This award-winning Thai Chicken Noodle Salad is a delicious cold noodle salad, made with grilled chicken, vermicelli noodles, crunchy veggies, and a creamy peanut sauce. It's filling enough for a meal and it's also Weight Watchers friendly at only 4 ww points per serving!
Thai chicken noodle salad is popular in the New Year and in the summer, but makes a great healthy meal any time of the year! And it pairs well with my Bread Machine Breadsticks. And this was the very first recipe I ever created over 30 years ago!
Jump to:
Why You'll Love This Recipe
- Healthy and Light. This recipe is the ideal meal for when you want healthy and light. It's only 4 ww points.
- Hearty enough for a meal. This salad is hearty enough for a stand-alone meal that leaves you feeling full and satisfied.
- Easy to make. This Thai chicken salad is quick and easy to make and you can make the whole thing in advance or parts of it (chicken and dressing).
- Simple Ingredients. You don't need any special ingredients to make this salad and you should have most of the ingredients for the dressing on hand.
Love healthy chicken and lettuce recipes? Try my Honey Sriracha Chicken Lettuce Wraps!
🥘 Ingredient Notes
For this Thai Noodle Salad with chicken, you'll need the following salad ingredients:
- Peppers. I use a combination of red bell pepper, yellow or orange pepper, and either mini or regular bell peppers- it just depends on what I have on hand. I have also used green peppers.
- Soy sauce. If you're concerned about sodium, use a low-sodium soya sauce.
- Vermicelli noodles. Vermicelli noodles are ideal for this recipe because they are very thin and don't weigh down this salad.
For the Peanut Salad Dressing, you'll need the following ingredients:
- Ginger. It's critical to use fresh ginger in this recipe.
- Lime juice. I use lime juice from concentrate because it's convenient and usually what I have on hand. If you use fresh lime juice, you'll need to double the amount to ½ cup and cut back the water to ⅓ cup.
- Honey. I use liquid honey.
- Peanut butter. I use light or low-fat peanut butter (creamy or crunchy- whatever I happen to have on hand).
- Dry mustard. Also known as 'ground mustard', it adds depth, flavor, and a little kick.
*See recipe card for full list of ingredients and quantities
📖 Variations & Substitutions
- Grape Tomatoes - You can use cherry tomatoes instead.
- Oil- You could use sesame oil instead.
- Green onions- You could use red onions instead.
- Lettuce - You could use leaf lettuce or head lettuce instead.
- Noodles -You could use rice stick noodles or angel hair pasta. In a pinch, you could also sub ramen noodles.
- Honey- You could use creamed honey instead.
- Vegetarian- Use peanuts and raw sunflower seeds instead of chicken.
Expert Tip:
In a hurry?
- Use pre-shredded carrots from the grocery store.
- Use store-bought shredded rotisserie chicken instead of cooking chicken breast.
🔪How to Make Thai Chicken Noodle Salad
- Step 1: Prepare vermicelli noodles as per package directions (usually you boil water, then remove from heat and soak the noodles in the hot water for 5 minutes.)
- Step 2: Drain and set aside to cool.
- Step 3: Spray grill with non-stick spray and season chicken with garlic powder and cajun seasoning.
- Step 4: Grill chicken on an outdoor or indoor grill (or cook in a skillet on the stove top) until cooked through (the chicken should have an internal temperature of 165 degrees F/73 degrees C). Cool and dice or slice (depending on your preference- I like to dice).
- Step 5: Wash and chop vegetables. Add to a large bowl.
- Step 6: Make the peanut dressing: Add all dressing ingredients in a microwave-safe bowl.
- Step 7: Microwave for 1 minute. Remove and stir with a whisk. *You may need to put it back in for another 30-45 seconds if it's not coming together as you whisk it.
- Step 8: Add chopped or sliced chicken, noodles, and dressing to the large bowl with vegetables and toss. Garnish: Garnish with lime wedges and sesame seeds if desired.
🥖What to serve with Thai Chicken Noodle Salad
This salad is pretty hearty on it's own, so I like to serve it with a Baguette Garlic Bread or this Zero (0) ww point Everything Bagel Cloud Bread. If I want to serve it with a hot dish, I pair it with a vegetarian soup such as this Easy Minnestrone Soup (shown).
🌡️Storage
Store leftover salad in the fridge in an airtight container for up to 24 hours. It will get soggy if you leave it any longer than that.
If you want to make it in advance, store the dressing, the noodles, and the salad/veggies in 3 different containers for up to 2 days, and combine just prior to serving.
These ingredients don't stand up to freezing.
Expert Tip:
Store your fresh ginger in the freezer! This recipe uses fresh ginger and ginger is usually a real pain to store because it goes bad so fast. I store my ginger in the freezer in a small freezer bag.
