Chicken Piccata Pasta
Updated Mar 19, 2025
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This Italian-inspired piccata chicken pasta is a one-pot, 30-minute dinner recipe packed with juicy bites of chicken in a creamy lemon piccata sauce with capers. It’s fancy enough to make for date night and quick enough for a family on the go!
Lemony Piccata Chicken Pasta
Chicken piccata is a classic Italian dish with pan-seared chicken cooked in a buttery sauce with lemon and capers. It’s exactly the type of meal that I crave in warmer weather: Light yet filling and quick to cook, with zesty flavors and fresh ingredients.
I’ll often serve chicken piccata with a side of pasta. Today’s recipe gets right to it, combining the two into a deliciously lemony, one-pot piccata chicken pasta.
This easy recipe is like my one-pot spaghetti meets lemon pasta. With unbreaded chicken and no butter needed, it’s a classic made lighter that’s still packed with bright flavor.
What Makes This Chicken Pasta So Good
- Juicy and tender. Fresh lemon not only adds flavor, but it also tenderizes the chicken. Each little bite is fall-apart-tender.
- Light yet creamy. This recipe replaces butter with olive oil and milk to make the sauce, and it’s just as creamy and rich.
- One-pot. Adding the pasta right in with the chicken cuts down on cook time.
- Built-in side dish. With chicken piccata and pasta all in one, it doesn’t take much to round out the meal.
Ingredients Needed
Gather the following ingredients to make this creamy pasta with chicken piccata. Scroll to the recipe card for exact amounts and thorough directions.
- Olive Oil – For cooking the chicken. You can use any cooking oil that you like, including vegetable oil or avocado oil.
- Chicken – I used boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into cubes. You could also use chicken thighs.
- Shallots – Or mild white onion, finely chopped.
- Garlic – I like to use whole cloves to infuse the sauce without overpowering it. Substituting ¼ teaspoon of garlic powder per clove also works.
- Chicken Broth – I used low-sodium and fat-free broth. You could also use half broth, half dry white wine.
- Lemon – Freshly juiced. I also like to add lemon slices to my pasta as a garnish when serving.
- Spaghetti Noodles – Follow the cooking directions on the package. Long noodles like linguini, fettuccini, and spaghetti are great options in this pasta recipe. Penne and spiral-shaped fusilli or cavatappi also work nicely with the silky lemon piccata sauce.
- Capers – These tiny, briny buds add a tangy, salty kick to the dish. Try not to skip them for an authentic chicken piccata flavor!
- Milk – Anything with less than 2% fat content won’t work as well and will make the sauce watery. Heavy cream is a great alternative.
- Parmesan and Fresh Parsley – For garnish.
Recipe Tips for Piccata Pasta
- Tenderize the chicken. Before cubing your chicken breast, tap it out with a rolling pin or meat mallet to flatten it slightly. Just like in traditional chicken piccata recipes, this allows the chicken to cook more evenly and absorb more flavor.
- Use fresh lemon. Please, please use freshly squeezed lemon juice to make your chicken piccata pasta!! Bottled lemon juice is too concentrated and can overpower the sauce.
- Low sodium options. Use low-sodium chicken broth if you prefer. Another way to lower the sodium in this recipe is to rinse the capers in cool water before you add them to the sauce.
Variations
- No capers? Capers can be substituted for sliced gherkins, green olives, or artichokes. Anything with a briny tang would work perfectly.
- Add veggies. Add vegetables to your chicken piccata pasta, like zucchini and mushrooms, broccoli, asparagus, and halved cherry or grape tomatoes.
- Substitute the chicken. Make this recipe with pork tenderloin, shrimp, or make pasta with salmon piccata or turkey scallopini, which is similar. Check the cook times for any protein substitutes and adjust accordingly.
- Vegetarian. Omit the chicken or swap it for vegetables.
What to Serve With Piccata Chicken Pasta
This delicious meal mash-up is a hearty dinner on its own. I’ll often serve my piccata chicken pasta with an heirloom tomato salad or a radish cucumber tomato salad to compliment the fresh flavors of the citrus and parsley. These are more easy ideas:
- A side of bread: Serve with air fryer garlic bread, homemade focaccia, or garlic breadsticks.
- Vegetables: I’ll sometimes make roasted mushooms, roasted eggplant, or these green beans and tomatoes (a Macedonian favorite!) to have as a veggie side.
- Appetizers: Try crispy Italian arancini dipped in marinara sauce, red pepper relish, or zhoug.
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Piccata Chicken Pasta
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 pound boneless skinless chicken breasts, cubed
- salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 2 shallots, finely chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 cups chicken broth, I use low sodium, fat free broth
- 1 whole lemon, juiced
- 8 ounces dry spaghetti pasta
- 3 tablespoons capers
- ½ cup milk, 2%, whole, or heavy cream are all okay to use
- thin lemon slices, optional, for garnish
- grated parmesan cheese, for garnish
- chopped fresh parsley, for garnish
Instructions
- Prep. Heat the olive oil over medium-high heat in a dutch oven or a nonstick pot.
