White Pasta Sauce

In this instructable I will show you how to make a white pasta sauce. This easy homemade white pasta sauce recipe is my favorite white sauce for pasta. How can you go wrong with cream, butter, bacon, cheese, tomatoes, spinach, and garlic? There isn't anything in that sentence I didn't like, haha. This sauce is a great sauce to build upon. Instead of using chicken, use shrimp. Don't like bacon? That is okay leave it out, and add a bit of olive oil instead. Lots of possibilities. If I can do it, you can do it. Let's get started!

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Follow the easy steps below or watch the video tutorial or do both. :)

You can print the recipe here on my website.

Ingredients:

• 2 to 4 strips of bacon (I always use 4)
• 1/2 of a medium onion, about 1 cup chopped. (150g)
• 5 to 6 cloves of fresh garlic, crushed/minced
• 1/4 cup of unsalted butter (57g)
• 1 cup of heavy cream (add more to thin sauce out or milk) (240ml)
• 3/4 cup of cut grape tomatoes (150g)
• 1 1/2 cups of cheese (mozzarella parmesan blend)
• 1/2 tsp. garlic powder (2g)
• 1/4 tsp. of ground pepper (1g)
• 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning (optional)
• 1/2 tsp. of salt (taste it first before adding in the salt)
• 1 cup of diced pre-cooked chicken (125g)
• 1 handful of fresh spinach
• 1 box (1lb) of penne pasta noodles (454g) cooked for 10 minutes in boiling water, then drained.

Tools:

• Large pot or skillet
• spatula
• spoon

First take a skillet or sauce pot and heat it on medium heat. Then add in your bacon. Let the bacon cook for 5 to 6 minutes.

*Note if you want this a little bit healthier after the bacon has cooked a bit, remove the grease and add a couple tablespoons of olive oil to replace it.

Now let's add in our onions and let them cook down a bit in that bacon grease. Onions are great flavor enhancers, I don't recommend leaving them out of this sauce.

Two of my favorite words are garlic and butter. So much flavor in those two ingredients. Add them to the pan with the bacon and onions. First add the garlic and let them cook down a bit, then add in the butter and allow it to melt.

Now we need to add in the cream. If you want your white sauce to be less thick you may add in more cream or some milk a little bit later. Allow the cream to heat up stirring the sauce occasionally.

Next we are going to add in some sliced grape tomatoes, you can use whatever tomatoes that you want. I like the look of the slice grape tomatoes so I always use those. Let the tomatoes cook in the sauce for a few minutes to soften up.

No after our tomatoes have had a chance to soften up a bit add in the cheese. This is a mozzarella and parmesan cheese blend. Stir the cheese into the sauce until it is completely melted.

Now give the sauce a little taste. You may want to add in more salt. I also usually add in pepper and garlic powder. Didn't I already mention I like garlic? It is very important to taste the sauce before adding extra seasonings especially extra salt. The bacon and cheese will have already added a certain amount of saltiness by themselves.

Now we need to finish that sauce off with some chicken and spinach. I always add the spinach in last because it cooks down really quickly. Use precooked chicken, I normally get it form the deli or use leftover chicken that I cooked for something else. When making pastas most people will advise you to add your pasta noodles to the skillet or pot with your noodles. So cook your noodles, penne noodles in this case, about a minute less then you normally would. Then pour the noodles in with your simmering pasta sauce. They will cook the rest of the way in the sauce. Normally I won't use two pans like I show here, but the stainless steel pan just looks nicer on camera. :) After stirring in the noodles for about a minute your pasta is ready to serve.

Enjoy that yummy white pasta sauce with your favorite noodles. Penne is always my favorite noodle of choice. But this same sauce works great with other noodles as well. And other proteins like shrimp instead of chicken, etc.

You can print the recipe here on my website.

Now watch those steps in action by checking out the video tutorial. :)