Creamy Lemon Pasta Sauce With Spinach
Pasta dishes are a regular in my house I love an ingredient that can be made into a light and refreshing or comfort-food style dish. This lemon spinach pasta is no different it works as a year-round meal. Its both creamy enough for a comforting, cozy winter dinner but light and citrusy enough for the warmer spring and summer months too.
As easy as it is to grab a jar of pasta sauce from the supermarket, unfortunately, they can contain a whole bunch of additional sugar, salt, and preservatives. Not to mention that its not a simple task to find a delicious, creamy vegan pasta sauce thats healthy, has clean ingredients, and cost-effective.
Luckily, this lemon sauce is super creamy without the use of any dairy cream, milk, or cheese. All you need are 10 ingredients for the entire recipe and a simple process. Not to mention that this recipe makes for an excellent base for what is a super versatile dish.
Herby Spaetzle With Creamy Lemon Sauce
This Herby Spaeztle recipe comes from Scott Conants new cookbook, Peace, Love, and Pasta. Ive added a Creamy Lemon Sauce and peas to make this a hearty and comforting vegetarian main dish.
Are two spaetzle recipes on one website too many? I sure hope not because its one of my favorite comfort foods so I was so excited when I came across a recipe for it in Scott Conants cookbook, Peace, Love, and Pasta. I was intrigued by his method of putting a large grater over the boiling water to push the dough through and create the iconic scruffy shape. In the past, Ive used two spoons to pick up the wet dough and push it into the water which was successful but rather labor intensive since you had to make each piece individually. Spaetzle dough is notoriously a very sticky dough so it can be messy to work with and I quickly found out that the method Scott uses is no exception. Your hands are covered in dough in the end but its actually a rather fun messy process and one Id imagine kids or friends would get a kick out of doing with you. The basics of the method is that you grab a chunk of the dough and you rub it across the grater that is situated over the boiling water so pieces are then drops on the other side of the grater into the boiling water. From there, you wait for the spaetzle to float to let you know its done.
Top Tips And Recipe Faqs
- Use a fresh lemon – don’t use a lemon that feels soft it should be firm and fresh.
- Pasta – use any long pasta shape, the sauce won’t coat short pasta as well.
- Use pasta water – pasta water helps to emulsify sauces and adds a lot of flavour it’s especially helpful in creamy sauces like this which can thicken quickly.
Do I have to use heavy cream?
Yes, I always recommend using heavy cream as lower-fat cream might curdle with the lemon juice.
How long does it last?
Leftovers don’t keep well because the cream thickens as it cools. I recommend eating the pasta as soon as it’s served.
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Garlic Lemon Butter Sauce For Crab Legs
Elevate your crab leg game by serving a side of this sauce! You will wow your guests and it is an amazingly delicious sauce to dip your crab legs in!
Whether you steaming or grilling your crab legs, this is a must-try sauce to pair with them!
I love serving crab legs with elote as a side dish. It is a match made in heaven and perfect for an elegant party!
Lemon Pasta Sauce Ingredients
To make this simple lemon pasta sauce, heres what youll need:
- Pasta I like to use angel hair pasta, but any type of pasta works here.
- Lemon use fresh unwaxed lemons.
- Parmesan the best that you can get your hands on!
- Butter and heavy cream the cream can be substituted with half and half.
- Garlic, salt, and pepper.
Complete list of ingredients and amounts can be found in the recipe card below.
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Rachel Roddy’s Recipe For Spaghetti With Lemon Parmesan And Cream
Lemons remind us of sunshine, and electrify both the senses and a simple, satisfying bowl of pasta
Lemons are many things, and January is a good time to fill a bowl with half a dozen. Take one, dig your nail into its oily, open-pored skin, sniff and make a mental list. Lemons are also full of particles with a positive electric charge, which, when on the loose, are like teenage boys in a brand new electric car, cruising around looking for other molecules to attach to, and in doing so they change them. It is this concentrated proton activity that the nerves in the tongue and brain interpret and experience as the sensation of sourness when they encounter lemon.
We studied this at school, and also stuck copper wire in oval fruits with nipples in order to make a lemon battery. However, it was rereading Margaret Vissers tart and witty chapter on lemons in her book Much Depends on Dinner that reminded me of the science how the movement and proton pumps result in the formation of citric acid, which explains much. Lemons are not just handy, long-lasting, perfectly packaged, sunny, essential, beautiful and so on, they are charged, they are jump leads, they are a sort of edible electricity. No wonder we get such a thrill from a wayward spritz of juice that hits an eye, a twist or a slice.
