When it comes to cream sauces, I can see why people have such a hard time with this. It is tricky to come up with a way to have creamy sauces that aren't made with heavy cream or something really dense and fattening. Which means if you did make a habit of indulging in this or have cravings for similar creamy items, this hurdle would become quite a stumbling block.
This brings up the usage of plain yogurt. Over the last year I have made a point to use yogurt as a substitute in a lot of different recipes. Basically anytime the tendancy would be to reach for sour cream I would use yogurt. I tested this out on my husband and his friends, instead of putting sour cream with nachos I used yogurt... and you know what? Nobody ever noticed.Yogurt has many uses and can be a substitute for many things. You can mix it with some fruit and bran for a healthy breakfast option, you can use it as a condiment, you can substitute it for eggs when baking bread or desserts.. and well if you aren't afraid to try, it works as a great facial mask because it not only softens your skin but its probiotic makeup can do wonders to your skins surface.
This Heathly Fettucine Alfredo recipe combines eggplant, mushroom and yogurt to create a smooth creamy sauce that you could use over a veggie pasta shown in the video link that I used or try this as a sauce for regular pasta. Even if you keep the carbs at least you are cutting down the amount of fat in your dish.
For this recipe I used:
1 Large eggplant
1/4 Large sweet onion
10 White button mushrooms
2 cups of water
1 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Pepper
1 Clove of garlic
2 Large pinches of basil
3-4 Zucchini
Sauce:
Cut up half the eggplant into cubes and add it, 1/4 sweet onion and 5 chopped mushrooms into a pot with 2 cups of water. Simmer these together until soft and then puree. While reducing add salt, pepper, garlic and basil. Once this has reduced to being very thick Add a cup of yogurt and mix thoroughly.
Zucchini Pasta:
Using a veggie peeler, peel Zucchini's into noddles as wide as you prefer. Steam the zucchini noodles for 3-5 min being very careful not to oversteam.
Other Grilled Veggies:
Optionally, slice up the remainding eggplant and the rest of the mushrooms and rub them with olive oil, salt and pepper. Throw these on the grill long enough for these to cook all the way through. These can be used to top off your pasta dish and are great for presentation.
If you would like to watch a video of how I put this all together please click this link below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeNKI7OtkFU
