Paleo Chicken Pad Thai combines butternut squash noodles, tons of vegetables for texture and flavor, and is drizzled with the most delicious creamy lime almond butter sauce! This kid-friendly variation is not spicy, but full of flavor. You’ll love this for an easy and healthy weeknight dinner!
A delicious and light way to enjoy Pad Thai!
Pad Thai Chicken will forever be one of our favorite meals to order off a menu at a restaurant. It doesn’t get much better than crunchy veggies, chicken, a peanut sauce, and noodles to slurp! But in typical Wholesomelicious form, I have to find ways to lighten up traditional Pad Thai.
As a nutritionist, I am always on the lookout for ways to add in more veggies and fiber. With this particular Pad Thai, we’re using butternut squash noodles! Butternut squash is loaded with fiber, and other nutrients like Vitamins A and C.
I am now obsessed with butternut squash noodles. They have this creamy nutty texture that is WAY better than pasta noodles. So how many times did I make them this week? Oh I’m glad you asked! Just 4 times. And this week, I have them on my list to make at least 5 more. From my Butternut Squash Noodles with Tomato Basil Sausage Cream Sauce, to my Greek Meatballs with Roasted Red Pepper Sauce.
How to Make Paleo Chicken Pad Thai:
To start, we will need to prep butternut squash and spiralize it. My spiralizer is one of my favorite tools!
- Cook the butternut squash noodles and chicken at the same time on a baking sheet. This saves time!
- While it’s baking in the oven, make the sauce by combining in the food processor or blender.
- In a skillet, heat up oil and saute the carrots and bell pepper.
- Scramble an egg in the same skillet.
- Toss noodles, veggies, chicken, and sauce together.
- Top with cilantro, green onion, and almonds to serve.
Nut Butter Sauce:
Since we never seem to have peanut butter in the house anymore, I made an almond butter sauce. I changed it up a bit from my normal sauce, adding in some lime and making it creamy with some flax milk (any dairy free milk will work). The honey, nut butter, coconut aminos, ginger, and apple cider vinegar work also work so well together! And the result from my official taste testers?
AWESOMESAUCE!! Their word not mine, haha. You may have more sauce than you need, which you won’t mind at all. Just store any extra in the fridge for later use.
Variations and Adaptations:
- Noodles: feel free to use any noodle of choice. This is also delicious with zucchini noodles or sweet potatoes. If you want to use any kind of pasta, you can also substitute with a thin noodle!
- Veggies: I used carrots and bell pepper in here. Feel free to customize! Mushrooms and broccoli are also great options.
- Protein: Shrimp or beef would also make a great option.
Other Thai Dishes you will enjoy
Here are a few of my favorite Thai dishes to make:
- Thai Coconut Curry Meatballs
- Thai Basil Beef Stir-Fry
- Thai Chicken Zoodle Soup
- Thai Beef Drunken Zoodles
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Paleo Chicken Pad Thai
Paleo Chicken Pad Thai is just like your favorite restaurant Pad Thai, without the grains! You'll love the delicious nutty sauce on top.
Ingredients
For the Pad Thai:
- 1 lb chicken breast or tenders*
- 2 butternut squash bulbs
- 2 tbsp avocado or olive oil
- 1 red bell pepper chopped and de-seeded
- 2 carrots chopped or julienned
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup chopped red cabbage
- 1/4 cup chopped green onion
- 1/2 cup chopped almonds or cashews
- 1/4 chopped fresh cilantro optional
- Salt and pepper to taste
For the Sauce:
- 1/2 cup almond butter
- 1/3 cup cashew milk or your favorite dairy-free milk
- 3 tbsp raw honey
- 1 tbsp toasted sesame oil
- 2 tbsp coconut aminos or soy sauce
- 2 cloves garlic crushed
- 1 tsp minced ginger
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- Juice of 1/2 lime
Instructions
-
Begin by heating your oven to 375 degrees. Line a baking sheet with foil and set aside. To use the stovetop variation, see the notes section below.
