The Secret To Olive Garden's Alfredo Sauce (And How To Copy It At Home)
The Olive Garden's Alfredo sauce is one of the great mysteries of casual dining. It's likely that many fans have imagined a pot of that famous secret recipe bubbling on a stovetop somewhere, locked in an Olive Garden test kitchen with more security than Fort Knox. But now, after decades of secrecy, the recipe is out, thanks to a report by Pop Sugar.
While fans know that the recipe contains cheese, cheese, and more cheese, they may not know that the Olive Garden's recipe contains half a cup of Parmesan, half a cup of Romano and equal amounts of heavy cream and milk — 1 ½ cups each, to be exact. The heavy cream is what makes the Olive Garden Alfredo sauce stand out. And that has been the case since 1982, when the chain first opened in Orlando, Florida.
Other versions of Alfredo sauce keeps things simple with no cream. It's a very Parmesan-and-butter forward recipe. By comparison, some Italian versions may not have the tablespoon of minced garlic that gives Olive Garden's version its savory taste profile. Both the American and Italian versions include salt and butter, although the Olive Garden version only has three tablespoons of butter in comparison to other recipes that uses a whole stick, or half a cup. Finally, three tablespoons of flour thicken the fast casual restaurant's cheese sauce and a little pepper adds a bit more savoriness.
What dishes get it
Olive Garden includes the combination of cheese and heavy cream in its Alfredo sauce recipe because Americans love the taste. Given how popular the sauce is among diners, Olive Garden wisely serves up this popular combination in quite a few of its dishes. Its most basic Alfredo dish is the fettuccine Alfredo. This vegetarian option relies on the sauce to flavor it and the shape of the noodles to capture the nuances of taste. The choice of pasta is intentional. Fettuccine noodles' design holds the cheesy sauce well, ensuring that diners get plenty of Alfredo flavor in each bite. The fettuccine Alfredo counts among the pastas served in Olive Garden's Never Ending Pasta special.
While the plain Alfredo has its share of fans, it's the Chicken Alfredo that ranks as the restaurant's most popular dish. This version gives restaurant guests two choices for chicken: crispy and grilled. For seafood fans, the Shrimp Alfredo and the Seafood Alfredo satisfies the cravings for that under-the-sea foodie experience. For those who like a little veggie to go with their fettuccine Alfredo, there's always a choice to add broccoli or mushrooms as a topping. And while many of Olive Garden's Alfredo dishes feature the flat fettuccine noodles, a few, like the Chicken Tortelloni Alfredo, include the stuffed tortelloni noodles instead of fettuccine.
Other ways to enjoy the sauce
Fans who have been going to the restaurant for a long time know that there are some other ways to get more of that yummy Alfredo goodness. One of the main ways is to order a small dish of it to eat with Olive Garden's unlimited breadsticks. It makes for a delicious dipping sauce and tastes just as good on the end of a soft, chewy breadstick as it does on the store's fettuccine dishes. Breadsticks plus cheese sauce dip equals a tasty appetizer.
Some diners bring the Alfredo sauce into the meal experience by ordering the dish of Alfredo to eat with Olive Garden's unlimited soup and salad options. This option allows them to eat all the Alfredo they'd like without having to order pasta for lunch or dinner. For lovers of the chain's creamy cheese sauce, ordering some of the sauce to go is a logical step following a nice dinner out. But now that the secret is out, those same diners can make the dish at home, using half a cup of Parmesan, half a cup of Romano, and 1 ½ cups of heavy cream and milk at a time for a delightful dinner at home.