Creamy Chicken Pasta with Spinach and Bacon is the best any night of the week pasta. The chicken is served over a delicious bowl of creamy cheesy pasta. Every bite is layered with creamy flavor, delicious spinach, juicy chicken, and creamy pasta. It’s the easiest, creamiest pasta recipe that’s special enough for the weekend, but easy enough to make any night of the week.
Why I love creamy chicken pasta
There are so many ways to make chicken and pasta. My favorite method is to combine chicken, pasta with creamy ingredients, such as cheese and half and half, or heavy cream for an over the top deliciousness.
I think creamy chicken pasta my favorite thing to eat during busy weeknights! It’s quick, easy and contains my favorite protein. Chicken! This simple recipe takes only about 30 minutes to make, yet is very rich and indulgent.
More ways to cook pasta and chicken together in a creamy way: Chicken Lazone Pasta, Creamy Garlic Lemon Pasta, and Creamy Chicken Pasta.
I love how easy it is to put this dish together and how flexible it is! For example, you can easily double the chicken pasta if you are feeding a crowd or want extra for later. Or, you can substitute ground chicken for chicken breasts and use turkey bacon instead of the regular bacon.
Here’s what you will need to make it
- Large Skillet – Use either stainless steel skillet or any skillet that is large enough to fit all this chicken and pasta. 12 inch is my favorite size!
- Sharp Knife – Cutting the chicken (and tomatoes) can be tedious. Dull knife – let’s not screw this up!
- Cutting Board – Medium one is perfect.
- Medium Bowl – To keep things tidy.
What’s in a creamy sauce?
I made this Creamy Chicken pasta sauce using butter, heavy cream, and Parmesan cheese. While the bacon and chicken are great together, I simply like to add garlic, salt, pepper, and Italian seasoning to make the sauce taste even better! You can also play with using dried oregano, thyme and/or rosemary instead.
Cream. Would like to lighten up this recipe? No problem – simply use half and half instead of heavy cream. While you can substitute heavy cream with half and half, don not substitute with milk, since we do need some fat content of cream so that the sauce is not runny.
Spinach is one of the healthy elements of this tasty chicken pasta dish. Besides, it’s one of my favorite ways to eat it. With pasta in the creamy sauce. Even though I always use fresh spinach in my recipes, I also like the idea of frozen spinach. Because compact frozen spinach may be easier to handle than fresh spinach leaves that cook down significantly.
How to cook creamy chicken pasta
- First, we will cook bacon, until crispy. Once done, remove bacon onto a separate plate and also drain the bacon fat from the skillet. I always wipe the skillet clean with a paper towel.
- Next, let’s cook the chicken breasts in the same pan by browning them on each side. When done, remove chicken and slice it in thick strips. You can keep chicken on the same plate with bacon.
Next, it’s time to make the delicious creamy sauce. This is my favorite part!
How to make creamy sauce
- You will start by adding butter to the hot pan and cooking chopped garlic for 1-2 minutes. Next, the tomatoes and spinach go in and I cook them for about 3 minutes until spinach wilts on low heat.
- Seasonings. Season with paprika, Italian seasoning, crushed red pepper flakes and salt.
- Cream. You will add heavy cream while still cooking on low heat. Heavy cream, especially the one with all the additives (not the one that just has milk fat and milk – that one is fine), might curdle when cooked at boiling temperatures, therefore keeping the heat low should prevent this.
- Parmesan cheese. Once heavy cream is slightly simmering, slowly add Parmesan cheese. Now stir the cheese on low simmer until smooth. If the sauce is still runny to your liking, simply add more cheese to thicken up the sauce.
Creamy Chicken Pasta Assembly
- First, add pasta, chicken strips, and sliced bacon back to the skillet with sauce. You will want to reheat them in the sauce, and stir until you fully coat pasta with sauce. You don’t want any dry pasta. Next, taste and season with more salt if necessary. Maybe just a bit!
- Second, cover the pan with a lid. This will keep the pasta warm.
- Finally, serve this easy creamy chicken pasta dish with chopped parsley, additional shredded Parmesan and red pepper flakes!
Reheating instructions
- Stove top reheating. Creamy pasta dishes will always suffer when reheated. What can we do? Add a little milk or cream to the ready mixed pasta and warm through slowly if reheating on the stovetop.
- Microwave method. If using a microwave add a little of the above liquid, then heat on a low wattage setting, stirring a couple of times in between.
