Chili Crisp Ground Chicken Noodle Bowls

My fellow chili crisp and chili crunch lovers are in for a treat with this ground chicken ramen recipe. Extra lean ground chicken breast is cooked with an umami, sweet, and spicy chili crisp sauce and placed atop a bowl of noodles tossed in a peanut butter sauce.

While traditional ramen and noodle bowls aren’t known for being macro friendly, these noodle bowls are packed with 33 grams of protein and just 470 calories. And there are plenty of customizations you can make to make this dish even more macro friendly.

I’ll walk you through the recipe and cover substitutions below, and you’ll find a printable recipe card at the bottom of the post. Let’s go!

Making the Chili Crisp Ground Chicken

The chili crisp sauce for the chicken is super easy to make. Here’s everything you need:

• Chili Crisp or Chili Crunch – I used Momofuku chili crunch, but any chili oil with some crunchy bits of garlic, seeds, and other goodies works great.
• Honey – You can substitute with maple syrup, brown sugar or a brown sugar substitute, or any sticky sweetener.
• Soy Sauce – Coconut aminos are a great soy-free alternative.
• Black Vinegar – You can use other vinegars like rice, balsamic, or malt. More info about black vinegar.
• Chili Garlic Sauce – You can use sriracha, gochujang, sambal oelek, or straight up freshly minced garlic. This ingredient is here for a punch of garlic (and funky fermented flavor if possible).

If you’re spice sensitive, you may want to make slight adjustments to the amount of chili crunch used. You could mix something like the sesame garlic crunch mentioned in my low calorie rice blend with olive oil or a bit of toasted sesame oil for a milder sauce.

There’s also the possibility of using other sauces to cook your ground chicken like honey sesame, Japanese barbecue, or firecracker.

Making the Peanut Butter Noodles

I recently watched Matty Matheson make $2 noodles and use a delicious looking peanut butter sauce. In typically Matty fashion, the dish is on the indulgent side and I wanted to take a stab at a lightened up version.

For the noodles, I used rice ramen from Lotus Foods (available in bulk at Costco). These are gluten free noodles made from brown rice and millet, and the macros are roughly the same as any other wheat ramen noodle without a seasoning packet. So, feel free to use any noodles for this recipe.

Just be sure to substitute gram for gram (210 grams)!

Side note: I compared healthy pasta alternatives and protein pasta options to plain ol’ wheat pasta when making my ultimate protein mac and found the added fiber and protein per serving was minimal and usually not worth the tradeoff. If you truly wanted to save calories, try something like zucchini noodles.

The recipe calls for cooking the rice ramen in salted water. But if you’re using a different ramen that comes with a broth packet or seasoning, feel free to add it to the water. You’ll be using a bit of the reserved pasta water, so some of the flavor will carryover.

As for the peanut butter sauce, I tested both peanut butter and tahini. While they both tasted great, I think the peanut butter flavor comes through more in a smaller quantity (to keep the calories under control). Using peanut butter also opens up the possibility of adding powdered peanut butter for an extra protein boost and more peanut butter flavor.

And the added lime zest and juice adds a pop of brightness to the sauce, but is definitely optional.

Assembling Chicken and Noodle Bowls

The recipe as-written makes 4 bowls with about 10 ounces of noodles and 4 ounces of the chili crisp chicken each. You’re welcome to portion things out as you see fit, and I’ve included the total nutrition facts in the recipe card’s notes section just in case.

Who knows? You may want to make rice bowls or pair this chili crunch ground chicken with another carb source.

As for garnishes, I think all you need are some sliced scallions and toasted sesame seeds or sesame garlic crunch. If you have the calories to spare, some extra chili crisp is also a great option.

All right, I believe that’s everything you need to know about making, customizing, and serving these ground chicken and ramen bowls. You can ask any recipe or ingredient questions in the comments below. And if you try the recipe and love it, I always appreciate recipe reviews!