Claudia's Winning Recipe

My sister Claudia was forever experimenting in her kitchen. She loved digging into cookbooks, especially classic ones-(Julia Child), to find just the right recipe to test. She often re-adjusted recipes substituting healthier options  to please her own–or husband Jim's palate.

So it wasn't a surprise when she won  a recipe contest held by a national magazine for her Creamy Pesto Alfredo Pasta dish, a recipe she based on an older recipe but changed around ingredients to put her own stamp on the dish. Claudia and Jim included the recipe in their cookbook that they created one Christmas and gifted to family and friends. Below is Claudia's  winning recipe appropriately titled "$200 Pesto Alfredo Pasta" as this was her prize amount. Try it out tonight! You won't be sorry it's a winner!

$200 PESTO ALFREDO PASTA

Time Factor:    30 minutes easily, including tossing a green salad.
Major Equipment:    Pasta pot, large non-stick skillet, pasta serving bowl.
Serves:    2 – 4, depending what else is served.

Ingredients:

½ lb. pasta, any shape
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons dried basil
1 large clove garlic, minced
4 oz. reduced fat (Neufchatel) cream cheese
½ cup (liquid measure) reduced fat cottage cheese
1/3 cup grated Parmesan or Romano cheese
½ cup chopped fresh flat-leaf (Italian) parsley leaves
½ cup dry white wine

Start warming the pasta serving bowl and heat pasta water.  Cook the pasta according to package directions, coordinating the time to finish cooking at the same time as the sauce.

In the large non-stick skillet, heat olive oil over medium low heat and sauté dried basil and garlic slowly, without browning, about 5 - 7 minutes, to soften the basil. 

Add cheeses and parsley, mixing well, turning heat to medium.  Add wine to thin sauce.  Heat well and cook down to desired thickness, about 5 minutes.  Add another tablespoon of wine if it is too thick.

Drain pasta, toss with sauce in warmed pasta bowl.  Or, toss pasta with sauce in skillet.  Serve immediately.

Origin:  The late great Marsha Scott Gori used to make this laden with full fat cream cheese and butter.  I overhauled it and added the wine.  I submitted it to a 1992 Better Homes and Gardens magazine contest and won, earning $200, which I spent on a cast iron floor lamp and the cost of a replacement glass shade necessitated when cats broke it a week after it arrived.  I have, alas, lost my copy of the magazine in which the recipe was published.