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Our Homemade Alfredo Sauce is rich and creamy with just 3 main ingredients. Only takes about 5 minutes to make and is perfect for coating pasta, dipping breadsticks, or using as a pizza sauce. People are raving about our recipe for how to make homemade Alfredo sauce and we keep hearing it’s even better than the restaurants!
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If you’ve been personally victimized by a jar of Alfredo sauce, please raise your hand.
Yeah. That stuff is no bueno.
And I’m pretty sure the only reason people use jarred Alfredo sauce is because they think Alfredo sauce from scratch is difficult.
No, friends! Our easy Alfredo sauce recipe is a breeze to make with just a handful of ingredients and about 5 minutes of time. You’re going to FLIP for this creamy, decadent homemade Alfredo sauce.
Not only is this homemade Alfredo sauce recipe super simple to whip up, it seriously rivals any restaurant Alfredo you’ve had, whether it’s the ever popular Olive Garden Alfredo sauce or a more authentic Alfredo sauce from your local Italian joint.
I just know you’re going to love this one!
Love making your own sauce? Try our homemade spaghetti sauce. It’s so much better than a jar!
Expert Tips & Tricks for Perfect Alfredo Sauce:
If you want the best tasting homemade alfredo sauce you can make then you’ll want to keep a few things in mind and follow these tips and tricks!
- Parmesan: It’s the most important ingredient! For the best quality alfredo sauce, use the best quality Parmesan cheese. You don’t have to go to Italy to get it but it wouldn’t hurt to use quality aged and imported Parmesan.
- Shred/Grate It Yourself: Again with the cheese. You know that bottle of dry crumbly grated Parmesan dust at the supermarket? Please don’t use that. Either shred or grate your own for best taste, texture, and melting quality.
- Don’t Overheat: If you try preparing the alfredo sauce at too high of a temperature or cook it for too long or you may end up with a clumpy texture. You want smooth and creamy alfredo sauce, so cook it low and slow.
Ingredient Notes:
Cream & Butter – You’ll heat heavy whipping cream (no substitutes, please) with butter and garlic to warm it through.
Cheese – When you’re making homemade Alfredo sauce you need lots of good quality Parmesan! You’ll want shredded Parmesan cheese, not the dry powdery stuff. We make our Alfredo sauce with cream cheese (just a little!) to add extra richness and creaminess to the sauce.
Seasoning – Salt and pepper, to taste, is all you’ll need.
What Readers are Saying!
“I started using this recipe over a year ago and I haven’t purchased a jar of Alfredo since. This is by far the best Alfredo sauce I’ve ever tasted!! Thank you so much for sharing this.” – Teesha
How To Make Alfredo Sauce From Scratch:
Heat: Start by melting the butter and cream together with a little blob of cream cheese (optional – see notes below). I do a garlic Alfredo sauce by adding in a teaspoon of minced garlic to the butter and cream while it’s heating. The garlic flavor is perfect with this creamy pasta sauce!
Cheese: When you’ve finished heating the butter and cream remove the pan from the heat and stir in the shredded Parmesan cheese! Keep stirring until it forms a smooth sauce.
Season: We sprinkle in a bit of salt and pepper to taste.
Serving Suggestions:
This Alfredo sauce recipe makes enough to generously coat one pound of pasta, but we usually reserve a half cup of the sauce for dipping our breadsticks in. Serve this sauce/pasta with one (or more!) of these sides:
- Air Fryer Breadsticks
- Tuscan White Bean Soup
- Ham and Bean Soup
- Marinated Cheese and Olives
- Tuscan Roasted Vegetables
You can also add a variety of ingredients and proteins to your pasta. Grilled chicken is the perfect addition to fettuccine alfredo, but our shrimp alfredo and tortellini alfredo are also very popular around here.
Alfredo Sauce with Cream Cheese:
This recipe originally did NOT call for cream cheese – it was just butter, cream, and Parmesan (and a little garlic, for flavor). I’ll always stand by the fact that this was a delicious authentic Alfredo sauce that just works!
If you don’t love cream cheese, just leave it out.
But, we did start adding in a couple of ounces of cream cheese to our Alfredo, because it does add an extra layer of creamy richness and flavor. We’re hooked, but we wouldn’t hesitate to make this sauce without the cream cheese if we were out, either. 😉
Garlic Alfredo Sauce:
We’re obsessed with garlic, so we add just a little bit to this recipe…it really makes the best Alfredo sauce!
We just add the garlic straight in with the cream and butter as it’s warming to let the garlic flavors infuse the sauce. So simple and delicious!
