Vegetable Fettuccine Alfredo-- 2 Ways!

My boys are not big fans of vegetables.  They'll eat salad and some raw vegetables but they rarely eat any of them cooked.

I thought I might be able to sneak a few veggies in if I made some vegetable Alfredo.  I have tried this a few different ways over the past few months and found that sneaking the veggies into the Alfredo sauce worked much better!

The first time I sauteed and steamed my vegetables and made a traditional Alfredo cheese sauce using these Knorr sauce packets.

Mixing up two packets of sauce mix following the package instructions 

My boys ate only the pasta and sauce leaving all the vegetables behind. 

The second time my Alfredo sauce itself was made using cauliflower and cheese.  

My boys gobbled it up!

Look how thick and creamy it is!  

I found a few recipes on the web for cauliflower Alfredo and then read quite a few posts on creamy, cheesy, traditional Alfredo sauce and decided to try pairing the two.

I just knew my boys would not eat cauliflower sauce as it does not have the same creamy, cheesy texture.  

However when I served my creamy, cheesy cauliflower sauce they had to objections at all!  I even had a couple of them ask for seconds.  

Ingredients:

Half head of cauliflower

Water (for boiling the cauliflower then saving a bit of the cooking water for blending)

4 Tablespoons butter

2 cloves garlic

1 cup whole milk

2 ounces cream cheese

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese 

1 tsp. dried Italian seasoning

Salt and Pepper to taste

Making my sauce:

1.   I cooked up a half of head of cauliflower florets; bringing them to a boil and cooking until fork tender.  I then blended the cauliflower in the blender with a 1/4 cup of the water I cooked it in.  

2. In a large saucepan I melted 4 tablespoons of butter and sauteed 2 cloves of garlic.  I then added the cauliflower puree, 1 cup whole milk, 2 ounces cream cheese and 1/4 cup of Parmesan cheese.  

3.  I seasoned the sauce with some Italian seasonings, salt and pepper. Once it was all blended together I poured it over a box of pasta. 

My boys could not tell the difference and had no idea they were eating cauliflower Alfredo.  

If they had noticed a difference or asked what it was made out of I would have told them but the boys honestly did not notice anything different (other that this sauce was thicker which they assumed was because I had made my own from scratch).  

That tells me this sauce was mighty tasty!