Chicken Scampi Pasta has a garlic butter sauce that is light, vibrant, and so satisfying. It was inspired by our Shrimp Scampi Pasta and the family licked their plates clean with this one.
My kids loved the lemon flavor and went back for refills, and so did my husband. It’s the best feeling when the whole family is so pleased with dinner.
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We love chicken pasta recipes from Chicken Alfredo to Lemon Chicken Pasta and let’s not forget Chicken Tetrazzini. If you are a pasta lover, this Chicken Scampi Pasta is a must-try.
Chicken Scampi Video Tutorial
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What makes a dish scampi?
In the US, most people think of Scampi as being the Italian-American concept of Shrimp Scampi, but scampi by itself is a dish that is served in a sauce made of butter, garlic, and dry white wine. You can make all kinds of scampi including lobster, scallops, and chicken scampi.
Ingredients for Chicken Scampi
- Pasta – use 12 oz spaghetti and salt the water
- Chicken Tenders – the easiest and most forgiving chicken to work with
- Salt, Pepper, Flour – to dredge the chicken
- Olive Oil, Butter– to cook the chicken and make sauce (do not skimp on the butter)
- White Wine – use a dry wine such as chardonnay or sauvignon blanc
- Garlic – 4 cloves, or 1 Tbsp minced garlic
- Lemon – you’ll need 1 tsp of zest and 1/4 cup lemon juice from 1 large or 2 medium lemons
- Parsley – finely chopped and added at the end
How to Make Chicken Scampi
- Prep – before firing up the stove, chop, zest and juice your ingredients. Season chicken tenders and dip in flour, dusting off the excess.
- Cook Pasta in salted water until al dente, reserve 1/2 cup pasta water then drain and tranfer to a serving platter.
- Saute Chicken – while pasta is cooking, sautee chicken in butter and oil for 2 minutes per side (or until 165˚F on a thermometer) then transfer to a plate.
- Make Sauce – Deglaze the pan with 3/4 cup white wine and cook 5 minutes to reduce down to 1/4 cup liquid. Add butter then garlic and simmer 30 seconds. Off the heat add lemon juice, zest, parsley and salt to taste.
- Combine – return chicken to the pan and turn to coat in sauce. Spoon extra sauce over the pasta and toss. Top the pasta with chicken and any remaining sauce.
Pro Tip: Use some of your reserved pasta water to deglaze the empty pan then drizzle that over your pasta to get all of the tasty sauce in your dish.
Common Questions
You can substitute with boneless, skinless chicken breasts that have been trimmed of fat and cut into strips (1-inch thick).
You can reheat leftover pasta and chicken over low heat on a skillet just until warmed through. If the pasta seems dry, you can drizzle with water and a little more butter. For a boost of flavor, squeeze in fresh lemon juice and serve with freshly chopped parsley and grated parmesan cheese.
You can use an inexpensive dry white wine, but I highly recommend only cooking with a wine that you’d drink. Avoid using “cooking wine,” which contains preservatives, sweeteners, and salt that can ruin a dish.
You can make the chicken scampi with sauce and serve it over Mashed Potatoes or White Rice. It’s also yummy on cooked buckwheat.
Serve with
Chicken scampi pasta is such a hearty and satisfying dinner. All it needs is a simple veggie side dish or salad to complete the meal. We love to serve pasta with:
Make Chicken Scampi for your next pasta night. It comes together fast and everyone loves this easy 30-minute meal.
More Pasta Dinners
If you enjoyed this Chicken Scampi Pasta, you will love these comforting and family-approved pasta recipes:
- Chicken Lasagna
- Baked Feta Pasta
- Stuffed Pasta Shells
- Baked Ziti
- Spaghetti and Meatballs
- Creamy Shrimp pasta
Chicken Scampi Pasta Recipe
Ingredients
- 12 oz spaghetti
- 1 1/2 lbs chicken tenders
- 1 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 Tbsp olive oil, divided
- 6 Tbsp unsalted butter, divided
- 3/4 cup dry white wine, chardonnay or sauvignon blanc
- 4 garlic cloves, (1 Tbsp minced)
- 1 tsp lemon zest, from 1 lemon
- 1/4 cup lemon juice, from 2 lemons
- 1/3 cup parsley, finely chopped
- Parmesan, freshly shredded to serve
Instructions
- Prep: chop, zest, juice, and mince all of your ingredients before you start cooking. Season chicken tenders with salt and pepper then dredge in flour.
