This delectably creamy and flavorful lemon butter pasta with juicy chicken is so delicious; featuring bright buttery lemony notes bursting throughout each bite! Perfect for a weeknight dinner or date night-in!

Pasta is my love language y’all. I’d be hard pressed to believe that pasta isn’t someone else’s love language, too! There are seriously sooo many variations and takes on pasta recipes. I like to think of pasta as one of those recipes that aims to please almost everyone. And lemon pasta, scratch that, lemon butter pasta? My lemon-loving self is crazy about this recipe!

How To Make Lemon Butter Pasta

This pasta dish is so wildly decadent, creamy, flavorful, and crazy good! The first thing to make before the lemon pasta is the chicken. The protein-element adds such a nice filling and textural component that compliments the pasta. The chicken gets pan-seared in butter, nice spices, and results in juicy pieces of chicken! So much variety of flavors are present within this lemon butter chicken pasta.

Next, the lemon butter pasta comes together with such ease, no kidding! To begin, make your pasta according to package directions and set aside. Now for this goodness, the lemon butter sauce! This delectable sauce is soo dreamy, has all the lemony goodness, and packed with ample flavor! The best part is that the lemon butter sauce comes together with very few ingredients too. Bold flavor from simple staples like butter, garlic, salt/pepper, heavy cream, and fresh lemon juice. Simplicity at its finest.

What Can I Sub For Heavy Cream?

A good substitute for heavy cream would be coconut cream, although the overall taste may slightly change.

What Kind Of Pasta To Use?

For this lemon butter pasta with chicken recipe, I used linguine. However, any kind of long pasta will work here. For example; spaghetti, angel hair, bucatini, tagliatelle, etc. I find that a longer cut of pasta works much better than using short cut pasta. Absolutely perfect and acceptable for slurping all the noods!

What To Pair With This Lemon Butter Pasta Recipe

Some options to pair alongside this dish for a complete meal include garlic bread or a side salad/soup. I just developed this loaded olive cheese bread that we tend to pair with this recipe, it is absolutely divine, y’all!

And don’t forget the wine! The Pinot Gris and Rosé I cracked open with this were delish, but there’s enough flavor and structure to this dish that you could go for a light red, maybe even a German Pinot.

This dish is extra perfect for weeknight dinners and date-night in situations (which we’re doing a lot of these days, ha). It’s also so much fun trying out different wines with this pasta and seeing how nicely they pair with. I hope you all enjoy this lemon butter chicken pasta recipe, can’t wait to see the recreations!

REMEMBER TO LEAVE A ⭐️STAR RATING⭐️AND TAG ME ON THE ‘GRAM IF YOU MAKE ANY OF MY RECIPES! I ALWAYS LOVE TO SEE IT WHEN YOU DO!

UNTIL NEXT TIME…LOVE AND BUTTER,

Q.

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lemon butter pasta with chicken in white bowl with fork

Lemon Butter Pasta with Chicken

5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star 4.8 from 4 reviews
  • Author: Quin Liburd
  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 20 minutes
  • Total Time: 30 minutes
  • Yield: 4
  • Category: Main Course
  • Method: Stovetop
  • Cuisine: American
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Description

This creamy and flavorful lemon butter pasta with juicy chicken is so delicious; featuring bright buttery lemony notes bursting throughout each bite! Perfect for weeknight dinner or date-night in!

Ingredients

For The Chicken:

  • 1 lb chicken breasts, sliced in half lengthwise
  • 1 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
  • kosher salt, to taste
  • fresh ground black pepper, to taste
  • 4 tablespoons unsalted butter

Lemon Butter Pasta:

  • 1 lb linguine, or other long pasta
  • 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
  • 1 tablespoon garlic paste, or 2 teaspoons garlic powder
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper
  • juice of 2 large lemons
  • zest of 1 lemon (from 1 juiced lemon)
  • 1 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
  • 1/3 cup reserved pasta water
  • 1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese, plus more for topping

Instructions

For The Chicken:

  1. Season chicken breasts half with garlic powder, paprika, and salt/pepper on both sides.
  2. In a large non-stick skillet melt butter over medium-high heat. Once butter has melted, pan-sear chicken breasts, about 4-5 minutes each side or until chicken is cooked through completely. Then set chicken aside on a plate.

Lemon Butter Pasta:

  1. Boil pasta according to your package directions, be sure to salt your water!
  2. On a separate burner, in a large skillet, melt butter over medium heat. Then add in garlic and stir together until softened and combined. Sprinkle in salt/white pepper and add in lemon juice/zest.
  3. Once pasta is done cooking, reserve 1/3 cup of starchy pasta water. Add heavy cream, pasta water, and parmesan cheese into sauce mixture, stir together. Allow cream to simmer on low for 2-3 minutes. Sauce will get bubbly and start to thicken as it cooks, resembling an alfredo sauce.
  4. Add cooked pasta into lemon butter sauce. Do this in batches (adding a little pasta at a time) so you can evenly toss and coat pasta without overwhelming the skillet all at once. 
  5. Serve warm alongside prepared chicken and sprinkle more parmesan cheese on top, if desired.