When I need it, I simply peel off some of the skin with a carrot peeler, then grate the ginger right into my food. It lasts several months in the freezer and this hack saves you both time and money! I use this for so many recipes including my Egg Roll in a Bowl.
👪 Serving Size
This Thai Peanut Chicken Noodle Salad recipe makes 6 servings. However, you can half, double, or triple the recipe by clicking on the serving number and selecting the number of servings you'd like. The ingredient quantities will automatically adjust.
🔢WW Points
This recipe is Weight Watchers friendly @ 4 WW points per serving using light peanut butter. But it's so good that no one will even suspect it's Weight Watchers friendly. My teenage kids love this recipe!
❔Recipe FAQ's
Absolutely! If you like spicy, you can add chili pepper flakes or sriracha sauce to the dressing to spice it up!
Yes, this is a great make-ahead salad! If you want to make it in advance, store the dressing, the noodles, and the salad/veggies in separate containers for up to 2 days, and combine just prior to serving.
Microwaving helps the peanut butter soften, and blend with the other ingredients. If you don’t have a microwave, you can gently warm the dressing ingredients on the stovetop while whisking.
If you’re allergic to peanuts or want a different flavor, you can use almond butter, Wow Butter, cashew butter, or sunflower seed butter as a substitute.
If you're looking for a hearty salad or a 30 minute dinner idea, you'll love this one. It's bound to become one of your family's favorite salads!
🥗More Hearty Delicious Salads
Did your family❤️this recipe? Did you know that commenting and⭐rating recipes is one of the best ways to support your favorite recipe creators? If you LOVED this recipe, please comment and rate it in the recipe card or share photos on social media using the hashtag #foodmeanderings or tagging @foodmeanderings !
📋Thai Chicken Noodle Salad Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
Salad ingredients:
- 1 large head of romaine lettuce
- ½ cup sliced yellow, orange or red pepper *regular bell peppers or mini peppers
- 3 medium boneless skinless chicken breasts
- ¾ cup grated carrot 3 large carrots, approximately
- ⅓ cup green onion 4 green onions approximately
- 1 dry pint cherry or grape tomatoes
- 1 ½ cups instant vermicelli noodles (about ½ a package)
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon cajun seasoning
Dressing ingredients:
- 2 ½ teaspoon white granulated sugar
- 1 ½ tablespoon olive oil
- 1 teaspoon grated ginger
- ¼ cup lime juice
- 2 tablespoon honey
- 2 tablespoon soy sauce
- ⅔ cup hot water
- 2 tablespoon chunky peanut butter * I use light peanut butter so it has less fat than calculator notes
- ¼ teaspoon minced garlic
- 1 teaspoon dry mustard
Instructions
- Prepare vermicelli noodles as per package directions (usually you boil water , then remove from heat and soak the noodles in the hot water for 5 minutes.1 ½ cups instant vermicelli noodles
- Drain and set aside to cool.
- Spray grill with non-stick spray and season chicken with garlic powder and cajun seasoning.3 medium boneless skinless chicken breasts, ½ teaspoon garlic powder, ½ teaspoon cajun seasoning
- Grill chicken on outdoor or indoor grill (or cook in skillet on stove top) until cooked through (165 degrees F/73 degrees C). Cool and dice or slice (depending on your preference- I like to dice).
- Wash and chop vegetables. Add to large bowl.1 large head of romaine lettuce, ½ cup sliced yellow, orange or red pepper, ¾ cup grated carrot, ⅓ cup green onion, 1 dry pint cherry or grape tomatoes
Salad Dressing
- Add all dressing ingredients in a microwave-safe bowl.2 ½ teaspoon white granulated sugar, 1 ½ tablespoon olive oil, 1 teaspoon grated ginger, ¼ cup lime juice, 2 tablespoon honey, 2 tablespoon soy sauce, ⅔ cup hot water, 2 tablespoon chunky peanut butter, ¼ teaspoon minced garlic, 1 teaspoon dry mustard
- Microwave for 1 minute
- Remove and stir with whisk.
Assembly
- Add, chicken, noodles, dressing to large bowl with vegetables and toss.
Terri Gilson
This Thai Chicken Noodle Salad with Peanut Lime Dressing is really special to me - it's actually the first recipe I ever created, about 25 years ago! The combination of fresh veggies, chicken, and that tangy peanut lime dressing is still my favorite. It's perfect for using up all that chicken I've been stocking up on lately!
Sue Slaght
Haha love the vision of you dragging the kids about town to use your coupons. Maybe not quite as good as a camera but a prize none the less! 🙂
foodmeanderingscom
yes, Sue Slaght - they were thankfully quite compliant and helpful! And we saved a lot of money on chicken this year. And who doesn't love saving money on chicken?!