- Cook pasta: Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add 2 Tbsp salt. Cook pasta according to package instructions until al dente. Reserve 1/2 cup pasta cooking water then drain the pasta and return pasta to the pot. Partially cover to keep warm.
- Sautee chicken: While pasta is cooking, cook the chicken. Heat a large skillet over medium/high heat. Add 1 Tbsp oil and swirl in 1 Tbsp butter. Sauté chicken 2 minutes per side or until golden and cooked through to 165˚F on a thermometer. Remove to a plate. Add another Tbsp of oil and 1 Tbsp butter and sauté the second batch of chicken then transfer to a plate and cover to keep warm.
- Make sauce: Carefully add 3/4 cup white wine. Return to medium/high heat and scrape the bottom of the pan to deglaze. Cook about 5 minutes or until reduced to about 1/4 cup liquid. Add 4 Tbsp butter and stir to melt. Add garlic and simmer 30 seconds until fragrant. Remove from heat and add 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1 tsp lemon zest, and 1/4 cup parsley. Stir to combine and season with 1/2 tsp salt or to taste.
- Combine: Return chicken to the pan and turn to coat in sauce. Transfer drained pasta to a large serving bowl then tilt the pan and spoon extra sauce over cooked spaghetti. Toss spaghetti lightly with sauce then top with chicken and drizzle remaining sauce over the pasta*. Serve garnished with more parsley and freshly shredded parmesan.
Notes
Nutrition Per Serving
Filed Under
It was an easy dish to follow but I only added half of the lemon juice and it was way too much
Sounds good, feel free to make some minor changes according to your personal preference, Molly.
I made this tonight and It was great. My husband is not a chicken lover at all and he liked it. I think this is my new favorite way to eat chicken loved it.
That is wonderful, Cheryl. Thank you for the review. So glad you enjoyed this recipe.
Love love love this recipe! So delicious. No need to go to an Italian restaurant when you can make this at home. Even my picky eaters loved it so much.
Absolutely! So good, it’s better than take-out! Thank you for the review.
Can this recipe be doubled? Wine and lemon double for serving 12?
Thank you!
I imagine that will work. If you try that, please update us on how it goes.
Only use one lemon 2 is waaaayy too much. Other than that its pretty good.
Thank you for sharing, Colleen. Yes, you could definitely use less lemon, especially if your lemons are larger.
yum, was amazing! but there wasnt actually very much sauce so I made a little more with the reserved pasta water..
Sounds great, Abbi. Feel free to add more sauce if you prefer that next time. Thank you for your review.
When I made this, it was dry and did not have a lot of sauce…what I realized was the box of spaghetti was 16oz…this calls for 12oz! I increased the noodles by 1/3 😬🙈
It was flavorful though. Remaking this again this week with the correct amount of noodles!
Hi Natasha,
I made this dish tonite and it was absolutely phenomenal! The flavor of the garlic and the butter, lemon and wine is so fresh and delicious! As a diabetic, I substituted chickpea pasta and it was very creamy and rich! Question. Can shrimp be directly substituted for the chicken in this dish considering the chicken is dredged in flour? Would the shrimp also be dredged in flour? Thank you so much in advance for your response and thank you very much for your recipes!!
I”m happy you enjoyed this recipe, it was inspired by my shrimp scampi recipe. You can use shrimp instead of chicken. No need to toss them through the flour. Here is the Shrimp Scampi recipe for reference. It doesn’t use wine but you could add some in if you’d like.
I just reviewed this great recipe, and then thought of a tip to share about the wine. We are red wine drinkers at our house, so buying a bottle of white wine for a recipe doesn’t work well because most of it gets thrown out before I cook another recipe that calls for white wine. So, I have started buying a 4-pack of the Chardonnay mini bottles to use for cooking. It works out great. As it happens, one of those bottles was the exact amount needed for this recipe.
Hi Dena! That’s a great tip! Thank you so much for sharing that with us!
What a great idea! I have the same problem when it comes to red wine. I have a pump, but sometimes I just forget.
Delicious dish that we will have again. Easy and comes together quickly! Thanks for the great recipes!