Recipe FAQs:
Alfredo sauce is a simple cream sauce made of heavy cream, butter, and Parmesan cheese.
While you can store this recipe in the fridge, it is best served fresh. It’ll last for 3-4 days tightly covered, but does separate a bit and get oily upon reheating.
This is a gluten-free Alfredo sauce, but many recipes do call for flour.
Yes! This is a keto Alfredo sauce recipe, because there is no flour. Of course, if you’ll want to avoid serving with pasta to keep the carb count low. It’s delicious over broccoli, though!
More Italian Inspired Favorites:
- Ravioli Lasagna
- Baked Tortellini
- Baked Spaghetti
- Chicken Parmesan Sliders
- Italian Pasta Salad
- Crockpot Lasagna
Homemade Alfredo Sauce
Ingredients
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 cup butter
- 2 ounces cream cheese
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 2 cups shredded Parmesan cheese
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
Instructions
- Add the cream, butter, creaeam cheese, a and garlic to a sauce pan over medium heat and heat, stirring often, until the cream cheese has fully melted and the sauce is hot.
- Turn off the heat and whisk in the Parmesan cheese, salt, and pepper.
- Continue whisking until cheese has fully melted and sauce is smooth and creamy.
- Serve immediately.
Tips & Notes:
Nutrition Information:
This recipe was originally published in March 2018. It was updated with new photos in March 2022. Original photos below.
Rafaela C says
When searching for recipes, you never know what your gonna get. Your recipe was simple and DELICIOUS! Thanks.
Karly says
Thank you, Rafaela!
Jill says
Too much salt, and I LOVE salt. Would cut it to a 1/4 tsp.
Tamia C says
I loved this recipe!!!
Karly says
Thanks, Tamia!
Kelsie says
This is one of the easiest white sauces to make. It’s delicious and a family staple- husbands absolute favorite!
Silina says
This is the way I make the Alfredo Sauce and it is high in fat content, but oh, so good. It is fun to splurge now and then.
Avery says
Definitely not my favourite recipe. It wasn’t bad but I halted the amount of Parmesan cause it seemed like a lot. The cheese was so strong it’s not even funny. Wasn’t awful but would not recommend
Karly says
Hi Avery! Did you use freshly shredded Parmesan? If you’re using the powdery canned stuff, I imagine it would be pretty overwhelming.
Carla says
This recipe is simple to make, and I love easy recipes and it is so, so delicious. I use GF pasta, as my husband is gluten intolerant.
Sara says
Have you ever used milk instead of heavy cream and how would that turn out???
Karly says
I would not recommend using milk in this recipe.
Max says
Can I omit the garlic? I don’t have any. I want to make this tomorrow for lunch. Will I still be able to make it?
Karly says
Yes, you can leave out the garlic. You just want get the garlic flavor.
Colleen says
Great recipe but I added mushrooms to sauces. Delicious!
Will make again. I used garlic noodles, shrimp ( which I browned on top of stove (winter in Minnesota) and added sauce. Served with Cesar salad and farm bread.
Karly says
Sounds amazing! Thanks, Colleen!
Sara says
I followed this recipe and it turned out thick and pasty almost. I mean it was delicious, but it was so thick that it looked like cheesy dough. It coated about 1/4 of the angel hair I used.
Karly says
Hi Sara! Sorry to hear this didn’t work out for you. I’ not sure what could have gone wrong as we use this recipe regularly without issue. You can see the texture/thickness of the sauce in the video…was yours more thick than that?
Sara Ferris says
I cant find the video on this page? I don’t know what went wrong either ?
Gunny says
Yep, that’s all there is to it! Next to Aglio e Olia, Alfredo has to be the simplest sauce to make.
I once ran into a friend in the market who was going to buy a jar. I consider any sauce in a jar sacrilegious and told her so. She couldn’t believe it when i told her how easy it was to make.
She bought the ingredients, made her own that night and couldn’t have been happier.
Thanks again for your page. I’ve made several recipes from here and still have others to try out.
Phoenix Cooks says
What a tasty dish!!!. Thanks for sharing. I think your dish is very delicious. I will make this recipe for my family and my friend. I hope you have more recipe like this.
brooklyn grill says
Looks yummy. I’ve tried to make this for my family, and my family really love it. I will introduce your recipe for my friends. Thank you so much. I love it.
backbeat says
Wow,it looks delicious.I really love homemade dishes. Thank you for sharing. I will try to make this pickles for my family. I believe my family will like this very much. Love so much.