How to Make Pasta Alfredo Without Cream

I fully subscribe to the idea that necessity is the mother of invention, especially when it comes to cooking. While I didn’t have many ingredients lying around, I still needed lunch, and with a couple ears of corn to mess with, it felt like the right time for inventing. When I’m tired and hungry almost everything starch sounds like a good idea, so I grabbed a box of spaghetti and tried my hand at making corn alfredo. The results were surprising.

Is there cream in alfredo sauce?

Before anyone yells at me for not using cream, I’d like to mention that a classic Italian pasta alfredo doesn’t use cream in the sauce. It’s a popular add-in to make the sauce extra thick and rich—and I usually do it, too—but all you need is a bit of pasta water, butter, and Romano or Parmesan cheese.

In this recipe, I’m working off of that classic, lighter type of alfredo sauce, sans cream. It’s thinner than the cream-boosted variety, but plenty flavorful and satisfying. Personally, finishing a big bowl of it doesn’t leave me feeling potentially gross like the creamier kind can do. Perhaps it’s not the alfredo sauce you might be used to, but it’s damn good in its own right. Rest assured, if the name bothers you, you can always add more ground pepper and call it “corn cacio e pepe” instead. 

My motto in the kitchen is “just try it,” and that’s what I did. What I ended up with was a bowl of pasta that tasted like a late summer celebration of corn. The sauce was subtle and buttery, and the Parmesan ended up showing more of a presence than I expected, while not overwhelming the dish. When you think about it, Butter, Salt, and Cheese are old friends of Corn anyway, so they all played very well together. 

Overall the dish is simple and fast to come together, but I’d recommend taking care in the last step where the cheese and hot pasta are added. Don’t be tempted to keep the heat on, or it can make the cheese tighten up. Turn the heat off and let the residual warmth melt it all down. Not that it changes the righteous flavors, but the dish will look like a lovely tangle of noodles, corn bits, and stretchy cheese. I used regular spaghetti since that’s what I had, but next time I’d probably use something with more grip, like rotini, orecchiette, or cavatappi to catch more crushed corn bits.

The recipe below looks salt-heavy but I’d encourage you to sprinkle some in, taste it, and assess. It really depends on how sweet your corn is. Mine was super sweet fresh corn, so I had to sprinkle in even more salt at the end. After cutting off my fresh corn kernels, I scraped the cob to get “corn milk,” but it’s not exactly necessary because the blending step will release the kernels’ juices too. You could also make this recipe with frozen corn any time of year if you feel like you need a taste of summer.

Pasta with Corn Alfredo Recipe

Ingredients:

• 4 ounces pasta

• 1 clove garlic, peeled and cracked in half

• 2 tablespoons butter

• 2 small ears of fresh corn, kernels cut off and cobs scraped

• ⅓ cup shredded or grated Romano cheese (or parmesan)

• ¼ – ½ teaspoon salt

• A crack of black pepper

1. Set a pot of water to boil. Once it’s boiling, add a bit of salt (“salty like the sea,” or otherwise) and add the pasta. Crush the corn kernels. You can do this by hand with a potato masher, in a blender, or with an immersion blender into a measuring cup. You’re just looking to squish out some of that corn “milk” (starchy goodness) and break up the kernels a bit. 

2. While the pasta is cooking, melt the butter in a large pan and add the garlic clove. Leave it just broken open; it’s for a touch of flavor. You’ll fish it out later. Let the butter and garlic cook in the pan for about a minute. Add the corn and stir for about a minute. Locate the garlic, take it out, and discard it. 

3. Around this time, the pasta should be finishing up. Turn off the heat of the pan, add the cheese, and add the pasta by using tongs to pull the pasta out and drop it straight into the pan. A little pasta water dribble is good for the dish (but don’t go wild with it). Toss it all together and serve it divided between two bowls. Crack some pepper over the top and add extra cheese if you wish.