Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Dangerous Alfredo

I have wanted to try making homemade alfredo sauce for a while, but I always have just bought the jar of sauce, because we don't have "true" alfredo dishes (another of Paul's dislikes). Well, I ended up with a half package of cream cheese, and some leftover angel hair pasta, so I figured - why not try it out? I call it dangerous, because it was WAY too easy to make, and it just took leftover ingredients from other things that I already had floating around the fridge. I always thought alfredo took a few weird things, that you had to blender-ize it to get it smooth, use a double-boiler and watch it tediously while stirring constantly. Well, it took me all of the sophisticated technology of a glass measuring cup and a wire whisk. And the microwave.
2 tbsp butter
1/2 pkg cream cheese
1/2 c half and half (whole milk would work)
3 tbsp parmesan cheese
1 tsp garlic powder
Melt the butter in the glass measuring dish. Drop the cream cheese in chunks into the melted butter and blast again, stirring every 30 seconds or so, until melted. Measure and pour in the half and half, parmesan, and garlic powder. Nuke again, stirring every 30 seconds until Parmesan begins to melt. (It may have a slightly grainy texture, but you won't notice it once you pour it over your pasta.) Season to taste with salt, peppper, or garlic salt (or all three!).
Oh. My. Gosh.
And this recipe only makes enough for about 2 servings of pasta (which I may or may not have eaten entirely on my own).
I am the only one who likes alfredo at this point. I don't consider my own cravings worth cracking open an entire jar of sauce. But I'm definitely going to make it again when I have cream cheese in the house again.... And this time I'll be adding chicken and broccoli.
(I found the original recipe on Cooks.com, but I halved it and adjusted some things.)

3 comments:

Amy Jo said...

Wow! Sounds easy and yummy! Hope you had a great Christmas!

The Other Rachel said...

I have a spectacular very low fat version if you ever want the recipe... I can't have much fat thanks to stomach problems, and definitely can't handle dairy, but I like my version almost as much as the *real* kind.

JC said...

Total rip-off of my version, but I'm pretty sure my version originated from said Cooks.com recipie. Add some parsley next time - it gives it a nice taste. Maybe some crushed red pepper if you're brave. Sun-dried tomatoes are also a nice touch.