Air Fryer Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce
Air Fryer Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce sounds fancy but it’s made with simple ingredients. Chicken, butter, flour, broth, and Cajun seasoning is all you need for this delicious dinner.
Some of you might be saying, “What in the world is velouté sauce?” It sounds so fancy. It is one of the five mother sauces. They are called mother sauces because they’re the base that many other sauces are created from.
Initially, I was going to use a bechamel to make a mornay sauce for macaroni and cheese, but I didn’t have cheese. To some, I might be speaking a foreign language, but if you’ve thickened milk with butter and flour and added cheese to it to make macaroni and cheese, then you’ve done just that. Made a mornay sauce from a bechamel.
What are the five mother sauces?
I touched a bit on that in my post about Espagnole Tater Tot Poutine. And I should have touched on that in my Chicken Chasseur post because apparently chasseur is part of espagnole sauce. I didn’t even know that until I did some research for this post. Maybe I’ll go back and mention that in that post. We’ll see.
The five sauces are:
- Bechamel
- Velouté
- Espagnole
- Tomato
- Hollandaise
From bechamel, you can make mornay, like I mentioned above. That’s perfect for macaroni and cheese and lasagna. Soubise is another sauce where you simmer onions in the bechamel and then strain the sauce. Nantua is another version where you add in cream, butter, paprika, and shellfish. That sounds delicious.
Velouté is the base for many delicious sauces and the icing on the cake of my Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce. Allemande adds in eggs and cream. Suprême has lemon and cream for a vibrant flavor to top asparagus or pork. Finally, cardinal sauce has fish stock, cream, cayenne, and lobster. All delicious combined into a sauce. This sauce would be perfect on air fryer cornish hens, too!
Espagnole, which I discussed previously lends itself to not chasseur, but chateaubriand with wine, shallots, lemon, and tarragon. Bordelaise, as you might have guessed, has red wine (Bordeaux?) shallots, bay and thyme. Robert is perfect for steaks with onion, mustard, sugar, and butter. Finally, there’s duxelles sauce with onions, mushrooms, white wine, and tomatoes.
Tomato sauce needs no true introduction. From tomato sauce you can make Creole, Spanish, Milanese, Neapolitan, and Bolognese just to name a few. All sauces that are more commonly used in our house than any of the others I’ve mentioned.
Finally, there’s hollandaise. From there you can make béarnaise with shallots, tarragon, and vinegar. I made a version of this sauce with my Filet with Crabéarnaise. I added crab to the sauce. The other sauces I’ve never heard of. Mousseline made with whipped cream. Interesting. Maltaise made with orange juice and zest. Grimrod only adds in saffron. Choron adds in a second sauce, béarnaise, along with tomato paste and heavy cream. It sounds very interesting, and I might have to try it!
How do you make Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce?
First you start the sauce. Add the butter to a saucepan on medium-high heat. When it’s melted and bubbly, then stir in the flour. Cook the roux until it starts to turn golden in color. The velouté is a light colored sauce, so do not cook it too long.
When the roux is golden and bubbly, stir the stock into the roux with a whisk. Stir constantly to ensure no lumps form. When the sauce begins to bubble, add the Cajun seasoning, then turn the heat down and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. Make sure to stir the sauce frequently so it doesn’t stick or burn to the bottom of the pan.
Rub the olive oil on both sides of the chicken breast and sprinkle with the homemade Cajun seasoning. My chicken breast was rather large. So, I cut it in half lengthwise to make it more portion friendly. They were about 1/3 to 1/2 an inch thick after slicing them, which made cooking the chicken quick and easy. I put them in my air fryer at 400 for 7 to 10 minutes per side. They were still juicy on the inside and nice and crispy on the outside.
What does Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce taste like?
The chicken is crispy and delicious. It has the family blackening spice mix on them. It’s one Dad received during one of his many trips to New Orleans. He was a foodie before the word even existed. He always came home with a sauce, spice mix, or dish we had to try. I put my chicken in a bed of buttered rice and drizzled the Cajun velouté sauce on top.
The sauce, oh my word. Not only is it as smooth as silk, but it was full of delicious chicken flavor from the chicken stock and I used. And it had that kick of blackened or Cajun seasoning goodness to it. But the rich flavor of such a simple sauce. I will most definitely be making velouté sauce more often. I needed this easy homemade rosemary bread to mop up all that sauce goodness!
The rice was the perfect vessel for this Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce. It elevated the velouté sauce making it more flavorful and delicious. Of course, feel free to serve yours with noodles, mashed potatoes or even this smoked potatoes recipe. Any of these will make the sauce taste that much more delicious.
Just look at how smooth and creamy that Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce looks! I’m not kidding when I say the sauce is as smooth as silk. I had to go back and grab a little more rice and a little more sauce. It was that delicious. And the chicken was tender and juicy with a perfectly crisp outside. Smooth and creamy with a kick and a little crunch. It really is a delicious dish.

Air Fryer Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce
Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce
Ingredients
- 2 chicken breasts (or one large one split in half)
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 1/2 tablespoons Cajun or blackening seasoning
- 3 tablespoons butter, divided
- 3 tablespoons flour
- 1 cup chicken stock
Instructions
- Rub the chicken breasts with the olive oil and sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of the Cajun seasoning. Set aside.
- Heat 2 tablespoons of the butter in a saucepan over medium-high heat. When melted and bubbly stir in the flour with a whisk.
- Cook the roux until lightly golden brown, stirring occasionally.
- Stir in the remaining Cajun seasoning and the chicken stock. When the sauce begins to bubble, reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer 15 to 20 minutes stirring occasionally.
- While the sauce simmers, place the chicken breasts in the basket or rack of your air fryer. Cook at 400 for 20 to 25 minutes depending on the thickness of your breasts. Mine were about 1/3 to a 1/2 inch thick and took 17 minutes.
- Stir the remaining tablespoon of butter into the sauce before topping the chicken and serving.
Nutrition Information
Yield
2Serving Size
1Amount Per Serving Calories 500Total Fat 30gSaturated Fat 14gTrans Fat 1gUnsaturated Fat 14gCholesterol 151mgSodium 2677mgCarbohydrates 14gFiber 1gSugar 2gProtein 42g
Let’s Get Saucy
- Air Fryer Chicken with Cajun Velouté Sauce from A Kitchen Hoor’s Adventures
- Eel Sauce for Sushi from Jen Around the World
- Homemade Tartar Sauce from Art of Natural Living
- Sausage and Mushroom Pasta Sauce from That Recipe
- Slow Cooker Marinara Sauce from Hezzi-D’s Books and Cooks
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The sauce is perfect–simple and flavorful! No more boring chicken breast!
For sure! And it was so delicious and flavorful. I had a hard time not eating it all. LOL
I’m all about my air fryer! That Cajun sauce sounds so yummy too!
We are, too! It stays on the counter and gets used at least once a week if not more.