Slow Cooker Kung Pao Chicken
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Saucy Slow Cooker Kung Pao Chicken with a spicy kick! Simple ingredients bring a ton of flavor to this easy-to-make family favorite.
I’ve officially had Kung Pao Chicken twice in the past 36 hours. I made this slow cooker version a couple of nights ago for dinner and instantly fell in love. If you’re a sauce person – like me – you’ll want to double this sauce because it is finger-lickin’ good.
But that was only the first time I had Kung Pao Chicken this week. Last night my husband came home from a business trip and we went out to dinner with my parents. They picked a Chinese restaurant I haven’t been to in years and I ordered the same thing I always ordered back in the days – Kung Pao Chicken. And here is the real kicker – I was disappointed because this slow cooker version was so much better. Like…. soooo much better.
Plus I’m pretty sure that this recipe is healthier than any restaurant Kung Pao Chicken. And easy! Just brown the chicken, throw it into the slow cooker with the sauce, let it work its magic for a few hours, and then add the last couple of ingredients. Perfect Kung Pao Chicken made with simple everyday ingredients and loaded with tons of flavor. I’m in love!
Slow Cooker Kung Pao Chicken
Ingredients
- 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts, chopped into 1 inch pieces
- 1 red bell pepper, chopped
- 1 zucchini, chopped
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic
Sauce
- 4 tablespoons soy sauce
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic
- 2 teaspoons chili paste
- 1 tablespoon vinegar
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- ⅓ cup water
- 2 tablespoons corn starch
- 2 tablespoons cold water
- ⅓ cup peanuts , (see note)
- optional: cooked rice, green onions
- 2 teaspoons sriracha , or ½ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
Instructions
- Drizzle a large sauce pan with oil and saute chicken over medium heat for 2-3 minutes until browned
- Add chicken to a greased slow cooker. In a bowl whisk together sauce ingredients: garlic, soy sauce, chile paste, vinegar, brown sugar, sriracha and 1/3 cup water. Pour sauce into the slow cooker. Cook on high 3-4 hours or on low 5-6 hours.
- About 10-15 minutes before serving, drizzle a pan with oil and saute peppers, zucchini, and garlic for 2-3 minutes until veggies are tender. Add to slow cooker.
- Whisk together corn starch and cold water til dissolved. Add to slow cooker and stir. Allow to thicken for 5-10 minutes. Serve over rice and garnish with peanuts and green onions as desired.
Notes
*double sauce ingredients if you like extra sauce – we do!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
What would the sodium count be for this meal?
Hi Susan- I recommend that you use My Fitness Pal for that! They have an awesome online tool where you can input any recipe URL into and it will generate the nutritional information for you!! Hopefully that can help answer your question! 🙂
All I can say is wow — amazing recipe and so simple. My husband also said this was easily nice restaurant quality. 🙂
Thanks for sharing!
Have you ever frozen this? To use for like… a freezer meal? I usually buy the kung pao sauce from Wal-Mart because I couldn’t find a recipe to MAKE IT?!?!? OMG it sounds so stinkin’ easy! I can’t wait to try it because I LURVE the sauce!!!
Hi April! I haven’t had the chance to freeze this yet so I’m not sure how it would turn out. The sauce is the bomb! I hope you enjoy!
Hi,
I will definitely try this. In our country we have 2 kinds of chicken. One that is soft and it’s what we use when cooking using oven we call it broiler the other is kienyeji chicken meaning traditional it is the kind that is rared free range in the farm just let loose to find its own food in the farm. This kind is somewhat tough.
My question is for the the recipes where you use slow cooker is the chicken kienyeji? because for broiler if cooked for all those hours it will become soup and there will be no chicken to be eaten.
Hi Tiffany, could I make this without pre-browning the chicken/sauteeing the veggies separately? Have you tried just throwing it all in the slow cooker? Thanks!
Made this Kung Pao chicken last night and it was great. My family loved it, i adored it. Thank you for sharing this recipe!
Definitely going to try this! Would you be able to just put in whole frozen chicken breasts, right into the slow cooker? I only have whole ones in the freezer right now… do you think that would screw up the recipe at all, or change cooking times?
If you don’t have the chili paste, is there anything else you can use?
You could try using crushed red pepper flakes.
This sounds delicious but I think there must be an error in the duration of cook time. Still not corrected??
Sorry for the confusion, it’s updated now!
Tiffany, I’m planning to make this for my family latter this week. I have a quick question about the chicken breast. I’m noticing a big difference in chicken breast sizes these days. Sometimes they are so big that one can be 3/4 of a pound and other times they are so small that 3 can be 3/4 of a pound. So can you tell me approximately how much the chicken breast should weigh in this recipe? Thanks!
Hi Sherri, It’s so true, chicken breasts to vary in size – I generally think of each chicken breast called for in the recipe being “medium size”. If you have a very large one, that could serve as 2 breasts, whereas if you have very small ones you will probably want to use 2 of those to equal one medium breast. I think the best way to put gauge how much chicken you need for a recipe like this is to go off of what your family would need to feed 4 people. If it’s a little more or less chicken than I used, that’s okay! It doesn’t have to be exact. 🙂