Is the Best Kung Pao Shrimp Healthy? How to Make Kung Pao Shrimp with Peanuts in 5 Easy Steps

Is the best Kung Pao Shrimp with Peanuts Healthy? Yes!! You’ll be loving this Kung Pao shrimp recipe, it has all the flavor of Chinese food with half the calories!

If you love Chinese food, but want to eat healthy, this recipe is for you. Kung Pao shrimp calories come in at 530 per serving, making them good for you and your waistline! Skip the MSG and delivery fees and make this Wok Wednesday special at home for an easy weeknight meal, or something fun on a date night in!

This post is all about Kung Pao Shrimp with Peanuts!

Healthy Micro SuperStars Featured in this Recipe:

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Mix and Match Kung Pao Shrimp with Your Favorite Veggies

You can mix and match your favorite vegetables in this easy Kung Pao shrimp recipe. Try making it a couple different ways until you find the one that you love most! This recipe combines seared shrimp, snow peas, red bell pepper, and sautéed onions in a savory peanut, soy sauce.

Is Kung Pao Shrimp Healthy? Yes!

Let’s start with the marinade. Use arrowroot powder instead of corn starch. Arrowroot powder is far better for you than corn starch and does the same thing to emulsify your liquid. In this case, the liquid is Tamari sauce.

Arrowroot powder contains more dietary fiber than corn starch and also packs in more calcium. Did I mention it is gluten free? 

Medical News Today, 2022

Where to find ArrowRoot Powder

Bob’s Red Mill has a nice arrowroot powder that will last for a LONG time. It also comes in a resealable bag, which helps keep it fresher longer. You can pick it up from Whole Foods (linked through Amazon below). Or, it is available in most local grocery stores.

Amp Up Your Gut Health with Leafy Greens

You can amp up the health factor for this Kung Pao recipe with some additional leafy greens! If you love adding leafy greens, try adding bok choy to your meal.

Bok Choy is a great way to incorporate healthy phytonutrients into your diet. Think phyto like photosynthesis as in the way plants make energy, remember 6th grade science?!

Phytonutrients are an umbrella term for many of the antioxidants and vitamins that help our bodies stay free from chronic disease. They also support our immune system and help our bodies work properly.

Dr. Kait

You can buy bok choy at your local grocery store. Or, order it here through Amazon and pick it up curbside at Whole Foods.

When you prep the bok choy, slice the white parts and then dice them into chunks. Place them to the side in a bowl. Then, roughly chop the leafy greens. You can add these to your brown rice.

Gut Healthy Ingredients in this Kung Pao Shrimp Recipe

This Kung Pao shrimp recipe packs 7 plant points (8 if you add the bok choy). It is so good, you won’t even realize you’re eating healthy food! Below are the rest of the gut healthy ingredients in Kung Pao Shrimp and some of their benefits.

Onion and Garlic’s Secret Power: Allicin Benefits

Onion and garlic’s superhero, allicin, is one of the primary components driving their health benefits. When onion and garlic is cut, minced, or chewed it activates the alliinase inside. Activated alliinase creates a chemical reaction and becomes allicin. Allicin provides us with many of onion and garlic’s benefits.

Chop and Stop! Cut garlic and onions first and wait 10 minutes for the allicin to form.Bulsiewicz, 2020, p. 161

Waiting 10 minutes allows the alliinase to turn into allicin which supports our overall health (2020). 

Garlic Reduces Cholesterol

While onion has plenty of benefits, garlic has it’s own super powers as well. Doctors have found garlic can reduce your cholesterol. Across several studies, taking a upplement with allicin, the primary micro superhero in garlic, has reduced cholesterol (Stevinson et al., 2000; Silagy & Neil, 1994). In fact, doctors found regularly consuming garlic reduced cholesterol up to 8% in patients with high cholesterol (Ried et al., 2013). Moreover, they found this also decreased risk for heart disease (Ried et al., 2013).

Bell peppers are high in vitamins that can support your overall health (Sun et al., 2007). 

