One Pot Chicken Parmesan Pasta
This post contains affiliate links. Read our disclosure policy.
Easy One Pot Chicken Parmesan Pasta is the best healthy dinner! This One Pot Pasta Recipe is delicious, quick to make and loaded with flavor!
This cheesy pasta is everything you love about Baked Chicken Parm, with WAY less work and the ease of a healthy one pot meal.
A complete chicken parmesan dinner can be ready in under an hour, giving you more time to enjoy your meal with your family (and less dishes, woo!)
Why you should make this:
- Made in one pot – This means fewer dishes at the end of dinner, which everyone loves! If you want more one pot meals, check out these Healthy One Pot Meals!
- Easy family friendly dinner – Your whole family will love this meal and even better, it comes together in just about 35 minutes!
- Low calorie while still being delicious – In every 1.5 cup serving, there are just over 500 calories, but this recipe is still loaded with flavor thanks to the savory spices.
Chicken Parmesan Pasta Ingredients
Searching for the best pan for your one pan meals? We LOVE this pan! It’s non toxic, non stick, and cleans up in seconds with just a little soap and water (seriously, food does NOT stick to it!)
Substitutions
Butter: You can substitute butter with 1 tablespoon olive oil.
Panko Topping: If you don’t have panko breadcrumbs you can use regular breadcrumbs or skip the breadcrumb topping. For gluten free, use gluten free breadcrumbs.
Olive Oil: You can substitute avocado oil, butter, or ghee.
Chicken Breasts: You can substitute with boneless chicken thighs or chicken tenders. If you want a baked pasta dish with ground turkey, try our Healthy Baked Ziti!
Pasta: What kind of pasta can I use? Any medium size pasta will work. Try farfalle, rotini, cavatappi, ziti, or rotini.
Can I use gluten free pasta? We haven’t tried this recipe with gluten free pasta, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Gluten free pasta gets mushy very easily.
Marinara Sauce: We always make our own tomato sauce. It’s easy to make at home with this Healthy Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce recipe. This is our favorite jarred sauce. For a richer sauce, you can add a tablespoon of tomato paste to the pot with the onions and seasoning, then deglaze the pan with a splash of red wine before adding the pasta and sauce.
Dried Spices: If you don’t have dried basil and oregano, you can use 1 ½ teaspoons Italian seasoning. Fresh basil and oregano can also be used in place of dried herbs.
Mozzarella: Freshly grated mozzarella melts best, but the bagged kind can be used as well. Use up leftover fresh mozzarella in our Baked Caprese Chicken – it’s so good!
Water: You can also use no sodium chicken broth in place of water for added flavor.
How to Make Chicken Parmesan Pasta in One Pot
- Saute chicken in oil over medium heat until mostly cooked. Add onion, garlic, dried basil, oregano, and red pepper. Cook for an additional 3 minutes.
- Add the pasta, jarred sauce & water to the pot. Stir together & cover.
- Bring the pot to a boil, then reduce to a simmer on low and cook covered for 12-15 minutes, or until pasta is cooked to your liking.
- Stir occasionally to prevent scorching on the bottom of the pot. Turn off the heat when the pasta is cooked.
- Stir in half of the mozzarella, all of the parmesan, and torn fresh basil if using. Top with the remaining mozzarella, place the lid on and allow it to melt for about 2 minutes.
- Serve right away, and top each bowl with a generous sprinkle of toasted garlic panko topping (see below for how to make it).
What to serve with this pasta:
Chicken parmesan with pasta is a complete meal in itself so you don’t need to serve it with anything else. You may also like our Vegetable Baked Ziti.
We like to serve it with some garlic bread or extra veggies on the side. Here are some veggie side dishes we like:
- Parmesan Roasted Asparagus
- Grilled Chicken Caesar Salad
- Green Beans Almondine
- Parmesan Brussel Sprouts
- Easy Kale Salad
- Garlic Roasted Brussels Sprouts
Storage
Storing: This dish is best enjoyed right away, but leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.
Freezing: We don’t recommend freezing this recipe, it will get very mushy in the freezer!
Reheating: To reheat leftovers; add pasta to a saute pan with about ¼ cup water. Cook on medium low, stirring frequently until warmed through.
One Pot Chicken Parmesan Pasta Recipe FAQs
“Chicken Parmesan” is named after the Parmigiana style of cooking, originating in Italy. The Americanized version commonly includes mozzarella cheese, leading to the somewhat misleading name.
Other Healthy One Pot Recipes
We love this recipe because it’s easy and made in one pot. Here are some more of our favorite easy one pot meals! Don’t forget to get our free healthy 30 minute dinners cookbook.
