Easy Cream Sauce

This easy cream sauce recipe is full of garlic and Parmesan flavor! It takes just 10 minutes to make and tastes incredible on pasta.

Here’s a delicious sauce everyone should know how to make: cream sauce! This luscious sauce is perfect for pasta and is ready in 10 minutes. It’s so simple to whip up by making a roux, a skill all cooks should have in their back pocket. Even better: you don’t have to use cream! Milk is all you need for this garlic cream sauce, then add just a small sprinkle of Parmesan cheese at the end. You won’t believe the rich flavor in this almost (dare we say) healthy pasta sauce.

Ingredients for garlic cream sauce

The great part about this cream sauce? It doesn’t use heavy cream! We’re not sure about you, but we don’t often stock heavy cream in our refrigerator. It’s a specialty ingredient and it’s pretty high in calories. This garlic cream sauce uses 2% milk and makes the most luscious white sauce you’ll have. Here’s what you need:

• Salted butter
• Garlic
• Flour
• Milk
• Salt
• Parmesan cheese

How to make a cream sauce: it’s all about the roux!

 A “roux” is flour and butter cooked together and used to thicken sauces. It’s usually made from equal parts of flour and butter. You’ll cook the butter and flour together until they start to turn light brown, then add milk to the pasta sauce. Here are a few tips on how to make a roux for this cream sauce:

• Measure out all the ingredients first. The cooking process goes quickly, so you don’t want to have to stop to measure an ingredient.
• Don’t leave the stove. You’ll have to babysit the pan for this sauce, especially the initial few minutes. Don’t get distracted!
• Saute the garlic only 30 seconds. Be careful not to overcook: you don’t want it to brown!
• Add flour and whisk constantly. This part is the most important. The flour can overcook in an instant, turning a brown color. Only cook it until it’s golden.
• Whisk in the milk gradually. Add just a little milk, then whisk it in. Continue adding little bits until the sauce is smooth. Then cook about 5 minutes until thickened, and add the Parmesan and salt. Voila!

Serving this cream sauce with pasta

This garlic cream sauce is perfect for serving with pasta! Long noodles, short noodles, spaghetti, penne or rigatoni, any pasta shape works with this sauce. Here are a few things to know about serving with pasta:

• It makes enough for 8 ounces pasta. If you’re making 1 pound of pasta, make sure to double the recipe quantities.
• Add it to the pasta, then add a few splashes of milk. To get it perfectly creamy, add a few splashes of milk to the pasta to loosen the sauce and help it come to the right consistency.
• Make it a meal with a protein & a salad. Add shrimp or these 5-minute Easy Cannellini Beans or Easy White Beans and a green salad.

Can you make cream sauce ahead? How to store it?

This garlic cream sauce is best freshly made! Since it only takes 10 minutes to make, it’s not hard to fit into your meal prep.

If you do happen to have leftover sauce, you can store it, but it gets very thick and gummy. Store it refrigerated, then re-heat on low head and add milk until the sauce becomes creamy again. This is not ideal, which is why we suggest making it fresh!

Other ways to serve cream sauce

Other than a white pasta sauce, there are lots of other ways to serve this garlic cream sauce! Here are some ideas:

• Drizzle it over baked salmon, pan fried fish or chicken
• Serve with sauteed shrimp
• Drizzle it over vegetables like roasted broccoli or asparagus
• Use it as a vegetable casserole filling (double recipe)
• Use it as a cream sauce in lasagna

This recipe is…

Vegetarian. For gluten-free, use gluten-free flour.

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More great sauce recipes

Want more sauces? Here are some more homemade sauce recipes to try:

• Pesto Cream Sauce This 5-minute pesto cream sauce is genius: just simmer pesto and cream until a thick sauce forms! Great for serving with pasta or fish.
• Tomato Cream Sauce or Tomato Basil Sauce Two deliciously classic spins on tomato sauce.
• Garlic Butter Sauce for Pasta This elegantly simple sauce features garlic, butter and Parmesan.
• Marinara Sauce Full of tangy tomato flavor and takes just over 15 minutes to make: no chopping required!
• Best Basil Pesto The best way to use up a boatload of fresh basil? Pesto, of course! Here’s our best basil pesto recipe, made the classic Italian way.
• Best Vodka Sauce This vodka sauce recipe is Italian grandmother style, simmered to perfection with tomatoes, garlic, butter, and Parmesan cheese.
• Vegan Alfredo Sauce Easy to make, starring nutrient-rich cauliflower and protein-packed cashews.