This easy honey glaze produces an exceptionally moist and tasty grilled chicken breast. You can never have too many great chicken recipes. Just follow the easy step-by-step photo instructions.
Introduction
This one is easy to do and will become the favorite recipe for many backyard grillers. Fire up the grill and have at it.
The honey combines with lemon juice, garlic, soy sauce, and few common ingredients make a wonderful glaze with an exceptional taste combination.
I don't have an "inspired by" for this recipe. Maybe an email from Cooks Illustrated, but that just triggered the idea. After reading many recipes, I jumped in.
My Rating
A 5 coming from my wife, who is usually lower than me. I'm at a low five. To get to a full five, you need to brine. See note below.
🐓The Chicken
The size of the breasts is also important. Try not to use those huge thick breasts. With a sugar-type glaze, you will end up burning the outside before the inside gets to the safe 165° internal temperature.
If the thickness of the breasts is over ¾ inches, get out the meat mallet and get them down to about ¾ inch thick. If you don't have a mallet, then the bottom of a heavy pan will do. It doesn't have to be exact, but close, please.
🧂Optional Brine
Like all skinless chicken breasts grilled, there was some dryness, not much, but a brine would make it a full 5.
A suggested brine would be two cups water and one tablespoons table salt for an hour or two. If you brine, then rinse and skip the salt before brushing with the honey mixture.
1 teaspoon table salt = 1 ¼ teaspoon Morton kosher salt = 2 teaspoons Diamond Crystal kosher salt
♨️The Grill
Finally, grill surface temperature at about 450°. You must be able to know the temperature you are cooking at to be successful doing any grilling.
I think most grilling failures are due to people driving blind. If you closed your eyes and tried to drive around the block, you probably would not be very successful. You need the information from your eyes to be successful.
Get a surface thermometer. Go to Amazon or your local hardware store and spend your $10. You will save many times that in ruined food. While you are there, get an instant-read thermometer, also.
See A Beginners Guide to Grill Temperature on a Gas Grill for a complete discussion.
📖Chicken Breast Recipes
How to Grill Chicken Breasts on a Gas Grill
How to Bake Chicken Breasts in a Convection Oven
Parmesan Mayonnaise Baked Skinless Chicken Breast
Pan Seared Oven Baked Chicken Breast
Garlic Lemon Marinaded Grilled Skinless Boneless Chicken Breast
This recipe is listed in these categories. See them for more similar recipes.
🖼️Step-by-Step Photo Instructions
Start with skinless boneless chicken breasts. Trim nicely. If you have time, brine in 2 cups water and 1 tablespoon salt for an hour or two. Be sure to rinse well after brining.
Mix the glaze of 2 tablespoons each of honey, soy sauce, lemon juice, and olive oil. Add ½ teaspoon garlic powder. Mix well—Reserve ¾ of the mixture for later.
Give each breast a little salt (if not brined) and pepper to taste, then brush the glaze on both sides of the chicken.
Allow the chicken to rest at room temperature for 15 minutes (maximum) while cleaning, oiling, and preheating the grill to a surface temperature of about 450°-500°—probably medium-high on most grills.
Place over direct heat. After about 5-6 minutes, flip the chicken and brush with glaze.
Continue to flip every 5-6 minutes and brush until an internal temperature of 165°—about 25 minutes. But your time may vary—Cook to the final internal temperature of 165° in the thickest area.
Allow to rest for 5 minutes before serving.
📖Recipe
Honey Glazed Grilled Chicken Breast
Ingredients
- 2 skinless boneless chicken breasts
Honey Glaze
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- Kosher salt and pepper to taste
Optional Brine
- 2 cups water
- 1 tablespoon salt
Instructions
- Start with skinless boneless chicken breasts—trim nicely. If you have time, brine in 2 cups water and 1 tablespoon salt for an hour or two. Be sure to rinse well after brining.
- Mix the glaze of 2 tablespoons each of honey, soy sauce, lemon juice, and olive oil. Add ½ teaspoon garlic powder. Mix well. Reserve ¾ of the mixture for later.
- Give each breast a little salt (if not brined) and pepper to taste, then brush the glaze on both sides of the chicken. Don't forget to reserve ¾ of the glaze for brushing during grilling.
- Allow the chicken to rest at room temperature for 15 minutes (maximum) while cleaning, oiling, and preheating the grill to a surface temperature of about 450°-500°—medium-high on most grills.
- Place over direct heat. Be sure the grates are well oiled.