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Salt and pepper your chicken breasts (make sure they are roughly around the same size for even cooking). Place on the baking sheet.
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Now prepare your butternut squash. Remove the bulbous end of the squash (you can’t spiralize this end because of the seeds). Now peel the skin off the narrow end that you are going to spiralize. It’s easier to cut this part in half. Spiralize the sized/shape noodles you like.(note that thicker noodles require at least 20-25 minutes, thinner noodles might be done faster). Once noodles are made, drizzle with a tbsp of oil, add to the sheet pan. Salt and pepper both the chicken and the noodles. Place in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until chicken is cooked all the way.
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Meanwhile make the sauce: in a blender or food processor, pulse together almond butter, honey, sesame oil, coconut aminos, garlic, lime, vinegar, and ginger. While motor is running, pour in cashew milk. Continue to pulse until sauce is creamy and well combined.
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Heat up skillet to medium heat. Spray with non-stick or use avocado oil. Saute carrots and bell pepper for 2-3 minutes. Whisk together eggs, and add them to the pan. Continue to cook another 2-3 minutes or until eggs are scrambled. Set aside.
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Remove chicken and butternut squash noodles from the oven. Cut chicken into small pieces. Toss chicken and noodles into a large bowl. Now add in eggs and carrot/pepper mixture. Add in cabbage, cilantro, and cashews or almonds. Continue to toss and pour the sauce on top of the mixture (you may not want to use the entire sauce). Mix around until well combine.
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Season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve!
Recipe Notes
*Chicken breast tenders are preferred since they will cook evenly. If you have just chicken breast, cut them into even strips.
**To make on the stovetop, saute the butternut noodles first with avocado or olive oil for 5-7 minutes. Remove from pan and keep warm. Next, cook the chicken after cutting into bite sized pieces. Once chicken is almost cooked, add the egg.Â
You had me with those stunning colours! Honestly I don’t know who would want to eat beige boring pasta when they can have this! Gorgeous!
I agree Donna!!! Love some bright colored vegetables in place of pasta!
I love squash noodles! And that sauce sounds amazing – I can’t have peanuts anymore so I can’t wait to try this! Thank you!
You’re welcome, Renee! Enjoy!!
So pretty with the red cabbage and all of the other vibrant colors! Looks like an absolutely perfect weekday dinner!
Thanks, Michele!
Oh my goodness I wish I had this right now! It looks so good! Pad Thai was my favorite before my gluten-free days. I’m going to have to make this soon.
Thanks Emily, hope you enjoy it!!
I love that you used butternut squash noodles for this recipe. So pretty with all the colors!
Thanks Katja!!
Rainbow Pad Thai! This is stunning!
I LOVE Paleo Thai food ! This chicken pad thai looks so gorgeous and delicious. A must try !
I am really craving Thai food now! This looks tasty 🙂
This looks so flavorful and delicious! I love that your kids approved- I hope my kids are good eaters like yours 🙂
We make a version very similar to this, I love pad thai
This looks so amazing and colourful…the perfect lunch or dinner option…
I need this meal in my life soon!
Pad Thai is one of my favorites and I love this healthy veggie-loaded twist on something I’ve missed
Pad Thai and butternut noodles are 2 of my ultimate weaknesses, so I can’t wait to try them paired together!
The photography on this is just stunning – look at all of those beautiful colours! It’s so funny when people say Paleo is restrictive because food like this exists!
I LOVE Pad Thai and this version looks like one I need to add to my menu, stat!
This will be perfect for the Thai cravings I get multiple times each week. And I LOVE squash noodles!
Amy, I had to write you and tell you that I made this for my family for dinner tonight. It was seriously, SERIOUSLY one of the most delicious things I had ever made, Thank you so much!
