Olive Garden Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara

February 24, 2015 by Stephanie Manley, Last Updated August 19, 2022 58 Comments

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Dinner should be exciting! This Olive Garden Chicken & Shrimp Carbonara takes exciting to the next level! It’s a wonderful take on a chicken and shrimp pasta meal using chicken tenders to update this classic dish.

Homemade Olive Garden Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara on a plate

Table of Contents

What Makes Shrimp Carbonara With Chicken Unique

This classic recipe is an Olive Garden favorite. Who doesn’t love a rich carbonara sauce?. It’s made up of sautéed seasoned chicken, shrimp, and bucatini pasta tossed in a creamy carbonara sauce with bacon and roasted red peppers. But this version uses chicken tenders for the chicken to offer a new twist on this classic dish. The breaded chicken tenders combine with all the other flavors so beautifully. And your kids will love it too!

What is the Difference between Carbonara Sauce and Alfredo Sauce

Both carbonara sauce and alfredo sauce are wonderful choices for any chicken and shrimp pasta dish but there is a difference. Alfredo sauce is a white sauce made from butter, parsley, heavy cream, and minced garlic. This Carbonara sauce, on the other hand, is made with parmesan cheese, heavy cream, eggs, garlic, pepper, red bell pepper, and bacon. Both delicious and both so easy to make.

If you like Olive Garden Alfredo Sauce, you will enjoy this recipe. I have often made a quick dinner of Alfredo sauce and pasta, but this recipe turns this up just a notch.

The origin of this dish is originally a simple dish made of pasta, eggs, cheese, bacon or ham, and lots of black pepper. This recipe is slightly different it has a creamy Parmesan sauce.

Is white sauce the same as carbonara?

Carbonara is a sauce made from egg yolks, white sauce is made from a mixture of butter, flour, and milk. Carbonara is a gluten-free sauce.

Does carbonara taste eggy?

Carbonara should have a rich, thick, velvety smooth texture. It will not taste strongly of eggs if cooked properly. The fat from the meat helps to transform the sauce into a rich thick sauce you are going to love.

How do you avoid scrambled eggs in carbonara?

There are two tricks in keeping your sauce from turning into scrambled eggs.

When making carbonara you will want to use room temperature eggs, the change of temperature will be less.
Stir continually when you add the eggs. Do not stop stirring, if you stop the dish from moving that is when the egg curds will form, so keep on stirring!

Ingredients for Chicken Carbonara Pasta With Shrimp

Here’s what you need:

Chicken Tenders
Flour
Panko Bread Crumbs
Salt & Pepper
Eggs
Large shrimp
Bucatini or Spaghetti Pasta or Linguine
Butter
Bacon
Garlic
Red Bell Pepper
Heavy Cream
Parmesan Cheese

Olive Garden Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara ingredients

How to Make Olive Garden Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara

Start by breading the chicken tenders with flour, panko bread crumbs, egg, and salt & pepper.
Allow breaded tenders to dry on a rack.
Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat.
Place the breaded chicken in the skillet and cook it for 5-7 minutes on both sides. Set aside.
Boil the shrimp until it’s perfectly pink.
Cook the pasta according to the package instructions.
While cooking the pasta, cook the bacon and butter in a large saucepan.
Add the garlic and red bell pepper until the bacon is cooked through.
Add the heavy cream and parmesan cheese mix with a wire whisk until you get a creamy consistency.
Add the pasta into the sauce and stir in the beaten egg.
Serve with chicken and shrimp.

Recipe Notes

The bucatini pasta adds a unique texture to this recipe but if you don’t have bucatini, you can use regular spaghetti for this dish
The last step of this recipe requires you to place one beaten egg into the cooked pasta and sauce. The residual heat of the pasta will cook the egg. If this makes you concerned, you can buy eggs that are already pasteurized, a brand of these is Safest Choice which is sold in many grocery stores. You will want to stir the egg in quickly as you don’t want the eggs to curdle
Garnish this dish with more cheese on top and a little black pepper

This dish is more hearty and slightly more updated. I think the additions are good and you will enjoy them in this copycat Olive Garden Chicken & Shrimp Carbonara.

Homemade Olive Garden Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara on a white plate

How to store and reheat these leftovers

You will want to store your leftovers in an airtight container in your fridge. They will last up to three days. I recommend if you aren’t going to consume all of this shrimp carbonara recipe in one sitting, I recommend storing the pasta and the sauce in separate containers. When you store the sauce and the pasta separately so the pasta does not soak up the sauce.

When you reheat this dish, I recommend reheating the sauce in a small saucepan on the stovetop. Heat the sauce gently and slowly, you may want to add a bit more cream to this sauce.

Love copycat Olive Garden Recipes? Be sure to try these Olive Garden menu items

More Shrimp Pasta Recipes

Be sure to check out more amazing pasta recipes and the best Italian recipes.

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