Fettuccini* Alfredo

Comfort Food. This recipe came from Chrisopher’s Brooks School cooking class and was a Topher - Pris dinner favorite on nights when Ed was away. If made with good Parmesean cheese and fresh pasta, it tastes almost as good as the pasta Ed and I had at Alfredo's in Rome many years ago.




The school recipe is quite concise:


"PASTA**
2 TB BUTTER
1/2 C CREAM
1/2 C PARMESAN CHEESE
MELT BUTTER, ADD CREAM AND CHEESE. STIR TILL SMOOTH, POUR OVER COOKED PASTA, TOSS AND SERVE.

I would add: cook the pasta according to recipe (fresh pasta) or package instructions. For "box" pasta, I like Trader Joe's Lemon Pepper Pappardelle Pasta.

While the pasta is cooking, put the butter in a small saucepan, melt and then add the cream and grated Parmesan cheese. Stir until smooth (do not overcook or cheese may solidify in a chunk), then pour over cooked, drained pasta. Toss and serve immediately with:

Additional Parmesan cheese and grater
Well stocked pepper grinder

* May 2013: One of the world's worst spellers, it was only when working on a vegan rendition of this recipe that I discovered the school recipe has a unique spelling for this dish, which is  most commonly referred to as Fettuccine Alfredo.

** May 2017: Revisiting this recipe I noticed no quantity of pasta is given. I think I would cook one package of Trader Joe's Lemon Pepper Pappardelle Pasta (8 oz) to go with this sauce. Mark Bittman in How to Cook Everything defines Fettuccine Alfredo as "(Pasta with Butter, Eggs, Cream and Parmesean)" and uses 2 T butter, 2 eggs, 1/2 c heavy cream and 1 c grated Parmesean cheese for 1 pound cut pasta. (Page 141). In a lot of my pasta recipes it is easy to reduce the amount of pasta and increase the amount of sauce (veggies!) per serving. Harder to do with this recipe, though in portioning sizes, remember this is a much richer sauce.

Reviewed 5/30/2017