- After about 5-6 minutes, flip the chicken and brush with glaze. Continue to flip every 5-6 minutes and brush until an internal temperature of 165°—about 25 minutes. But your time may vary—cook to the final internal temperature of 165° in the thickest area.
- Allow to rest for 5 minutes before serving.
My Private Notes
Recipe Notes
Pro Tips:
- Brine if you have time. 1 teaspoon table salt = 1 ¼ teaspoon Morton kosher salt = 2 teaspoons Diamond Crystal kosher salt.
- If you brine, rinse off the brine well and do not add any more salt.
- Critical point #1 - Flatten to ¾ inch thick if needed.
- Critical Point #2 - Grill surface temperature of about 450°.
- Critical Point #3 - Remove at 165°. Lower is not safe. Higher will dry.
- Rest for 5 minutes before cutting.
- Be sure to oil grill grates well to start to prevent sticking.
- To do this right, you should have a grill surface thermometer and an instant-read thermometer.
To adjust the recipe size:
You may adjust the number of servings in this recipe card under servings. This does the math for the ingredients for you. BUT it does NOT adjust the text of the instructions. So you need to do that yourself.
Nutrition Estimate
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Originally Published July 19, 2014. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation. The original recipe was named honey crusted but glazed is more accurate to me.
Celestine Armstrong Erby
Hi There, can I substitute with mayonnaise instead of olive oil in the honey sauce?
Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan
Hi Celestine,
Welcome to the blog. I have some major doubts about how well that will work. I do have a nice mayo breast recipe that is oven based https://www.101cookingfortwo.com/parmesan-mayonnaise-baked-skinless/
Dan
Scotty
Can I use chicken legs?
Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan
Hi Scotty,
Welcome to the blog.
The answer is probably. I have never done it but I grill drumsticks longer. Please see https://www.101cookingfortwo.com/art-of-drummies-grilling-chicken/ So the legs will need to cook longer so be careful about all the sugar burning.
Dan
Timothy Enns
Very nice recipe. It was my clear inspiration. I replaced the soy sauce with Coconut Aminos (4 T) and added all of the ingredients into a Sous Vide bag. Cooked at 141 for 1 and 1/2 hours. Then finished on the grill, glazing with the Sous Vide juices. Optionally, you could glaze with a BBQ sauce. Wellbee’s BBQ is great and compliant with our diet restrictions.
Nora
has anyone made it the oven? if so what temp, how long? Out of gas and don't have a grill pan. Recipe sounds really good! Thanks
Corine Wilber
Not sure if you figured out the answer, but I'm going to try tonight! I already brined my chicken and it starting POURING outside. I'm going to try 425 and rotating and glazing every five minute as instructed when cooking on the grill. I'll let you know how it turns out!
Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan
Hi Corine,
Welcome to the blog.
Your plan probably will work. You probably should check out https://www.101cookingfortwo.com/baked-chicken-breasts/ since you have done half that recipe. Maybe just bake per those instructions. Glaze the top then flip halfway and glaze again.
Dan
Mike Fisher
Dan, I made this tonight for the wife and myself. It was perfect. I put it in the brine for an hour beforehand. Moist on the inside, sweet and sticky on the outside. Great recipe. Thanks!
Mike
Tim Burke
Used the recipe on chicken tenderloins, soooooo delicious!!! Currently trying it on some home cut pork chops right this minute, made a nice spicy teriyaki BBQ sauce to go with, idk if it's gonna work out or not, keeping my fingers crossed!!
DrDan
Hi Tim,
First, sorry for the delayed reply.
Hope that teriyaki worked well for you.
Thanks for the note.
Dan
Loraine
This recipe was awesome! The best yet. Hubby just got a Weber grill and followed ur recipe to a tee.. moist inside too for being a chx breast...Thxs!!
Dawn Burke
This recipe was amazing! I didn't have lemon juice on hand so substituted with orange juice and it was great! This recipe is a keeper! Thank you!!
DrDan
Thanks for the note and rating.
DrDan
Cheryl Barnes
I made this tonight. YUMMY!!!!! Unfortunately I had to make it on a grill pan on my stove because our outdoor grill wasn't gassed up tonight. lol. This was soooooo delicious and moist and I didn't do the brine first. It was so tasty that my husband volunteered to do the dishes. :-). Thank you so much for this recipe. I will be making this again!
I have one question/suggestion is nutritional info available? I put everything I eat into the my fitness pal app and it would be super if that was available. Thank you.
Suzanne
This recipe looks sooo good. Will be cooking it this week.