Healthy Chicken Lettuce Wraps made with ground chicken, water chestnuts, carrots, butter lettuce, and delicious Asian sauce is a great quick and easy recipe for a busy weeknight or even a party!
This shop has been compensated by Reese Specialty Foods. All opinions are mine alone.
I love trying new fun recipes that are quick and easy to make, yet taste amazing.
This Healthy Chicken Lettuce Wraps is a perfect example of a creative recipe that takes minimal time to prep and has a great texture and flavor. Plus, I love the presentation! It’s so much fun to serve this colorful dish for a house party to surprise your guests!
Not a fan of ground chicken? Here are 3 great ideas to make a boring ground chicken look and taste great!
Flavor: A good sauce makes a big difference! The Asian sauce I made for this recipe provides sweet and spicy tang to the whole dish.
Texture: Sliced water chestnuts and carrots gives a great crunchy texture to the meal.
Color: It is a good idea to use butter lettuce leaves (or any other lettuce) for serving! First, just look at the beautiful color! Second, it’s so comfortable to serve and eat! Third, it’s a good excuse to add healthy leafy greens to the dish!
What are Water Chestnuts?
I am so excited to partner with Reese Specialty Foods and use one of there products in this recipe, water chestnuts! This is a wonderful ingredient to bring some extra texture to an Asian dish.
If you are not familiar with this ingredient, here are a few facts about Water Chestnuts:
- Despite being called “chestnut”, they are not nuts at all. Water chestnuts are aquatic tuber vegetables that usually grow in ponds, paddy fields, or marshes, and usually come from southeast Asia.
- They are known as very nutritious yet low in calories. Water chestnuts are packed with fiber, vitamin B6, potassium, and many nutritious elements.
- They also contain a good amount of antioxidants.
Reese brand has a great variety of high-quality products. From delicious artichokes to capers to cooking wines and seasoning, they bring the best ingredients from around the world right to your kitchen! You can check out their website for more products HERE, plus find stores around you for convenient shopping!
How to make the sauce
This sauce is quite similar to the sauce from my favorite Mongolian Beef recipe.
To make it healthier, I used coconut sugar with maple syrup instead of brown sugar. Also, this combination gives additional flavor to the dish.
Here are the ingredients we need to make the sauce:
- low-sodium soy sauce
- coconut sugar
- maple syrup
- water
- ginger
- garlic
- red pepper flakes
Just combine all these ingredients together.
You also can taste the sauce mixture and see if you want any adjustments. We all have different tastes and preferences. I like mine to be sweet and spicy. You can also play around with adding more ginger or garlic for more flavor.
How to make Healthy Chicken Lettuce Wraps
To start, we need to preheat a large pan over medium/high heat and add some olive oil.
Add ground chicken and break it into smaller pieces, using a spatula. It will take about 10 minutes to cook it through.
While the chicken is cooking slice water chestnuts and carrots in Julien style. Then add it to the chicken when it’s cooked and stir.
Reserve ¼ cup of the sauce mixture and pour the rest to the chicken. Bing it to boil and cook for 1-2 minutes.
Add cornstarch to the reserved mixture and mix until there are no clumps. Then add it to the chicken.
Stir and bring it to the boil. Cook for another 1-2 minutes or until the sauce thickens up to the desired consistency.
How to serve Lettuce Wraps
Separate lettuce leaves at the bottom, rinse and dry.
When ready to serve, place the lettuce leaves on a serving plate. Scoop the chicken mixture on top of the leaves.
I like to garnish it with sesame seeds and chopped green onion.
Serve immediately.
Did you make this recipe?!? I’d love to know how it turned out! leave a comment and a rating below👇 thank you!
Healthy Chicken Lettuce Wraps
Ingredients
- ¼ cup low sodium soy sauce
- ¼ cup coconut sugar
- 2 tablespoons maple syrup
- ½ cup water
- 1 teaspoon ginger minced
- 1 clove garlic minced
- ⅛ teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 1 pound ground chicken
- ½ cup water chestnuts sliced
- 1 cup carrots sliced
- 1 head butter lettuce washed and dried
- ½ tablespoon sesame seeds to garnish
- 1 bunch green onions diced, to garnish
Instructions
- Preheat a large skillet over medium/high heat and add olive oil. Then put ground chicken to the skillet and cook for about 10 minutes or until it’s cooked through. Using a spatula, break the chicken into smaller pieces.
- When the chicken is cooked through, add sliced water chestnuts and carrots and cook for another minute.
- While the chicken is cooking, mix all the sauce ingredients in a small bowl (low-sodium soy sauce, coconut sugar, maple syrup, water, ginger, garlic, and red pepper flakes).
- Reserve ¼ cup of the sauce and pour the rest to the skillet with cooked chicken. Mix well and bring it to boil.
- Add cornstarch to the reserved sauce mixture and mix well until combined. Add the mixture to the skillet.
- Bring it to boil again and cook for 1-2 minutes or until the sauce thickens.
- Place butter lettuce leaves on a serving plate. Spoon the cooked chicken mixture on top of the lettuce.
- Garnish with sesame seeds and green onions.
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Huge hit! Definitely will be making again!
Thank you, Carrie! Glad you liked it!
Loving this recipe! And I had no idea that water chestnuts were so good for me! I love water chestnuts! And chicken wraps are just delish! Can’t wait to try your version!!
I love lettuce wraps ! These are so fitting to eat outside in the sun, and these ones look so delicious. We love them on the spicier side 🙂
I also love a creative recipe that takes minimal time to prep and has a great texture and flavor. These chicken lettuce wraps are sure to impress my family and friends.
We love this lower calorie version of a sandwich. This way you have your meat in a wrap plus a salad. A great way to go and you can have several without guilt. I agree that chicken does not have to be boring – you give some fine examples on how to ramp it up. Great recipe.
These are SO beautiful! And they look scrumptious 😀 I love lettuce wraps especially in the summer…it’s a light, refreshing change. Definitely, need to make these soon!
Chicken lettuce wraps are quite literally one of my favorite things in the whole world. If I’m at a restaurant and they are on the menu, I’m going to order them. But making them at home is the best because I can make extra and eat them for daaaaaaays. These look incredible. Thank you so much for sharing!
What a great healthy meal, and I love the addition of water chestnuts! They are such a great ingredient that are really underused. Great recipe x
The more I see recipes with chestnuts the more intrigued I become. I am yet to experiment with chestnuts but it looks like they are a fabulous ingredient to use. Love the sauce you are using, too!
I absolutely love lettuce wraps and I love them even better with water chestnuts in them! Thanks for sharing this!
I LOVE Lettuce Wraps like this! Butter/Bib lettuce is my absolute favorite and I’m LOVING the fact that you put chestnuts in this! Not only does it add crunch but also such awesome flavor! I know what I’m making for lunch tomorrow!
I had no clue that water chestnuts are tuber vegetables. Wow. I love learning something new. I agree with you about the butter lettuce! Your chicken wraps look so delicious and other than the lettuce and water chestnuts, I have everything else in my cupboard, so I’ll be making these as soon as I get to the store.
Lettuce wraps are a favorite of mine. They are easy to pack for lunch any day of the week.