Bell Pepper Micro Nutrients Fuel Your Body

Micro superstars residing within bell peppers include:

• beta-carotene, which helps your body build vitamin A (Marín et al., 2004). 
• Vitamin B6 which supports red blood cell development, an important component to our immune system. 
• Vitamin K which helps our body clot blood. Anyone with/or has had a toddler knows how important this is, as they are constantly banging their bodies into something. 
• Potassium, which may support heart health (Whelton & He, 2014).
• Quercetin, which has been shown to support heart health and prevent other chronic disease (Marin et al., 2004). Although it is worth saying that green bell peppers are higher in polyphenol levels and therefore better for this particular aim, than colored bell peppers (Marin et al., 2004).

Snow peas have less starch than a traditional pea. This means they contain less carbs! When you are prepping your snow peas, rinse them well and pull the little string off of the flat edge of the bean.

Choose Tamari sauce over soy sauce.  It is considered more rich and flavorful than traditional soy sauce.

Tamari Sauce Has Less Sodium Than Soy Sauce

Additionally, Tamari has significantly LESS SODIUM. Tamari contains less than 1/3 the amount to sodium per tablespoon as compared to soy sauce (Masterclass, 2021). Did I mention it is gluten free?

You can find Tamari, like this one shown below, at Whole Foods or at your local grocery store!

Peanuts are an excellent source of plant based protein! Including roasted peanuts in this recipe gives the Kung Pao shrimp stir fry a satisfying crunch.

Overall, basmati rice has lower levels of arsenic than other types of rice. Rice has arsenic?!! Yeah, that’s what I thought too. Isn’t arsenic a poison? Well, it’s a heavy metal that can harm you – or kill you – if too much is consumed. Obviously, the amounts in rice is not deadly, however lowering your consumption can decrease your risk of diabetes, heart disease, and some cancer (Hong et al., 2014).

Brown basmati rice is whole grain. Whole grains lower your risk of diabetes, heart disease, cancer, overall inflammation, and premature death.

Aune et. al, 2016; Vitaglione et. al, 2015; Aune et. al, 2013

I usually buy basmati rice at Aldi, because it is a good price. You can find Brown Basmati Rice at Aldi here. Or, you can buy it online at Amazon and pick it up at your local Whole Foods.

(for more information on difference in basmati rice check out Lai et al., 2016)

Press the Easy Button and Cook Basmati Rice in the Instant Pot

To make rice as easy as POUR and PRESS cook it in the Instant Pot! It is so easy and really hard to mess it up. If you’re like me and have bizarre difficulty cooking rice on the stove, this is for you.

Is your rice often too crunchy, soggy, or burned? Try the Instant Pot! Dump in ingredients. Close lid. Press rice. Walk away. THANK YOU! Healthy whole grain brown basmati rice with the touch of a button.

Dr. Kait

Chinese black vinegar is one of those ingredients you would never think of (if you are originally from the Midwest) but really cannot be substituted well. The tangy flavor makes the dish. But, I definitely would NOT recommend eating it plain. This vinegar is meant to be added to a dressing or stir fry for flavor.

Chinese Vinegar Can Help You Maintain Healthy Cholesterol 

Consuming vinegar can prevent your body from storing LDL (low-density lipoprotein), otherwise known as “bad cholesterol” (Iizuka et al., 2010). In a study on people consuming vinegar doctors found that it inhibited the build up of bad cholesterol.

Results showed that vinegar contained abundant polyphenols and inhibited LDL oxidation and oxidized LDL-induced foam cell formation by decreasing the expression of scavenger receptors.

Iizuka, 2010

We couldn’t find Chinese black vinegar locally, because sometimes in the Midwest, it’s hard to find things. So, we ordered it online. You can order it on Amazon here and get it shipped free if you are a prime member!

Make an Authentic Kung Pao Shrimp Recipe in a Wok

Use a wok to get the best kung pao shrimp at home. If you’re looking for a wok, look for something large. Rachel Ray’s wok (pictured above) can hold enough food to accommodate a large family, or left overs!

This wok is seriously a keeper. At 14 inches wide, there is room to actually STIR the stir fry! And it is oven safe up to 400 degrees! As a side note, Rachel Ray’s wok is perfect for baking frittata. If you don’t have a wok, you can find one in the link here!

Try Kung Pao Shrimp with Peanuts on Your Next Wok Wednesday or Weekend Night In!

Kung Pao shrimp with peanuts is the perfect way to get your Chinese food fix without feeling weighed down by local delivery options. Combining seared shrimp, snow peas, red bell pepper, sautéed onions, and bok choy in a savory peanut, soy based sauce, this one will be a recipe you save!