter – I like using Land O Lakes butter. The half sticks are perfect for slicing off into cubes and they come with measurements by the tablespoon or cup written onto the packaging so you can skip measuring spoonfuls of butter.
- Flour – This helps thicken the sauce. After adding it to the melted butter, the mixture will bubble a little while cooking.
- Chicken broth – Use low-sodium chicken broth since there’s already enough sodium from the ranch seasoning packet.
- Sour cream – This adds more flavor and thickens the sauce a little. I used 1/4 cup of sour cream to balance out the flavors so it tastes more like ranch dressing than sour cream. If you prefer a stronger sour cream flavor, feel free to increase this amount to about 1/2 cup. Use full-fat sour cream so it doesn’t curdle in the sauce.
- Ranch dip seasoning mix – I used one (1 oz.) packet of Hidden Valley Ranch dry seasoning. If you’re uncomfortable with the amount of sodium, try using half a packet of ranch seasoning instead. You might also be able to substitute the dry mix with regular ranch dressing from the bottle but I have not personally tested this.
- Leftovers – Leftovers will keep in the fridge for up to 3 days.
- Reheat – Reheat this in the microwave or in a pan over low heat. Add a splash of milk if needed to loosen up the sauce when reheating.
Customize It!
- Add more flavor – Top the chicken with some chunky bacon bits before serving or add them into the sauce.
What to Serve with Creamy Ranch Chicken
Serve this creamy chicken with some starch that will absorb all that yummy sauce. The chicken pairs wonderfully with mashed potatoes, rice, or noodles. Add some veggies to balance out the meal like green beans, garlic Parmesan roasted broccoli, lemon pepper asparagus, or some garlic butter mushrooms.
And that’s about it. Enjoy your meal and let me know how you liked it, what substitutions you made and what you paired it with in the comments below!
This post was originally published on November 19, 2017 and updated on September 25, 2022.
MORE CHICKEN BREAST RECIPES TO TRY
- Easy Oven-Baked Chicken
- Garlic Butter Baked Chicken Breast
- Baked Parmesan Crusted Chicken
- Honey Garlic Butter Chicken
- Chicken with Lemon Garlic Cream Sauce
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Creamy Ranch Chicken
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
Description
This creamy ranch chicken recipe is comforting and delicious with juicy pan-seared chicken breasts in a zesty and flavorful cream sauce.
Ingredients
- 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (5–8 oz. each)
- Salt and pepper
- 3 tablespoons butter, divided
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 tablespoon flour
- Fresh parsley, to garnish (optional)
SAUCE
- 1 cup low sodium chicken broth
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/4 cup sour cream
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
- 1 (1 oz.) packet Ranch seasoning mix
Instructions
- Pound the chicken breasts to an even 1” thickness using a meat mallet and season both sides of the chicken with salt and pepper.
- In a skillet over medium-high heat, melt 1 tablespoon of butter and add olive oil. Sear the chicken on each side until golden brown, about 4-5 minutes per side. Remove to a plate and set aside.
- Reduce heat to low and add the remaining butter. Stir in flour and cook for about one minute.
- Pour in chicken broth and scrape up the browned bits stuck to the pan.
- Add milk, sour cream, onion powder, garlic powder, Italian seasoning and ranch seasoning mix. Stir to combine until the sour cream and ranch seasoning has fully dissolved into the sauce.
- Add chicken and plate juices back to the pan and spoon the sauce over the chicken. Simmer in the sauce until the chicken is heated through and the sauce has reduced slightly.
- Dish and serve hot topped with fresh parsley (optional).
- Enjoy!
Notes
- I used boneless, skinless chicken breasts on the smaller side (about 5-8 oz. each). If you have large chicken breasts, cut 2 breasts in half lengthwise to get 4 chicken cutlets.
- Use full-fat sour cream so it doesn’t curdle in the sauce.
- Add more flavor – Top the chicken with some chunky bacon bits before serving or add them into the sauce.
- Scroll up to RECIPE TIPS for more useful tips, suggestions and ingredient substitutions.
- Prep Time: 10 mins
- Cook Time: 30 mins
Comments & Reviews
This has become one of my husbands favorites recipes! I had to share with another friend out of state on something to serve for people coming in from out of town and she says it was a hit! Love, love, love it!
Love hearing that and thank you for sharing the recipe with others! I’m so happy to have helped you find a new staple 🙂
This was really good. My picky daughter even liked it.
Glad to hear it, Kourtney! This recipe is a well-loved reader favorite and it’s great to hear it’s even winning over the picky eaters 🙂
I really liked the sauce too but I was concerned about the saltiness of the Ranch so I only used pepper when browning the chicken. I made extra sauce and added some bite sized yellow potatoes and then some spinach at the end. (Had some to use up.) Very good- will make it again.
