Easy 30-Minute Spicy Chicken Rigatoni Pasta
Your search for the best chicken pasta recipe is over! This spicy chicken rigatoni recipe has a creamy, comforting spicy tomato sauce loaded with lots of parmesan cheese, crushed red pepper flakes, and fresh basil to finish. Simple, classic flavors, quick to make, and well-tested tips for an unreal dinner. The Practical Kitchen readers say: “I can definitely see myself adding this to the rotation, and it's the type of dish that I wouldn't mind making even after a day at work. Another slam dunk for The Practical Kitchen.”
Ingredients
- 1 chicken breast (butterflied)
- 8 ounces rigatoni pasta
- ½ cup cherry tomatoes (sliced in half)
- ⅓ cup minced shallot (about one medium-large shallot)
- 1 clove garlic
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste concentrate (use 2 tablespoons of canned tomato paste)
- 1 teaspoon salt (plus more for seasoning)
- ½ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper (plus more for seasoning)
- 1 ounce parmesan cheese (freshly grated works best!)
- 1 sprig fresh basil (how to chiffonade basil)
Optional
- 1 ounce goat cheese (add with the parmesan)
Instructions
- Place the chicken breast on the cutting board and pat dry. Holding your knife so the blade is horizontal, butterfly the chicken breast so that you have two thin slices. Season the top side of the chicken breast pieces with salt and pepper.
- Preheat high sided skillet over medium heat 30-45 seconds. Add 1-2 tablespoons cooking oil. When the oil has loosened up and coats the bottom of the pan when you swirl it, place the chicken seasoned side down in the pan. Season the top side of the chicken with a sprinkle of salt and pepper. Increase the heat to medium-high and cook the chicken about 3-5 minutes per side until cooked through (at least 160°F on an instant read thermometer). Then remove it to a plate or clean cutting board to rest.
- Without cleaning out the pan, reduce the heat to low and add the remaining tablespoon of cooking oil. Add the onion and cook, stirring frequently about 2-3 minutes until softened. Then add the tomato paste, garlic, and cracked red pepper flakes and cook 1 minute more until things start to caramelize slightly. NOTE: It will start to stick to the browned bits on the bottom of the pan. Don't worry about that — that's a good thing! Just don't let it burn.
- Add a splash of water to the pan, just enough to cover the bottom. It will immediately sizzle on contact with the pan. Increase the heat to high and use a wooden spoon or spatula with a sturdy edge to stir and scrape up the browned bits on the bottom as the liquid begins to boil.
- Add the pasta, tomatoes, salt, and pepper to the pan and give them a quick stir. Then add just enough water to almost cover the pasta. It's okay if some of the pasta noodles are sticking out above the water.
- When the water begins to boil, set a timer for the "al dente" time given on the rigatoni box. Keep the heat at high the whole time, stirring constantly as the water boils and the pasta cooks to prevent the pasta from sticking to the bottom of the pan. Add water in very small amounts as needed (some pasta shapes absorb water more quickly than others). The idea is to have very little water left in the pan just as the timer goes off.
- When there is about a minute left on the timer, and very little water remains in the pan, check the pasta for doneness, reduce the heat to low, add the parmesan cheese all at once and stir vigorously to melt the cheese into a creamy sauce. If the pasta isn't done yet, keep cooking, adding water as needed until it is cooked through.
- Take the pan off the heat. Slice the chicken and add it back to the pan, along with half the thinly sliced basil. Stir to combine. Serve immediately, topped with the remaining sliced basil and additional grated parmesan cheese.
Chicken is considered fully cooked at 165°F, but it will continue cooking as it rests. We're pulling it off the pan a little bit early so that it doesn't overcook!
Bite a noodle in half — if you can see a ring of uncooked pasta in the center, it needs a little more time to cook.
If the timer goes off and you still have a lot of water in your pan, crank the heat as high as it can go and stir really well — the more you stir, the faster the water will evaporate. If you truly have way too much water left, use a spoon, ladle, or turkey baster to remove some water from the pan.
RECIPE NOTES
- This cooking method does not work with fresh or fancier gourmet pastas. Fresh pasta cooks too quickly and is so starchy that it will break down in the water. Even dried fancy pastas tend to be a little too starchy to work really well here. It doesn't mean you can't use them, they just don't always hold up as well to the rigorous boiling and stirring as boxed pastas do. Aim for a pasta with a 9-12 minute cook time.
- I recommend using a 10-inch high-sided skillet for this recipe. I like to use a 3 or 4 quart sauté pan. If you use a skillet that's too wide, you'll have a shorter layer of pasta, which means the water will evaporate much more quickly and it will be harder to submerge the pasta. And if you use a regular sauce pot, the water will be too deep to have evaporated by the time the pasta is done cooking.
- 8 ounces of rigatoni and 1 pound of chicken breast is enough for three very hungry people OR or four moderately hungry people who are eating this alongside something else. If you're going to scale this recipe up, the cooking process is the same; just remember, the more crowded the pan is, the more water you'll need, and the longer it will take the water to absorb/evaporate!
- Every time you add new water to the skillet, it will cool down the temperature of the pan. This can slow down the cooking time. Add additional water in small amounts, but only as needed!
- I gave the cheese measurement by weight because finely grated parmesan cheese is very light and delicate and there's a lot of air in it, which makes it hard to measure accurately using cups. If I told you 1 cup of parmesan and you use a denser, thicker grated parmesan, you'll have WAY too much cheese. Measuring by weight means no matter how you grate your parmesan cheese (or if you buy the pre-packaged stuff) you'll have the right amount of cheese! If you don't have a kitchen scale, add the cheese ¼ cup at a time and stir until it melts. When the sauce is as cheesy as you want and clings to the noodles, stop adding cheese.
- Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week. To reheat, microwave in 30 second bursts, stirring in between, until warmed throughout.
- Variations:
- Vegetarian - Skip the chicken! You'll miss out on the flavor from the fond, but you can make up for it by doubling the amount of shallots, AND/OR by sautéing some thinly sliced leeks with the shallots before you add the pasta.
- Extra Spicy - Double the amount of red pepper flakes AND/OR season the chicken breast with a pinch of cayenne on each side. You could also add a dash of your favorite hot sauce to the pot when you add the water. Add extra red pepper flakes to garnish.
- Extra Mild - Leave the red pepper flakes out entirely.
- Like Bucca di Beppo - Add ¼-1/2 cup frozen peas when you add the chicken back in at the end.