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Monday, March 16, 2009

Cooking with Meghann 101: Homemade Alfredo

Otherwise known as: the post your butt will never forgive me for.

The original recipe is found here, and was tweaked by both me and my dad.

As always, click the pictures to see them bigger!

So, ingredients:

-1/2 cup butter (use the real stuff, this is the kind of recipe where all health consciousness goes out the window, so you need to fully commit)
-couple cloves minced garlic (recipe says 2, my dad said more, I forget what I did, it's all a blur)
-2 cups heavy cream (again, go real, don't be a pansy)
-pepper (I am going to say to taste, and do yourself a favor and use fresh ground. Recipe says white, but this recipe doesn't discriminate, any color will do.)
-1/2 cup grated parmesan (I used the stuff in the bag)
-3/4 cup mozzarella (again, I used the bag stuff)
-pasta (ok, the recipe states 1 box of angel hair. My dad warned me that would not be enough to handle this sauce. He uses 32 oz. fettucine. I used 32 oz. rigatoni. I think less pasta would be ok for adults who don't mind super rich dishes. As far as the kids are concerned though, I'm glad I went with more pasta.)

Ok, let's get crackin'!

First, I cooked some bacon. (oh, did I not mention bacon? I decided to fully kill my arteries and go for the carbonara version)



I think I ended up doing 5 slices or so. I think any amount is ok.

Mmm. Bacon.



Now would be a good time to get your pasta water going.



This is also when I really went nuts. The hubby and Lindsay were going to have shrimp with theirs, so I went ahead and sauteed it in the bacon grease, and then set it off to the side.



Ok, now we melt the butter in a saucepan over medium low heat.



When it's melted, toss in the pepper and garlic.



And then the cream.



And this is also when you are going to need to start stirring till you can't stir no more.



About this time is when my pasta water looked about like this:



So, I did this



By now, the butter cream mixture should be simmering, so add in the parmesan. You'll want to cook it 8-10 minutes, or until the sauce is smooth and thickened.



Then, you'll add the mozzarella, and stir, stir, stir.



Here is where I also added the bacon



Mmm.



Somewhere in there, you need to grow a third arm and get the pasta drained while the sauce is finishing up cooking.



And set aside a bowl of pasta for your child that has declared the sauce to be "yucky."



Then, the best part. (Well, other than eating it) Dump the sauce into the pasta.



You see that melted butter swimming in it? Yeah, baby!

Here is where you can also dump in some sort of meat if you want. I went with chopped grilled chicken.



Then stir it all up



And serve!



And try to ignore the shrieking you hear. It will just be your arteries.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

OMG I could kill you... but this recipe might get me first, lol!
YUM!

Jim L said...

Glad it turned out well! It's a great recipe, isn't it?

Anonymous said...

Mmmm! Looks really yummy!

You have the same stove as me ;)

Meghann said...

Liz-yeah, you'll find it hard to kill me while you're in a daze from eating all that fat, lol!

Dad-yep, we really liked it. The younger kids didn't, but Ryan ate it up too. I'll probably make it again, with a contingency plan for the younger ones.

Margaret-does yours have a window in the door? Ours doesn't, and it drives me crazy!

Anonymous said...

OMGoodness. I'm completely drooling over here. Still can't quite get over the amount of butter in it, but I'm sure after one taste I'll completely forget ;-)

That last picture looks really awesome- restaurant worthy!