How To Make Homemade Fettuccini:
This super easy recipe is perfect when you are wanting to satisfy a pasta craving quick! It is ready in under 30 minutes. While your fettuccini cooks, you can prepare the sauce and have it ready to toss with the pasta when it is al dente. A vibrant and rich dinner has never been so easy!
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Recipe For Pasta With Ham And Peas
I hope you give this Pasta al Limone recipe a try. And if you do, please come back and give the recipe a star rating. And leave a comment about your experience with the recipe.
This recipe calls for heavy cream. I didnt have enough cream on hand last time I made it, so used 1 cup cream and 1 cup whole milk. That makes half and half and you bet it worked fine.
I love using pappardelle pasta for this recipe. Pappardelle is a wide, flat, ribbon noodle that is traditionally served with rich heavy sauces. Its sturdiness will even hold up to under sauces that are heavy with stew or roasts. For this dish, it brings a dramatic and elegant flair to the lemon cream sauce.
And if you have a recipe using pappardelle pasta, let me know, Id love to give it a try.
Can I Make Lemon Pasta With Chicken
Yes, you can easily add protein to this pasta dish! If you were going to use chicken, I would suggest using a rotisserie chicken and add the shredded chicken to the sauce the same time you add the pasta.
Sliced turkey or seafood like shrimp or scallops would also make great add-ins for this pasta!
Protein isnt the only thing that can be added to this dish!
Think spring veggies! Brussels sprouts, zucchini, asparagus, spinach.almost any vegetable would taste amazing tossed in that creamy, lemon sauce! You can bulk up this dish almost any way youd like!
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How To Make Creamy Lemon Garlic Butter Sauce
For full ingredient measurements and serving suggestions, keep scrolling to the recipe card below!
How To Make Lemon Chicken Pasta
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Creamy Lemon Pasta Is An Easy 20
For any pasta recipe that means using a high caliber pasta like Garofalo®. Based in Gragnano, Italy, it is the longest and oldest operating pastificio and also its namesake.
Fact: Pastifico is the official name of a pasta factory.
Much like fine wines, Garofalo meets strict productionrequirements called IGP to prove that it is indeed manufactured in the covetedpasta production region.
Garofalo is Non-GMO certified and comes in a variety of short andlong cuts as well whole wheat, gluten-free and specialty cuts.
For my Creamy Lemon Pasta, I prefer a long cut like fettuccine,spaghetti, bucatini or linguine, but you can use your favorite shape. Farfalleor fusilli are also fun and hold onto the decadent cream sauce well.
The cream sauce for this dish is a cross between traditionalalfredo and mac and cheese sauce using a simple blond roux compounded with atouch of Dijon mustard and lemon zest.
Dijon mustard is non-traditional, but adds a punch of unexpectedflavor that your friends and family will rave about, but cant put theirfinger on. It is one of my favorite tricks for spicing up basic cream sauces.
Whisk with heavy cream and lemon juice for the perfect velvetysauce that gives loads of flavor but isnt overly heavy.
Creamy Lemon Pasta functions as a side dish or even vegetarian entrée. If you wanted to make it a full meal for all you can add grilled shrimp, seared scallops or even grilled chicken.
- Sweet peas
Creamy Lemon Pasta Al Limone
Youll be rewarded with a rich, velvety sauce that practically sparkles with fresh lemon.
The original version of this dish even became the inspiration for Quick Creamy Cacio e Pepe, another one of my easy pasta recipes that combines a carbonara sauce with cacio e pepe pasta.
Because the super-creamy and did I say lemony? sauce is so utterly unfussy, you can make this recipe in about 15 minutes flat.
You dont even need to cook it.
In fact to make the sauce, just whisk the ingredients together in a big bowl while the pasta water boils.
- Pasta, eggs, lemon and cheese
- Zest of one lemon
- Make the sauce with egg yolk, lemon, cream and cheese in a bowl.
- Whisk until smooth
Toss the hot pasta with the sauce in the biggest bowl in your kitchen and serve while its hot.
Sure, on an exhausting day you could just microwave macaroni and cheese and be done, but I promise this will be sooo much better .
Pappardelle al Limone = Pasta with Lemon.
The name of the recipe all by itself pretty much translates as Mac and Cheese for Grown Ups.
Its basically a creamy tangle of wide noodles that are the perfect-sized strands to capture the tangy lemon sauce.
Who doesnt love a bowl of creamy comfort food?
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Creamy Lemon Chicken With Pasta
Today we are making the easiest 30-minute chicken pasta dinner.
It is a creamy lemon chicken pasta with the best Alfredo sauce and it is so easy.
Image by KRISTYN MERKLEY via Lilluna
How To Make Creamy Lemon Chicken Pasta:
Were gonna cook some pasta. Bring a pot of water to boil and add one tablespoon of salt and 12 ounces of fettuccine pasta. Cook until al dente according to the package instructions.