- Cook the chicken. Add the cubed chicken to the heated oil and season it with salt and pepper; cook for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently, until the chicken is no longer pink.
- Cook the aromatics. Add shallots and garlic; continue to cook for 1 minute, stirring frequently.
- Cook the spaghetti. Stir in the chicken broth and lemon juice, and bring to a boil. Stir in the spaghetti and capers; lower the heat to medium and cook for 12 to 15 minutes, stirring frequently, until most of the liquid is absorbed and the pasta is cooked.
- Finish and serve. Stir in the milk and cook for 1 minute. Garnish with lemon slices, grated parmesan cheese, fresh parsley, and serve.
Equipment
Nutrition
Nutritional info is an estimate and provided as courtesy. Values may vary according to the ingredients and tools used. Please use your preferred nutritional calculator for more detailed info.
How to Make Piccata Chicken Pasta
For this quick dinner, we start with the chicken piccata, then move on to preparing the pasta, and finally bring it all together. Everything is ready to plate in 30 minutes or less.
- Prep. Add the olive oil to a skillet or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Meanwhile, dice up the chicken, mince the garlic, and chop the shallots while the oil heats.
- Add the chicken. Add the chicken to the hot pan, season with salt and pepper, and cook for 6-7 minutes, or until the chicken is no longer pink. Stir frequently so it browns on all sides.
- Make the sauce. Next, add the shallots and garlic and stir for 1 additional minute. Pour in the chicken broth and lemon juice and bring the pot to a boil.
- Add pasta and capers. Lower the heat and stir in the uncooked pasta and capers. Cook for 12-15 minutes (refer to the cooking time on your pasta package, just in case), stirring frequently, until most of the liquid has been absorbed into the fully-cooked pasta. Add the milk and stir for another minute.
- Garnish and serve. Plate the pasta and garnish with grated Parmesan cheese, parsley and three slices of lemon. Enjoy!
Storing and Reheating Leftovers
- Refrigerate. Store the cooled piccata chicken pasta in an airtight container in the fridge for 3-4 days. It tastes even better the next day!
- Reheat. When you’re ready to dig in, microwave leftovers in 30-second intervals, or reheat them on the stovetop until warmed through.
- Freezing. This recipe is best enjoyed fresh. Freezing the lemon and caper sauce can cause it to curdle when thawed. However, if you have leftover chicken, you can freeze that separately and make a fresh batch of pasta and sauce when you’re ready to use it.
Great easy one pan recipe. I added 5 oz. Baby spinach to the pot for the last 5 min. cooking time.
Delicious.
Love these recipes! Thank you so much for going the extra mile in providing calorie breakdown with servings. But under this recipe, you show amount per serving of 1g??
Hi! The calorie-counter does that automatically and I have tried to fix it, but there’s no way around it. It definitely is more than 1 gram though! hehe This recipe serves 4 people. Serving of pasta is 1 cup cooked. Serving of chicken is about 3 ounces, cooked. I hope that helps. 🙂
Lemon have Vitamin C, useful for my health. I like this recipe.
Simple and tasty! Great recipe!
Made this tonight for my family! Did not change the recipe at all, except for my husbands portion added red pepper flakes, he likes spicy! Delicious! We loved it and will make it again. Thank you!
Hi Katerina,
Love Piccata anything, but also would like to make it with 1lb spaghetti. Can I double the liquid portions of this
recipe to accommodate 1lb pasta. Thanks for one pot wonders, that’s my speed.
Robert
Hi! I’ve made it with more pasta and needed about 4.5 to 5 cups of liquid to start with. So, don’t double the liquid, just add about 2 cups more of the chicken broth. I hope that helps! 🙂
Question… does this really need the milk???
Hi! No, you can skip the milk, but it does add a bit of creaminess to the dish.
Thanks so much for the quick response.
Question – it says 1 juiced lemon and then grated. Are you talking about the rind? If so, do I add that when I add the lemon juice?
Hi!
I use the grated lemon just for garnish, but if you like a stronger lemon flavor, you can definitely add some together with the lemon juice.
Simple and delicious.
I love one-pot meals like this for busy weeknights! I have been making some Indian dishes that are a one-pot style dish you build upon the flavors and then serve with some naan. So good! Thanks for the great recipe!
Oh I bet!! It sounds so good! And, Naaaaaan!! YESSS! 😀
This recipe is just what I need Kate! And one pot, how can I not make it??
Hi PAULA!!! SO happy to “hear” from you! 😀 XOXO