Your Alfredo Sauce Will Taste Better With One Simple Addition

Few sauces rival alfredo for decadence. The luxurious, velvety perfection of butter, cream, and cheese elevates the humble fettuccine noodle in Italian restaurants all over the world. It's interesting that there's not exactly a consensus on a standard alfredo recipe. Wide Open Eats, for example, explains that the foundation of the alfredo sauce can be similar to how a béchamel — a sauce that begins with a roux of butter and flour — is made. Other alfredo recipes skip the roux and simmer cream and butter, then add seasoning and Parmesan cheese to finish the sauce. And if you want to go for something seriously authentic, Serious Eats says to skip the cream as well, simply combining butter and cheese to create a creamy, luscious sauce.

The real challenge of alfredo sauce is ensuring it doesn't break or separate into an oily mess. The Recipe Critic points to using heat that's too high as the culprit for a broken sauce, particularly after you've added the Parmesan cheese. But is there a secret ingredient that can make for an easy alfredo perfection?

While it may not be exactly traditional, The Recipe Critic credits cream cheese as the secret ingredient that makes for a foolproof rich and creamy alfredo sauce. The cream cheese helps thicken the sauce, while adding a delightful tanginess that some alfredo sauces may lack (via AllRecipes).

With all the butter, cream, cream cheese, and Parmesan cheese, Alfredo sauce doesn't exactly fit into the category of health food, but in moderation, it can absolutely be part of a healthy diet. Nutrition Value indicates that alfredo sauce can contain protein, along with calcium. Alfredo sauce can also be keto, since it's low-carb (though your noodles may not be). And if you happen to have leftover sauce, it's also delicious as the base for white pizzas ... though nobody would blame you for simply having another bowl of fettuccine alfredo.