Copycat Domino's Chicken Carbonara Recipe

Domino's is, of course, best known for their pizza, but the chain's menu has expanded quite a bit in recent years and there's a lot of great stuff you can order these days. One idea? You guessed it, Domino's Chicken Carbonara. Domino's is also well known for low prices and for speedy delivery, but you can enjoy a meal that's even more affordable and ready to be eaten even faster than when you call for a delivery (or order online, more likely) when you make a copycat Domino's Chicken Carbonara dish at home.

"This can be as easy as you'd prefer," says chef and recipe developer Erin Johnson of Probably in the Kitchen, "since you can purchase the chicken, bacon, and Alfredo sauce already prepared for you. I like to cook the pasta ahead of time to make this a super fast weeknight meal. If you prefer to make all of the components yourself — feel free!"

Assuming you have all of your ingredients pre-cooked, then you can be enjoying this meal about 20 minutes after you decide to make it. Need to cook the pasta and the chicken? Well no big deal there — now we are talking about a 35-minute wait from conception to consumption, and that's still giving the delivery guy a run for his money.

To create a more than passable recreation of this tasty pasta dish from Domino's, you'll need several cups of cooked penne pasta (figure about 3 cups of dry pasta if you need to make it from scratch), Alfredo sauce, chopped onion, minced garlic, about 2 cups of cooked chopped chicken, sliced mushrooms, and about 8 slices of cooked chopped bacon. You can also garnish it with parsley and Parmesan cheese if you want to add a little something extra.

No need to stop there, of course, if you're willing to deviate from making a Domino's replica. "This is a really good basic recipe you can build on if you want to add more veggies," says Johnson, adding, "Peppers and broccoli are some of my go-to veggies to add in."

Assuming you have precooked your pasta and chicken (or you have leftovers — "This is a perfect recipe to use leftover chicken or a rotisserie chicken," says Johnson), then your prep is really quite simple here. First, preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

Next, mix the cooked pasta and Alfredo sauce together in a large mixing bowl. Then add in the chopped onion and minced garlic and stir to combine these in. Now add the chopped chicken and sliced mushrooms and stir again. Then pour all of these ingredients into a greased 8x8-inch baking dish.

Next, mix most of the chopped bacon into the casserole, making sure to leave some scattered along the top. This is largely for looks, yes. Now pop the baking dish into the hot oven and bake it for 15 minutes.

When you retrieve your dish, top it with grated Parmesan cheese and chopped parsley if desired (and you should so desire) and then serve and enjoy. Made a bit too much? Johnson says: "Store it covered in the fridge for up to three days. I reheat [mine] in the microwave or oven until warmed through and mix a little milk into the pasta and stir it up before reheating — this helps to bring the dish back to its original creamy state."

Who knew it would be that easy to recreate your favorite Domino's pasta dish at home? 

If you don't have precooked chicken, you'll have to add a step in here. Don't worry, it's an easy one. If you have ordinary-sized chicken breasts, all you need to do is cook that chicken until its internal temperature hits 165 degrees, and to do that you can bake it in an oven at 375 degrees Fahrenheit for about 20 to 30 minutes, you can grill it for about 5 or 6 minutes on a side, or you can slice it into smaller pieces and panfry the meat in a matter of 3 or 4 minutes.

Just don't overcook the chicken, as it will dry out and get tough and chewy.