While the pasta is cooking, lets prep the chicken. Cut two medium chicken breasts in half lengthwise so you end up with four cutlets.
Now set up two bowls. In the first bowl, beat together one egg and one tablespoon of milk.
In the second bowl, combine one cup of panko breadcrumbs, half a teaspoon of salt and an eighth of a teaspoon of black pepper and stir that together.
Working with one piece of chicken at a time, dip first into the egg mixture.
Let the excess egg mixture drip back into the bowl, then drip into the breadcrumbs, thoroughly coating both sides.
Repeat with the remaining chicken cutlets until all four pieces are breaded. Now, its time to saute.
Place a large skillet over medium heat and add two tablespoons of oil or enough to lightly coat the bottom of the pan.
Once the oil is hot, add the chicken pieces in a single layer and saute for three to four minutes per side, or just until cooked through.
The chicken should register at 165 degrees Fahrenheit on an instant-read thermometer then transfer the chicken to a plate.
How To Thicken Cream Sauce
Reducing a cream sauce for a few minutes , will thicken the sauce without anything added. However, if you want a much thicker sauce, using cornstarch will do the trick. Mix 1 tbsp of cornstarch with 1 tbsp of water and pour into the simmering sauce, allow to cook for a few minutes until the sauce is thick and smooth.
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Storage And Reheating Instructions
- Fridge: Store in the fridge in a sealed container for up to 3 days.
- Reheat: Reheat the pasta in a skillet over low-medium heat, and add a splash of water to thin out the sauce. Do the same if using the microwave.
- Freezer: I dont recommend freezing this lemon pasta, as I found that it breaks when frozen and reheated.
Ingredients You Need To Make Creamy Lemon Pappardelle Pasta:
- Butter. Use a good cultured butter, unsalted or salted. I dont often cook with salted butter, but if you happen to see a lightly salted premium butter at your market, get it and use it! It will take this pasta to the next level.
- Cream. Make sure you get a cream labelled as heavy cream , not whipping cream. Heavy cream has a slightly higher butterfat content than whipping cream and gives the sauce a luscious mouthfeel.
- Parmesan. Dont buy the pregrated stuff. I really hate to sound like the ultimate food snob here, but if you can get real-deal Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, please do! It is without question a bit pricier, but you only need about 4 ounces of cheese for the recipe. If that isnt within reach, just choose a good hunk of Parm that you grate yourself.
- Pappardelle. A pasta that looks like wide fettuccine or tagliatelle. Its a perfect shape for hearty thick sauces. You can find packaged dried pappardelle in many grocery stores.
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Lemon Garlic Cream Fettuccini
This recipe has been around in my home for years and it has been a tried and true meal we all enjoy. The creamy sauce with the fresh lemon flavor is incredibly delicious. The lemon garlic bursts through in every bite. It is the perfect twist on the classic homemade alfredo sauce that we all love.
Lemon garlic cream fettuccini feels like a gourmet meal with rich garlic and perfectly cooked fettuccini, but it is really a simple pasta recipe that even a beginning cook can prepare. Since it is ready to serve in under 30 minutes, it makes a quick weeknight meal, but is luxurious enough for a homemade celebration. Add in some grilled chicken or shrimp for a full meal or let it shine by itself, and soon this recipe will become a family favorite in your home as well!
Lemon Cream Sauce Instructions:
First, pick out your favorite pasta and cook it per the box instructions and set the noodles aside. When picking a noodle for my lemon cream sauce, I choose a short pasta with a lot of nooks and crannies or a long noodle with a lot of surface area.
Basically, you want a pasta noodle that gives the sauce plenty of space to grab hold of and stick. Next, in a medium saucepan over medium heat, add the olive oil and garlic, and saute the garlic for about 3 minutes.
You may notice, I used a saute pan, thats okay too. Either way, give the pan a minute or two to warm up before adding the olive oil and garlic.
Most importantly, do not let the garlic burn. It gets bitter and has a terrible texture on the tongue.
After that, add the heavy cream and stir the sauce well to combine everything while heating the cream until its hot. But do NOT let it come to a boil.
If your heavy cream mixture looks like mine below, dont panic. Just use a whisk to briskly combine the cream and oil.
Now, add the salt and pepper to the pan. Do a quick taste test and add more of the seasonings if you desire.
Then, add the lemon juice and remove the pan from the heat. The sauce will thicken quickly.
I dont know the chemistry behind it, but lemon juice seems to thicken cream in a matter seconds, so theres no need for cornstarch or a roux.
Last, toss the sauce with your cooked pasta and garnish with fresh basil and Parmesan if you want. Or toss in some spinach for creamy spinach lemon pasta.
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