Thank you, Millason!Just made my day 🙂
The flavor was really good and I would make this again. Gave 4 stars because: 1) It took me 45-50 minutes to make, and I had pre-spiralized squash and pre-cut cabbage; and 2) for my tastes, it needed salt and extra lime on top of individual serving; and 3) by the time I put everything together it was luke warm. I would put it all in the pan together when adding the sauce. I would definitely double the recipe next time so could have left-overs. My husband and I ate the whole thing! P.S. Don’t rate a recipe that you haven’t actually made.
I completely agree with you on rating a recipe that you haven’t even made, it’s not truthful and people like me are looking for people who have actually made it. I don’t want to try something everyone says oh how pretty, looks amazing, sounds good…all that may be true, but how does it turn out!?! I’m here bc all I was able to ascertain on my own. Your comment is the second comment of someone who actually made this recipe…smh. Thanks for your thorough comment! Cheers!!
This dish looks fabulous. I love the blend of colors, flavors and textures that this dish promises. Can’t wait to try it.
I made the recipe exactly as listed and it was great. The second time I used spaghetti squash and added some chili paste and it was awesome too. Thanks for the great recipe.
Flavors were really great, but the dish came out like a clump and grainy. I was concerned when the directions said to cook the spiral cut butternut squash in the oven. Being so thin I expected the squash to cook quickly and it did. This lead to the dish getting mushy once all mixed together. I’ll make this again, but cook the squash separately in a frying pan. Thanks!
I just searched for sheet pan pad Thai and this came up. Have to say it looks DELICIOUS and I’m definitely going to try it out! Thanks!!
I tried this recipe, and it was awesome! The sauce was amazing. Thank you!
Wooohoo!!
I made this last night and it was delicious! My whole family loved it and even had seconds. Win Win for getting tons of veggies into the kids and they didnt even know it 😉
I am looking for a use for spiralized carrot noodles (TJ’s frozen section). Do you think these would be a suitable substitute for the butternut squash zoodles?
Yes, I think that would work well!
Just made this, and holy crap it is delicious!! We added some red pepper flakes, purple basil and chili paste to add some kick but otherwise it is perfection. Will definitely be making again!
For the sauce, I reduced the honey to 1 tablespoon, admittedly a tiny bit overflowing, and the sauce was amazing. Not too sweet. Also I used lentil spaghetti noodles along with zucchini noodles, cabbage, red onion, green beans and for the meat I cut up salmon into small bite sized pieces and sautéed in sesame oil because these were what I had on hand. Delicious
So glad you loved it!!
Do you have nutritional information?
Yummy this was good thank you for sharing will make again
Made this for dinner for my wife and I. Amazing results with cooking squash noodles with the chicken. Sauce is great, my wife is a true Minnesotan and was afraid of the name, but really enjoyed it. Well done.
Thank you, Bob! Glad you enjoyed it.
I have about 35 “go to” 5 star recipes that I depend on as a diabetic that has lost 35 pounds and gotten off injections! This pad thai recipe has hit the #1 spot in my top 35 list that I’ve been grooming over the last two years.
I’m sensitive to carbs and calories so I made the following substitutions:
I trade low fat PBFit (powdered Peanut butter) for the almond butter and honey. (I find PBfit to be naturally sweet, and that is an easy way to reduce calories. Coconut aminos is also inherently sweeter than say, soy sauce.
I added a bit more butternut squash using the thicker noodle spiralizer, then i ALSO added a Turnip spiralized….they make fantastic and firm noodles as well. I added about twice the cabbage, and I cooked it a little instead of tossing it in raw.
I have now served this to company with no excuses as “diet food”. It makes sizeable portions at about 375 calories. Very satisfying! I’m so glad I’ve discovered your posts!
This looks delicious! It’s on my meal plan for this week. Is there another way to make butternut squash noodles? I know with spaghetti squash, I bake it then fork it out and it comes out as noodles. But I don’t have a spiralizer and the grocery store was all out of premade squash noodles.
Back to say I made this with rice noodles and it was delicious! I doubled the cabbage and carrots. My young kids even gobbled it up. Thank you!
Yay!! So glad it worked out and glad you love it.