Kung Pao Chicken Spaghetti is deliciously spicy and sweet, a favorite and best seller at California Pizza Kitchen that you can make at home.
Kung Pao Chicken Spaghetti from California Pizza Kitchen is my go to every time we go there for dinner (this is pretty often you guys, it is just down the street!).
Sabrina’s Kung Pao Chicken Spaghetti
This deliciously spicy and sweet recipe from the California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook is a best seller that you can make at home and with my adjustments, enjoy it with about half the calories and ALL the taste! Sure it takes a few extra bowls and about 30 minutes of prep before you even start cooking, but it is worthy of true hero status.
Recipe Card
Ingredients
- 1 cup chicken stock
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 3/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
- 1/2 cup sherry
- 3 tablespoons chili paste with garlic
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
- 2 tablespoons sesame oil
- 2 egg whites
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 lb spaghetti
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1 lb chicken breast , boneless and skinless, cut in 3/4-inch cubes
- 10 -15 whole Chinese dried red chili peppers (don’t eat these, they are for color and heat)
- 1 cup dry roasted peanuts , unsalted
- 1/4 cup minced garlic
- 3 cups green onions , greens and whites, coarsely-chopped
Instructions
Kung Pao Sauce
- In a saucepan, whisk together the chicken stock, and 2 tablespoons cornstarch until the cornstarch is fully dissolved.
- Stir in the soy sauce, sherry, chili paste, sugar, red wine vinegar, and sesame oil and bring to a boil.
- Reduce the heat and simmer until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon (about 20 minutes).
Slurry
- In a mixing bowl, use a whisk to stir together the 2 egg whites, 2 tablespoons cornstarch, and ½ teaspoon salt until blended but not frothy.
To Finish
- Bring a large pot of salted water to a rapid boil. Add the pasta and cook a minute shy of al dente.
- In a large nonstick frying pan over medium-high heat, heat the ¼ cup olive oil for about 1 minute.
- Add the chicken to the slurry and mix.
- Add the chicken and egg white mixture to the pan in one large pancake shape as carefully as you can.
- Cook until the egg mixture sets.
- Using a large spatula, carefully flip it over then with a wooden spoon, gently separate the pieces.
- As soon as they darken in color (about a minute) stir in the garlic and scallions.
- Let the garlic and scallions cook for about 30 seconds (do not brown the garlic, it will get bitter) add the Kung Pao Sauce and toss and stir to coat the ingredients.
- Add in the cooked and drained pasta and combine with the sauce.
- If your pan isn’t big enough, combine them in a big bowl.
- Add the Chinese peppers and roasted peanuts into the bowl.
- Top with extra chopped scallions.
Nutrition
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Table of Contents
Chef’s Note
This recipe is almost verbatim the recipe in the cookbook so it is truly authentic. The major differences are in the amount of fat used. It is scary that they want you to add more than double the amount I used (not just add it to fry something, but add it in and keep it in permanently)! The best part is that when I served this recipe, no one noticed the reduced fat once they tasted it.
Can this be Made Ahead of Time?
Make the sauce ahead of time and the dish will take way less time in the future. I make a quadruple recipe and freeze the other portions in flattened ziploc bags until I’m ready to make another batch.
Tips and Tricks
- Soy Sauce: Nothing much to say here except Kikkoman has the best flavor overall and I always recommend reduced sodium.
- Wok: The best way to cook quickly and over high heat for Asian dishes, a good wok is the perfect stir fry pan.
- Sesame Oil: The flavor of sesame oil in this dish is unmistakeable and not really able to be substituted. Some Asian grocery stores will try and sell less expensive options that aren’t actually sesame oil, so just be sure the one you’re buying is authentic sesame oil.
- Chinese Dried Chili Peppers: These add a ton of flavor, just don’t eat them! You add them towards the end of the cooking time and they add a nice low heat to the dish.
Variations
- Protein: Swap chicken out for shrimp, tofu, or pork.
- Vegetarian: Roast off some zucchini and eggplant and toss them in for a totally different vegetarian alternative. If you want to go truly vegetarian, swap out the chicken stock for vegetable stock.
- No Pasta: If you’d like to lighten it up even more, add in two spiraled zucchinis. You won’t notice the flavor difference but you’ll cut the calories significantly per serving.
- Spice: I add the peppers in the bowl before tossing because the company we had over were sensitive to spice. This kept it at a true mild heat. I took my serving and crushed a couple of the peppers to kick up the heat on my dish. If you are making it for a group of people who like spice, then add the peppers in with the green onions and garlic.
Related Recipes
More Spaghetti Recipes
Some of the original photos from when I first made this dish for the blog two years ago:
You NAILED it!!!!! Wow so good. Thanks for sharing.
You’re welcome Gail and thanks for the kind review!
chili paste with garlic > The only thing I can find at the local supermarket is Chilli Garlic Sauce (by Lee Kum Kee), is that the same?
In my mind, paste and sauce seem different… If they are indeed different, is there any recommended brand or specific product?
I do not recommend any specific brand having used a number of different ones over the years.
This recipe is absolutely amazing. Such a tasty and gorgeous dish that was really fun to make! I made it last Friday and it was a major hit in my household. It was great the day after, too, it didn’t dry up at all. The only changes I made was that I used Sambal Oelek instead of chili paste with garlic because I couldn’t find any and I used vegetable stock instead of chicken stock because I had some that I needed to use. I love this recipe so much that I translated and shared it on my own food blog – I credited you of course. Thank you so much for this gem.
