Can you paint kitchen cabinets that are knotty pine with varnish?

See if this post helps you. homeguides.sfgate.com/different-stains-knotty-pine-99342html

Lightly sand to remove any shine. Prime with Zinsser 123 primer. Then paint with your color. If you can remove the doors and hardware it would make painting easier. Use a foam roller and foam brush to get a smooth finish.

Zinser 123 is awesome ! It can be tinted if you plan to use a dark paint. Agree with foam roller use...very smooth finish !!!

We are in the middle of this now and have learned some lessons. Our cabinets had a thick coat of varnish on them. We sanded lightly to medium, as indicated above, primed with Zinsser, and then painted. Even with the prep, where too much varnish was left on the wood, the paint did not stick well. It fish-eyed. For the rest of the project, we sanded more thoroughly, stripping off all the orange varnish, down to the wood, and we love the white-wash look that we got. It is very hard to cover knots so they don't bleed through, so we white-washed instead of trying to paint it solid. If you choose to do that, mix your paint with water. Mix half and half or use two parts paint and 1 part water, depending on how much you want them whitened. It's a lot of work, but worth it. For kitchen cabinets, it's good to finish with a clear coat to seal it and make cleaning easier. We're using lacquer because polyurethane yellows with age. However, applying the lacquer is a challenge in February because it needs warm temps and excellent ventilation. Good luck! I hope you're as pleased as we are.

. You don't have to strip them completely to paint over. Before you even start sanding, use a degreaser cleaner. No matter how clean you think your cabinets are, if there is the slightest bit of oily residue from anything used or cooked in the kitchen, it will mess with your final results (oil and grease do not sand off). Once they are clean and dry, then start sanding. I suggest spending the extra money on the oil based primer (Zissner or the like). It covers more problem spots without them soaking through to ruin your paint.