That’s a good way to cut the sodium along with switching chicken broth to low sodium. I’m glad you were able to adapt it to your liking without sacrificing the flavor! Potatoes and spinach are a great way to bulk up this meal.
I try it and it was good
Wonderful to hear, Corriell! Thank you for trying it out 🙂
The chicken came out so nice and juicy and the flavors were amazing! I added mushrooms and green peas, which made for a nice combination!
Love the mushrooms in there! I’m a big fan of mushrooms anything and they compliment chicken so well. Thank you for sharing your add-ons, Justine!
This was SO good! Everyone loved it! Will make again but will double the sauce next time!
The more sauce, the better! More to soak up the mashed potatoes 😀
This was good but we thought it was very salty. Instead of 1 oz. Of ranch dressing, we thought we would halve that amount next time. Will definitely make again.
That’s a good way to start. Let me know how halving it next time works out for you – I hope it’s more to your taste.
Very good!! Made it with rice! Did not disappoint!!
Glad to hear you enjoyed it 🙂 I bet the rice + sauce was delicious! I love using rice with gravy/sauce.
Made this for dinner last night with mashed potatoes, we really enjoyed it and will make it again. Thank you! 👍🙏👍
Yum, we had ours with mashed potatoes too. It was a perfect vessel for all that extra sauce. Glad to hear it worked out just as well for you, Tom!
Made this for supper tonight…YUM!!! The only change we made was to serve over noodles. Will definitely be making it in our rotation of meals. I will be watching for more great ideas.
I hope you find other recipes you to try and enjoy just as much. Happy cooking and thanks for sharing, Wendy!
Could I use light sour cream without it curdling? It’s what I have on hand but don’t want to ruin the recipe.
I personally have not tried this recipe with light sour cream. If you do decide to try it, I would simmer it over very low heat and baby that sauce. Anything past a certain heat point might make it curdle. A trick you could try is to temper the sour cream by adding a couple of tablespoons of the sauce to the sour cream and mixing it up. This slowly brings up the temperature of the sour cream to prevent it from curdling later. Then slowly mix in the sour cream with the sauce.
This was absolutely delicious!! I ended up making it in the oven in a 13×9 casserole dish w/o sautéing the chicken first b/c I was in a hurry. I made the sauce as instructed, added a little extra flour to thicken it up and used 1/2C sour cream instead of the 1/4C. This was hands down the best tasting and easiest chicken dish I’ve made all year. Served it with rice and fresh green beans…sooo yum! Thanks for the recipe!
You’re welcome, Elaine! Also, thank you for sharing your experience in baking this instead of making it over the stovetop. This should help others looking to adapt it the same way 🙂
How long did you bake it in the oven? And were your chicken breasts completely thawed?
I would try 400°F for 20 minutes in the oven with completely thawed chicken breasts.
How would I go about making the sauce would I just add all the ingredients in a baking pan with the chicken or cook it prior to baking it with the chicken and then add it in when I bake the chicken?
I’m going to be cooking it in the oven also. Should i cook the sauce on the stovetop first then add it to the pan? Was curious how you did that. THANKS
I haven’t personally tested this chicken with the baked method yet, but you should add some flour to help thicken the sauce (since you’re not simmering it down on the stovetop) then pour the sauce mixture over the chicken so it has some moisture while baking and absorbs all the flavor. Cover the casserole dish with foil and bake at 400°F for 20 minutes.
This should work and I hope it helps! Let me know how it turned out for you and how much flour you added. I will eventually have a baked version of this on the blog since it also seems to be popular.
Great receipes, thank you!
You are very welcome, Beverly! I hope you try out more of them and happy cooking 🙂
Do you have a version of this for slow cooker?
Not yet although it is in the works. In the meantime, if you were to try it I would suggest it on LOW for 3-4 hours. Skip the flour, butter, olive oil, substitute milk for heavy cream – you want higher fat content so it does not curdle. Only add dairy (sour cream, heavy cream) towards the end, maybe in the last hour or so.
Made this for supper tonight. Added diced onion and minced garlic instead of the powders, and also added some mushrooms. Used Better than Bullion Italian herb instead of Italian seasoning, and used Tuscan chicken broth. Sides were rice cooked in the Tuscan chicken broth green beans cooked with baby potatoes. Definitely will make again.
Great substitutions switching out the powders with fresh aromatics. I usually mention that option in my notes – looks like I missed it in this post! I have Better than Bouillon roasted chicken and beef as staples in my pantry but never heard of Italian herb before. It’s on my try list now!