- Preheat the oven! Set your oven to 350F (175C) and wait for it to preheat. This method is gentle on pasta and sauces, but may not be practical for a single serving. Add the pasta to a baking dish and spread it across, because a deep pile of pasta may heat unevenly. Add a splash of milk or extra sauce to keep it moist. The pasta is usually ready in 20 minutes, but check after 15 minutes just in case. The foil should help trap moisture, slowing the drying process.
Tips and troubleshooting
- Use fresh Parmesan Cheese. Note that it is best to use freshly grated parmesan cheese right off of the block so that your sauce isn’t grainy. I do not recommend using the “shaker” style container grated cheese for this recipe.
- My cheese clumped up. To avoid cheese clumps, make sure to reduce heat before adding heavy cream and Parmesan cheese. Once you add the cheese, stir on low simmer until smooth.
- My sauce won’t thicken. The Parmesan will thicken this sauce up. If it isn’t quite thick enough, allow the sauce to stand for 2-3 minutes before serving.
- Sauce is too watery. Depending on the chicken your supermarket carries, it may have added liquid. Unfortunately, this liquid will be released during cooking. This is the reason why the dish turns out too watery. I recommend always draining excess liquid after cooking chicken and as long as you discard it, the consistency will be perfect.
Substitutions
- Tomatoes. If you don’t like messing around with fresh tomatoes, you can always replace them with a can of diced tomatoes, drained.
- Herbs. Prefer fresh herbs? Use fresh herbs, such as basil and oregano instead of the dried herbs.
- Bacon. Not a big fan of a regular bacon? If so, you can always replace regular bacon with a turkey bacon.Turkey bacon will be fabulous in this dish!
- Spinach. And if you love spinach, by all means, use more than the recipe indicates. It will shrink when cooking anyways! You can also add some basil.
Hungry for more cheesy chicken recipes?
More pasta deliciousness here:
- Italian Sausage and Chicken Pasta
- Easy Vodka Sauce Pasta
- Chicken Pesto Pasta in Creamy White Wine Sauce
- Chicken Pasta in White Wine Parmesan Sauce
Creamy Chicken Pasta with Bacon
Ingredients
Main Ingredients:
- 6 bacon strips
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 pound boneless and skinless chicken, (thick in size, such as chicken breasts)
- salt and pepper
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
Sauce
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 3 garlic cloves, (minced)
- 4 small tomatoes, (diced)
- 2 cups spinach
- 1 ½ teaspoon paprika
- 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning, (more, if desired)
- ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1.5 cup heavy cream
- 1 cup Parmesan cheese, shredded (more for garnish)
Pasta:
- 10 oz. penne pasta
- 2 tablespoons Parsley, (chopped)
Instructions
Cook bacon
- Add bacon strips to the skillet and cook until crispy. Transfer cooked bacon to a paper towel-lined platter that will absorb extra grease. Chop into 1 inch pieces
- Drain the bacon fat from the skillet and wipe the skillet with a paper towel.
Cook chicken
- Paper towel dry the chicken and season with salt, pepper and garlic powder. Then set aside.
- Heat olive oil in the same skillet.
- Add chicken breasts and cook on each side on medium high heat for about 4 minutes per side (for a total of 8 minutes) until nicely browned.
- If chicken is still pink in the center, reduce heat to medium and cook covered for several minutes until no longer pink in the center. Remove chicken from pan and slice it.
Make sauce
- Add butter to the hot pan and once it melts, add chopped garlic and cook for 1-2 minutes until fragrant.
- Add tomatoes and cook for 3 minutes on medium high until tomatoes release their juices. Add fresh spinach and cook until it wilts.
- Reduce the heat and season with paprika, Italian seasoning, crushed red pepper flakes and salt. Mix.
- Next add heavy cream – you are still cooking on low heat. Once heavy cream is slightly simmering, slowly add Parmesan cheese. Once you add the cheese, stir on low simmer until smooth.
Cook pasta
- In the meantime bring a large pot of water to boil, add pasta and cook it according to instructions. Drain the pasta, but do not rinse.
Final assembly
- Add sliced chicken, bacon and pasta to the sauce in the pan.Once heated up, add chopped parsley. Stir until fully coated in sauce.Season with more salt if necessary.
- Serve with additional shredded Parmesan and red pepper flakes, if desired.
Nutritional information is provided as a courtesy only. This information comes from online calculators. Although whatsinthepan.com attempts to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures are only estimates.
Video
Notes
Wow!!! is the comments i get with recipe every time I make it. The family beg me to make it more often. So thank you.
I’m glad they are begging!!! So happyyyyyy to hear that!!!
Can this recipe be frozen and reheated?
Yes, you can freeze it, but cook pasta al dente so that it’s still sort of firm when you freeze it. Otherwise, it will be mushy.