Recently, I have been crazy about Kung Pao Spaghetti and have been visiting my local restaurant way to often to satisfy my cravings. I found a few recipes online, but this one seemed to be the ‘one’. So glad I used it. It’s well written and the recipe – spot on! First time around I always try to follow the recipe closely. I even made the sauce ahead of time (as mentioned), took a chance and doubled the sauce to freeze some for later. The next night it was easy to put everything together, and I was thrilled when my first attempt yielded a dish (do I dare say, ‘nearly’) identical to my local restaurant. Yum! I am in Kung Pao heaven. Thank you, thank you. You are a goddess :>)
LOL. This made my day. Really appreciate your feedback and delighted you enjoyed the recipe. Thanks so much for the five star review Donna!
Moved to Iowa 14 years ago and have not had CPK in years and years and this recipe nailed it! Thank you so much!
You’re welcome Maggi and thank you for the 5 stars!
If I make this recipe again I will use HALF of the soy sauce in the recipe. It was waaaay too salty and the flavor of soy sauce, overwhelmed all the other flavors. I had to do a bit of tweaking such as adding more chicken broth a little bit of water and at first I started adding just a little bit more sugar, but that wasn’t doing it, so I added maple syrup to lighten up the saltiness and enrich the flavor. I didn’t have whole chili peppers so I used red pepper flakes instead and that worked. This recipe as written here is VERY salty. Not a bad sauce if you reduce the amount of soy and add a little as needed. The chicken turned out perfectly.
You are super creative in the kitchen Nancy! I have found that salt is one of the primary seasonings that everyone has strong feelings about so I completely understand your comments. Thank you for trying our recipes!
This was absolutely delicious and a real winner with my husband and I. I did however, because I’m a wooz with anything spicy, I only used 2 TBLSP of the chili sauce and half of the chilies. Will be making this again, however I will add more chicken as I like a meatier pasta. Thank you for the great recipe.
Absolutely a winning recipe, and yes: certainly restaurant quality!
It makes a ton of food, which is wonderful frozen for another couple of meals for the two of us.
Thank you for your many fantastic recipes! They are exceptional, every time.
Thanks, Andrea.
I wanna make this with shrimp do I still put them in the egg white and cornstarch mixture?
No, you don’t have to when using shrimp. Enjoy!
Can’t wait to try this recipe. Is the sherry supposed to be dry or sweet?
I would go with sweet. Let us know what you think of the recipe!
Hi Sabrina,
Thank you so much for the wonderful recipe of Kung Pao Chicken Spaghetti. It was fabulous. All four of us loved the dish and will make it again and again. I will add more peanuts (because we like them in this a lot) and I added 3 tablespoons more sugar, as we like it a bit sweeter. Other than that, the recipe was made exactly as you did. I was also wondering if a tablespoon or two of peanut butter would make a nice addition to this? I haven’t tried it, but was wondering. I liked it also as it left us with some leftovers to have the next day. Thanks again. It is a favorite recipe.
I’m glad you enjoy it so much. If you want to add peanut butter you’ll need to add more rice wine so it’s not too think. Enjoy!
Do you have the actual CPK recipe without modifications available to share?
I linked the cookbook that has the copycat recipes listed in the post above.
What is the point of the corn start and egg step?
It’s part of their recipe, creates a breading for the chicken. I’ve made it with and without this step in the past, healthier without it, but I love the flavor of the breading.
Just made it. We loved it. Can you freeze leftovers?
Yay!! So glad you enjoyed it. You can freeze this for up to 3 months.
Hi, I just wanted to clarify it calls for red wine vinegar and not rice wine vinegar? Thank you.
Yes, it’s red wine vinegar. Enjoy!
What a great dinner we had tonight — definitely worth the effort. The only changes I made was to leave out the red chile peppers and I reduced the amount of chili garlic paste to 2 tbsp. vs. 3. Delicious and a definite repeat at our house.
This was fantastic (I used popcorn chicken instead to save time). We had left overs, and decided to try it on pizza! I made more sauce, added a bit of shredded mozzarella cheese then topped it with the pasta. My husband claims this is by far the best (if not messiest) pizza he’s ever had.
I love cooking spicy food like this! I love Chinese food!
This was very tasty. I cut down the spice in the sauce by about half and that was perfect for my family. I made a lot of broccoli to go with it and sauteed some tofu in a bit of oil plus about a quarter cup of the sauce that was simmering. It took about 30 minutes to make the meal and I was pretty much working on something non-stop for those 30 minutes. Not a difficult meal to make, just lots of steps especially if you add in a veggie and protein. If you want to keep it simple, then you can just do the sauce and maybe a bag of microwaved veggies and it would still be yummy.
Thanks for dropping by to let me know! I’m so glad you enjoyed it!
Definitely should have used low sodium soy sauce….the overall dish was very tasty but overly salty.
Made this for dinner tonight it was amazing. we have enough for 2 more meals it really makes
a lot!
I’m so glad you guys enjoyed it! Thanks for coming back to let me know!
Why not eat the dried red chili peppers? That’s the best part. Do not afraid.
Hi this looks amazing!! Thanks for the recipe! This might be a silly question, but I was wondering if you used pre-cooked chicken? Or is it raw? Thanks in advance!!
Not a silly question at all! Glad you asked.
The chicken is raw in the beginning and you’ll be mixing it with the egg white-cornstarch mixture and cooking it in the skillet. Hope you enjoy it!
You have a great blog. Its like finding a treasure case of my fav recipes. I cnt wait to try this one.
What would be a close, non-alcoholic substitute for sherry and rice wine vinegar for this recipe?
I’m so glad you’re enjoying the blog!!
There isn’t any alcohol in rice wine vinegar so you’ll be fine with that. As far as the sherry, it would be ok to just leave out all together.
Enjoy!