Chicken Parmesan Pasta
Ingredients
Panko Topping
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1/2 tablespoon garlic minced
- ¾ cup panko breadcrumbs
- ⅛ teaspoon black pepper
Pasta
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 ½ lb boneless skinless chicken breasts cut into 1” chunks
- 1 cup minced yellow onion
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic 3 cloves
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes optional
- 1 lb dried medium pasta farfalle, campanelle, rigatoni
- 24 ounces marinara sauce low or no salt added
- 4 cups water
- 2.5 cups shredded mozzarella cheese (8 oz)
- ½ cup grated parmesan cheese
- Torn fresh basil optional
Instructions
- In a large dutch oven or pot, melt butter over medium heat. Add garlic, panko bread crumbs, and a pinch of pepper. Toast the breadcrumbs for about 3 minutes, stirring frequently, until golden brown. Remove from the pot and set aside. Wipe any remaining crumbs out with a paper towel.
- Raise the heat to medium high and add the olive oil. Pat the chicken dry with a paper towel to remove excess moisture. Once the pot is heated, add the chicken to the pan.
- Sauté the chicken for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the onion, garlic, dried basil, oregano, and red pepper flakes (if using). Stir together and cook for an additional 3 minutes.
- Add the dry pasta, marinara, and water to the pot. Stir together and cover the pot.
- Bring the liquid to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium and cook covered for 6 minutes or half the amount of time the pasta package recommends. Make sure to stir occasionally to prevent scorching on the bottom of the pot.
- After 6 minutes, take off the lid and remove the pot from the heat. The pasta will continue to cook as it sits and absorbs the liquid.
- Once the pasta has sat for 5 minutes off the heat, stir in mozzarella, Parmesan, and fresh basil. Serve right away. Top each bowl with a generous sprinkle of the toasted garlic panko breadcrumb topping before serving for a delicious crunch.
Is there a way to do breaded chicken with this recipe, and if so, how would I got about that?
I wouldn’t recommend doing that. The breading will turn to mush and fall off when it’s cooking. Highly recommend making it as is! Otherwise, check out our Healthy Baked Chicken Parmesan and serve it over pasta!
Easy recipe with tons of flavor! My whole family of 5 loved it. It was easily enough for all of us plus with leftovers. Recommend!
I was pleasantly surprised. The longer it sat, the longer the flavors melded together. I was worried that the red pepper flakes might be too spicy, but not at all! Very good one pot recipe!
Easy to make on a busy night. Big hit with the whole family and will definitely be making this again.
Another amazing recipe! Made this tonight and it was so good, I definitely went back for seconds. The panko is such a great touch. The recipe did take close to 50 mins as directed, but well worth it. This is going to be a staple in my home. Thank you!
Looks so good. I’d like to keep it with my other saved recipes on Pinterest, but I don’t see a way to do that. How could I save it?
There’s a purple pin button in the top right of the page, or you can go to this URL: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/495466396518536115/
This was so so good! We are a family of 6 with 4 kiddos. It’s so hard to find something where everyone is happy and no one complains. But this was it. So good. A healthy twist on a classic.
I’m so glad you liked it, Whitnie! Thank you so much!
I made this once before, absolutely LOVED IT. question though, I have some cooked chicken breasts already baked and seasoned, can I proceed right to step of after cooking the chicken and use what I have premade? Thanks!!
Yes you totally can 🙂 Enjoy!
This was super yummy, quick and easy to make. My Husband and both kids loved it! My 14 yr old son is a picky eater and he ate it all up. Thank you for the reciepe.
I just made this tonight. It was very good! I followed the directions, but I didn’t have Marinara sauce, so I substituted Organic tomato basil spaghetti sauce. Yummy, with lots of leftovers since there are just two of us.
Easy and delicious! I was going to skip the panko topping but I’m so glad I didn’t! The recipe makes a lot and the serving size is generous! Wish it could be stored in the freezer but I definitely won’t mind eating it for the next three days!
You can freeze it, it will just be kindof soggy and not as good when you reheat it. Pasta doesn’t freeze well IMO!
One pot chicken parmesan was really good and only ONE pot
So delish. Kid friendly. 1 hour start to finish
This was so yummy and the kids really liked it as well.
I am a married Mom of two small children. Everybody enjoying and eating the same dinner is a bit of a rainbow unicorn situation. So when my son walked by and told me how good it smelled as it was cooking, I was encouraged. To my surprise, this was a hit with ALL of us!! I pretty much stuck to the recipe, only substituting pasta and adding slightly more chicken and cheese. I would add even more chicken next time! I really recommend the fresh basil. I think that combined with the toasted/crunchy panko topping really makes this dish a little extra. I can’t imagine not making this again at some point!
Sorry, 5 stars!
So good and so easy!! And plenty of leftovers! Will definitely be adding to our weekly menu rotation.