Curried Apricot Chicken

I taught several quick and easy pantry recipes this past Tuesday night at our church to the Relief Society. Several women gathered to learn some hands on prepping of four main dishes for quick & easy weeknight meals for their families. The recipes I demonstrated utilized pantry ingredients and other items you typically would have on hand. 


Holly & I enjoy curried apricot chicken. I grew up eating this quite a bit. I learned how to make this from my Mom, and it's pretty versatile. We make this easy dish all the time for a quick dinner. I typically serve this over rice or some couscous. Often times I'll even add in some chopped dried apricots to the dish as well while it cooks down. And I always look for organic style preserves free of corn syrup and made with reduced amounts of cane sugar. Same approach to the dressing. I like the Roasted Red Pepper dressing base the best as it typically has no sugar in it's ingredient list. You can pretty much substitute whichever way you choose. No need for extra salt in this recipe, as there is ample amounts of salt in the dry onion soup mix base. 


Dan's Curried Apricot Chicken


6 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, or 2.5 pounds boneless chicken thighs 
1 1/2 (1 ounce) packages dry onion soup mix
1 (10 fluid ounce) bottle Russian-style, Catalina-style, or Roasted Red Pepper-style salad dressing
1 cup apricot preserves or apricot jam 
1 T curry powder (mild, medium or hot) 
Fresh ground pepper to taste 
Dried apricots, diced - optional 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Place the chicken pieces in a 4 quart casserole dish. Mix the soup mix, dressing, curry powered, pepper and jam together, and pour over the chicken. Cover dish and bake for 1 hour in preheated oven.