Chicken with Olives in White Wine Sauce

Name: Chicken with Green Olives in White Wine Recipe
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 45 min
Total time: 1 h
Cuisine: Italian cuisine
Ingredients: Chicken thighs 4; Green olives 100 g; Dry white wine 1 cup (or rosé) (200 ml); Garlic 2-3 cloves; Olive oil 3 tbsp; Bay leaf 2-3; Rosemary, sage 2-3 sprigs of each fresh, or 0.5 tsp of each dried; Salt to taste

☆ Rate it

1 h

In Italian cuisine, chicken with green olives is a very common dish, given that olives go into probably most main courses. Usually it is made with chicken pieces or whole young chickens. One of the classic ways to make it is chicken Cacciatora (“hunter’s style”), with white wine, rosemary and green olives.

Of course, you always want plenty of meat in a main course. So it’s better to use thighs or whole legs. White meat turns out somewhat dry, so give preference to the dark meat of the chicken.

The dish is distinctive for its fairly generous use of aromatic herbs. Fresh rosemary and sage are almost always used. If you don’t have them, use dried herbs, and so they don’t spoil the look of the finished dish, put them in a sachet bag first and discard it later. It’s best to buy olives with pits and not the largest ones. The wine is white or rosé, and it’s important that it is a natural wine.

Ingredients

2 servings

Chicken thighs 4
Green olives 100 g
Dry white wine 1 cup (or rosé) (200 ml)
Garlic 2-3 cloves
Olive oil 3 tbsp
Bay leaf 2-3
Rosemary, sage 2-3 sprigs of each fresh, or 0.5 tsp of each dried
Salt to taste

Step-by-step recipe

Turn on cook modeKeeps your screen from turning off while the recipe is open

Preparing the ingredients

Chicken with olives is a delicate dish. It isn’t hard to make, but it needs your attention and personal involvement.

Prepare the ingredients: be sure to clean the chicken thighs of any remaining down and large pieces of fat. It’s better to use olives with pits rather than stuffed ones, since you don’t need extra flavors. If you don’t have fresh herbs, get dried ones ready.

How to fry and braise the chicken

Fry the chicken with garlic: heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. When the oil begins to sizzle, let it heat for 1-2 mins. Then add the unpeeled garlic cloves and the chicken thighs. Turning them, fry the meat on both sides until lightly golden. Don’t overfry the chicken or try to cook it through. What matters is that the thighs brown evenly.
Add the herbs and salt: put 2-3 sprigs each of fresh rosemary and sage into the pan. If you don’t have fresh ones, take a sachet bag and put 0.5 tsp of each dried herb in it, which is enough. Add 2-3 bay leaves and salt the meat.
Pour the dry wine, white or rosé, into the pan and heat it over high heat for 3-4 mins to let the alcohol evaporate.
By the way, I read somewhere that in southern Italy chicken with olives is often made with red wine.
Braise the chicken: turn the heat down to the minimum, cover the pan with a lid and braise for about 40 mins. By the end of cooking most of the liquid will be absorbed by the meat, and what remains will turn into a thick, light-colored sauce.
Add the olives: remove all the herbs or the spice bag from the sauce, if you used one. Take the green olives out of the brine and add them to the chicken. They don’t need any special cooking. Just let them warm through in the sauce for 5 mins, and the dish is completely ready.

Serving

Put the chicken thighs on a plate and add all the olives, then pour the remaining sauce over the meat. You can garnish with a sprig of fresh rosemary. Serve the chicken with green olives right away while it’s hot. Fresh bread and a glass of wine won’t hurt.
The chicken keeps for a couple of days in the fridge in an airtight container. Reheat it before serving.
This is the basic and most common way to make it. Quite often the ingredients also include onion and tomatoes, as well as sweet and hot pepper. Sometimes there are versions with mushrooms. Apparently, the idea of “hunter’s style” is interpreted quite broadly. Rabbit, various kinds of game and lamb are cooked the same way. It is served with bread or even pasta.

How did you like this recipe?

I really want to know how the recipe turned out for you.

Thanks for rating!

Calories and macros

870 kcal

Serving ≈ 330 g

Protein46 g21% of kcal
Fat73 g77% of kcal
Carbs5 g2% of kcal

100 g261 kcalProtein 13.6 gFat 21.9 gCarbs 1.5 g

Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.