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! Thank you for the wonderful review, Dena!
So, I googled chicken tender recipes and this was the first of many. And I am soooo glad I made it. I substitute rice vinegar for the wine though. And the family and I absolutely LOVED it. I here that you have a lot of good recipes so I look forward to trying them.
Thank you.
I am so happy to hear you enjoyed this recipe. That’s a great idea for the substitution. I am glad it worked out well and your family enjoyed it! I hope you will try some other recipes and love them even more! Thank you for the review.
Hi,
This recipe looks great. I’m excited to make it. What wine did you use? I don’t cook with wine often, so specifics would be nice. Thanks!
Hi Dee, you may use a dry wine such as chardonnay or sauvignon blanc
I am going to try this zucchini zoodles instead of the pasta I love scampi
Please do, we’d love to know how it goes.
After you drained your pasta, do you rinse it so it doesn’t stick together. I rinse in cold water awhen hen it has to be heated back up
Hi Carol, we do not rinse it.
I love this simple recipe. I made it for dinner but with a twist, instead of dry white wine, chardonnay or sauvignon blanc I used some chicken stock and it was delicious. I will definitely make it again.
That’s great to hear, Ann! Thank you for sharing your feedback, with us.
So delicious! Made this tonight and the whole family liked it. I made it exactly as written using the pasta water to deglaze and white wine also.
Yum! I’m glad it was enjoyed. Thank you, Susan.
I made this recipe last week and my family absolutely loved it! I did double the sauce because I did not want the leftovers to be dry, and because I used 16 oz of pasta instead of 12oz so we would have left overs. I will be making this again!
Hello BJ, great to hear from you. Thank you for your good comments and feedback, I’m glad you enjoyed this recipe!
Hello! I have been obsessed with all your recipe videos for some time now! Can you please link the two pots/pans that you used in this video? The one you used to cook the pasta and the one you used to cook the chicken/sauce? I would love to purchase both. Thank you so much 🙂
Hi Maura, you can find our favorite kitchen tools in our Amazon Affiliate Shop HERE.
The lemon 🍋 flavor makes this dish delicious 😋 Definitely worth making!
Yes, it really does help improve the taste!
I have a couple of quick questions, are you able to add capers to this meal or is that not recommended? Also — can you double the sauce without jeopardizing the meal and if so how? I’m making it tomorrow for my family. I’m looking forward to it!
FYI, I made your chicken pot pie soup and it was outstanding!!!
That’s just awesome! Thank you for sharing your wonderful review, Ryan!
Hi Ryan, I haven’t tried that myself to advise. but I bet topping it with capers may work! If you experiment, let me know how you liked the recipe
I’ve been making your recipes for years but I haven’t left a review before. I have been wanting to make this recipe for a while now, and just finally got around to it after Thanksgiving. I doubled the sauce – my family likes their pasta saucy. This came out great Natasha, thank you! I will be adding this to the rotation of favorites that I’ve discovered on your website.
Hi Dylan, thank you for taking the time to share your good feedback and review with us. I’m glad you enjoyed this recipe!
Can someone help me? I can’t have any alcoholic drink so no wine in my cooking. Even if I could I don’t want to buy an entire bottle of wine I’ll only be able to use extremely rarely and have it taking up space in my too small fridge.
Now here’s the question. Can I use chicken broth or stock instead of wine in this recipe?
Thank you.
Hi Scott, you can but the flavor won’t be the same. Reducing the wine cooks out the alcohol and it also adds wonderful flavor.
Sorry to say alcohol will not cook off. This is from The Food Network
As a reference, here’s a helpful rule of thumb: After 30 minutes of cooking, alcohol content decreases by 10 percent with each successive half-hour of cooking, up to 2 hours. That means it takes 30 minutes to boil alcohol down to 35 percent and you can lower that to 25 percent with an hour of cooking. Two hours gets you down to 10 percent.
That is interesting. I found another article that says after 30 minutes it’s 35% remaining, I’d be curious to see if the USDA has put out anything on this. Thanks for sharing that!
Hi Natasha, can I use skinless and boneless chicken thigh for this recipe?
Hi Debbie, we prefer it with tenders, but I bet thighs may work here. If you experiment, I would love to know how you like that!