Skip the restaurant wait times and recreate Olive Garden’s most beloved dish in your own kitchen. This chicken marsala delivers all the luxurious flavors of the Italian classic with tender, flour-crusted chicken simmered in a rich marsala wine sauce with earthy mushrooms. What makes this recipe truly special is its simplicity (one pan does it all!) and the restaurant-quality results you’ll achieve in just 40 minutes.
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What Makes the Olive Garden Chicken Marsala the Perfect Weekend Dinner
If you want to skip the crowds at Olive Garden this weekend, why not try making your version at home?
With this recipe, you can quickly whip up a delicious meal and enjoy quality time with your loved ones. It’s the perfect way to unwind after a busy week. The famous Italian dish feels so luxurious and indulgent. It is undoubtedly a great way to spoil your family!
Why You Should Try This Recipe
The secret to authentic chicken marsala lies in the flour dredging technique, which creates a golden crust that seals in juices while providing the perfect base for the sauce to cling to. The dry marsala wine reduces during cooking, concentrating its complex flavors and creating that signature restaurant-quality sauce. Cooking everything in one pan allows the chicken to absorb the wine and mushroom flavors while the fond (browned bits) add incredible depth to the final sauce.
Ingredients
For the Chicken:
- Cake flour – Creates a lighter, more delicate coating than all-purpose flour
- Salt – Enhances all flavors and helps tenderize the chicken
- Freshly ground black pepper – Adds warmth and complexity to the flour mixture
- Dried oregano – Provides classic Italian herb flavor throughout the coating
- Chicken breasts – The protein base that becomes tender and juicy when properly cooked
- Cooking oil – Provides high-heat cooking fat for proper searing
- Butter – Adds richness and helps achieve golden-brown color
For the Sauce:
- White button mushrooms – Provide earthy flavor and meaty texture that complements the wine
- Yellow onion – Adds sweetness and depth to the overall sauce flavor
- Dry marsala wine – The star ingredient that creates the signature rich, complex sauce
How to Make Olive Garden Chicken Marsala
- Combine the flour, salt, pepper, and oregano and blend well.
- Heat oil and butter in a large skillet over medium heat until bubbling lightly.
- Dredge the chicken in the flour mixture and shake off the excess.
- Cook the chicken for about 2 minutes on the first side, until lightly brown.
- Turn over the chicken and add the mushrooms and onion around the chicken pieces.
- Cook for about 2 minutes more, until the chicken is golden brown on the second side.
- Stir the sliced mushrooms.
- Add the Marsala wine, cover the pan, and simmer for about 10 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through.
- Serve the chicken covered with the marsala sauce. Garnish with fresh parsley if desired.
What to Serve with Copycat Olive Garden Chicken Marsala
This is the perfect opportunity for you to make other Olive Garden dishes. Serve this recipe with Olive Garden fried mozzarella sticks, steamed broccoli, or Olive Garden house salad. You can also serve it on a bed of fettuccine noodles or rice, which is equally delicious!
Storage & Reheating Instructions
- Freezing: Best enjoyed fresh, but can freeze for up to 2 months. Thaw completely before reheating
- Refrigerator Storage: Store in airtight containers for up to 4 days. Keep chicken and sauce together to maintain moisture
- Reheating Method: Oven method preferred. Reheat at 350°F for 20-30 minutes until heated through. The stovetop works too – cover and heat gently over medium heat, flipping chicken once
Love Olive Garden? Try these copycat recipes
- Chicken Scampi
- Cappellini Pomodoro
- Crispy Chicken Fritta
- Fettuccine Alfredo
- Shrimp Caprese
- Fried Mozzarella
Popular Italian Recipes
- Cavatini
- Pasta with Eggs and Parmesan Cheese
- Pasta con Broccoli
- Shrimp Pasta with White Wine Sauce
- Chicken Gorgonzola Pasta
- Gnocchi
- Homemade Italian Sausage
You can find the best Olive Garden copycat recipes at CopyKat.com, the web’s most popular destination for copycat restaurant recipes.
