Creamy white (pasta) Sauces

Aridhol

H/A I need you!

Tonight I'll be cooking a nice dinner with the lady friend and we can't decide on a sauce to make (from scratch)

So far we'll be making:
Baked then sliced chicken breast, sautee'd in olive oil and a bit of garlic.
Whole wheet penne pasta
some fried pancetta torn up for throwing in the pasta.

What we lack is a sauce. We're looking for something white, creamy with a *strong* flavour that doesn't have a lot of ingredients, stuff we can get at any grocery store.

Any ideas are appreciated.

Drag

Alfredo sauce.

You can google up a number of recipes for it, but it's basically butter, parmesan cheese, heavy cream and garlic, and it complements chicken perfectly.

Speakeasy

How about Alfredo sauce? Easy to make, and tastes so so good. It's pretty much just melted cheeses.

Yeah, beat. But it is -the- white, creamy sauce.

enderwiggin13

I make a good white sauce similar to alfredo, but I don't really use measurements...I'll try my best though you may need to experiment a bit.

1 small cup of sour cream
extra virgin olive oil
butter
fresh garlic
asiago cheese
romano cheese
parmesean cheese
oregano
black pepper

The cheeses are better fresh grated, but you can cut out some time by getting the Sargento Italian blend in the bag pre-shredded.

Sautee 2 cloves of garlic in butter
Add a tablespoon or so of olive oil and oregano
Melt the cheeses in over low heat, stirring constantly
Add in the sour cream

Then you have to add more cheese, sour cream or olive oil to get the consistency you want. More cheese for thicker, more olive oil and sour cream for thinner. Stir in some black pepper when you're done and serve.

capnrico

Easy as hell Alfredo sauce:
1/2 cup margarine or butter
1/2 cup whipping (heavy) cream
3/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
1/2 teaspoon salt
dash of pepper

Heat margarine and whipping cream over low heat, stirring constantly, until margarine is melted. Stir in cheese, salt and pepper.

Aridhol

Most of the alredo sauces I've had in packages or made myself or even at most restaurants have hardly had what I would consider a strong flavour.

I appreciate the replies, I may try enderwiggins and maybe find some stronger cheeses.

Thanks all.

KalTorak

One of the secrets to getting actually good alfredo sauce vs. shitty alfredo sauce is using real parmesan cheese. Not the crap that you shake out of a can - get yourself one of those rough chunks wrapped in plastic wrap but you can still smell the awesome right through the wrapping.

The sauce I make is equal parts (usually 1/2 cup) butter, heavy cream, and grated cheese. Melt the butter in a double boiler, add the cream, when it's hot whisk in the cheese until it all melts. Bit of salt and pepper and you're done. You can add garlic with the butter at the beginning if you like, but if you use the good cheese then you probably won't need to.

EggyToast

I usually make a parma rosa by taking a white sauce, dumping it over the food, and then adding some regular tomato sauce too. Pretty tasty. My only modification to the recipes above is that I make a roux, by melting butter and then whisking an equal measure (a teeny bit less for my taste) of flour into the melted butter, at low heat. Makes it thicker and gets rid of the flour/butter taste to make the base for most sauces.