Olive Garden Chicken Marsala Copycat
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup cake flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/4 cup oil
- 4 ounces butter
- 2 1/2 pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts
- 1 cup sliced fresh mushrooms
- 1 medium onion sliced (optional)
- 1/2 cup dry Marsala wine
Instructions
- Combine the flour, salt, pepper, and oregano and mix well.
- Heat the oil and butter in a large skillet over medium heat until bubbling lightly.
- Dredge the chicken in the flour mixture and shake off the excess.
- Cook the chicken for about 2 minutes on the first side, until lightly brown. Flip the breasts and add the mushrooms and onions (if desired) around the chicken. Cook for about 2 more minutes, until the chicken is lightly browned on the second side.
- Add the wine, stir the vegetables, cover, and simmer for about 10 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through.
This recipe looks amazing!ish!
I searched for a copycat Chicken Marsala after having some at Olive Garden and I came across this recipe. Using 1/2 a cup of Marsala wine is in no way enough liquid for this recipe to be like Olive Garden’s! Here’s what I did to make this much more like Olive Garden’s:
I doubled up on the flour and seasonings. Dredged the chicken.
I used the chicken tender part of the chicken breasts and pan fried both sides in butter and oil to brown, then removed them to a platter.
Add 1 cup Marsala wine in the pan to scrape up any bits, add 2 Tbsp unsalted butter, heat to cook off the alcohol, measure out 1.5 cups of beef broth, whisk in 1 tsp cornstarch and the remainder of the flour that the chicken was dredged in plus 1/2 tsp chicken bouillon, 1/2 tsp onion powder, 1/2 tsp garlic powder (in place of using an actual onion), whisk until smooth, add to the pan of Marsala wine stirring well, heat through, toss in the sliced mushrooms, and some asparagus cut into 2″ length pieces and allow to cook for 5 minutes stir occasionally, add in the chicken pieces and cover, cook on medium low an additional 5 minutes or until the chicken pieces reach an internal temperature of at least 163F.
I served this with pasta. It tasted almost exactly like Olive Garden’s and we loved it!!
This was amazing. I served mines with white rice. Use the cooking wine
The printed recipe states to heat the oil and butter together and cook the chicken in it… however, you didn’t add the butter until the chicken was cooked and out of the pan. Does it matter which way you do it?
Please follow the written recipe.
This recipe is so delicious and is easy to make, I will make it again.
Thank you so much….I loved watching you make this …I loved all the comments in the notes I’m going to buy the Lombardo dry Marsala wine and try to make it exactly like Olive garden it’s my favorite dish in the world I love the flavor of that wine and butter and chicken yum yum
can you use the bottle of marsela cooking wine?
You could do that.
Saw the comments about soy sauce & molasses. Sounds like a splash of teriyaki sauce would do the trick. Yum!
Stephanie are you out there? i asked about olive garden marsala sauce in late december it is the original marsala sauce not the stuffed .
Sure, I may have missed your original post with the holidays. I think they key here is to figure out exactly what type of Marsala that they use. I understand it is a proprietary wine. I think the recipe and the technique is ok, again the question is to find the right marsala.
Someone who worked at Olive Gardens told me it’s Lombardo dry marsala.
good but just standard marsala sauce. DOES ANYONE KNOW HOW TO MAKE OLIVE GARDENS RICH BROWN MARSALA SAUCE????????
To make the rich Marsala sauce, you are suppose to heat the wine, stirring in pieces of butter at a time while whisking constantly so the mixture doesn’t break.
Do you pound the chicken breast to make them flat?
I think it is always smart to pound them a bit if they are of uneven size. It’s not required but can help with the cooking time.
Oh my god!
I made this today and it was wonderful. I modified a little added 8 ounces of mushrooms half a white onion some extra butter and more wine. I did this because wanted extra sauce for my mashed potatoes. Also served it withe garlic butter asparagus it was so delicious. This was a very easy dish to prep and cook
Oh my god!
I make this today and it was wonderful. I modified a little added 8 ounces of mushrooms half a white onion some extra butter and more wine. I did this because wanted extra sauce for my mashed potatoes. Also served it withe garlic butter asparagus it was so delicious. This was a very easy dish to prep and cook