Is it cheaper to make your own Alfredo Sauce?

I am a huge Alfredo Sauce fan and I absolutely adore the pasta sauce at the Olive Garden restaurant. Throw in some garlic bread sticks and a salad and I can eat for days.

Unfortunately, eating chicken alfredo weekly at the Olive Garden is not in my budget, so I will have to settle for my home cooked version.

I’ve always wondered if the restaurant alfredo sauce tastes better because it is homemade or if they just make a better fettuccini alfredo than I do. There are lots of expensive versions of alfredo sauce at the grocery store, and it makes me think that maybe making it myself will be cheaper. Let’s dig into the numbers and find out!

Why is Alfredo Sauce so expensive to make?

Let’s take a look at a super popular homemade alfredo sauce recipe by The Salty Marshmallow. This recipe makes 2 cups of alfredo sauce.

Here is the breakdown of the ingredients:

Ingredient	Price of Item	Cost for the Recipe
1/2 cup of butter	$3.98 (16 oz package)	$0.99
1.5 cups heavy whipping cream	$2.58 (16 oz container)	$1.94
2 teaspoons minced garlic	$0.58 (1 bulb)	$0.14
1/2 tsp Italian Seasoning	$1.00 (0.95 oz container)	$0.08
2 cups grated parmesan cheese	$6.66 (3 bags of 6oz shredded cheese)	$5.92
Total:	$14.80	$9.07

Wowsers! Look at the price to make your own homemade alfredo sauce. if you had to buy all the ingredients, you are looking at spending almost $15 just for the sauce. Now of course you don’t use all of the items just for the sauce, so your total cost for the recipe is $9.07.

Is homemade Alfredo sauce cheaper?

This alfredo sauce recipe makes 2 cups (16 oz) of alfredo sauce, so that comes out to $0.56 per ounce. Let’s see if that compares to store bought alfredo sauce at my local Walmart.

Store Bought Alfredo	Price	Cost per Oz
Prego Roasted Garlic Alfredo Sauce (22 oz jar)	$3.12	$0.14
Great Value Alfredo Sauce (16 oz jar)	$1.74	$0.11
Newman’s Own Alfredo Sauce (15 oz jar)	$2.52	$0.17
Rao’s Homemade Alfredo Sauce (15oz jar)	$6.88	$0.45
Botticelli Alfredo Sauce (14.5 oz jar)	$4.48	$0.30

Even comparing the cost per ounce of jarred Alredo Sauce by multiple makers and price points, there is no savings to be had by making your own alfredo sauce.

The reason homemade alfredo sauce is so expensive is the cost of parmesan cheese. There are other recipes that use less parmesan cheese and instead use mozzarella cheese. This would be a good way to make the recipe cheaper, but the taste may not be as good.

I do not recommend using powdered parmesan cheese in order to make the recipe cheaper. This will result in a very grainy sauce because the powder will not melt like fresh parmesan cheese.

Is it hard to cook homemade alfredo sauce?

Making alfredo sauce is actually amazingly simple to make at home. Typically, most recipes start with melting butter in a pan over medium heat, adding heavy cream and seasonings, and then stirring them to combine.

At the end, you slowly add the parmesan cheese a little at a time so it can melt and make the sauce creamy and thicker.

As long as you can stir and keep an eye on your saucepot, you can make homemade alfredo sauce. You have to make sure that you don’t walk away in the middle of making the sauce because it is very easy to scorch the heavy cream and parmesan cheese.

If you burn your alfredo sauce, there is really no coming back from it. Unfortunately, the burnt taste will ruin the whole batch, so make sure to keep an eye on your sauce while you are making it.

Homemade traditional alfredo sauce will last about week in the fridge, but honestly, I rarely ever have much leftover after dinner. Any leftover sauce can be used on a homemade white pizza, or you can freeze alfredo sauce in an ice cube tray to use later.

How do I make jarred Alfredo sauce taste better?

Since we can’t make alfredo sauce cheaper at home, it is more economical to buy a jar of alfredo sauce. Unfortunately, not all jarred alfredo sauce is super tasty.

Some jars of alfredo are bland, or just not super yummy. The trick to making jarred alfredo sauce taste better is to add your own seasonings.

I usually buy plain jarred alfredo sauce and add my own Italian seasoning, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. You can also add cooked bacon pieces, roasted fresh garlic, hot pepper flakes, and extra cheese to the premade sauce.

Adding freshly grated parmesan cheese to your sauce can also add that extra touch of yummy too! My grandmother swears by adding extra milk or heavy cream to her store-bought sauces to make them taste more like homemade.

Another easy trick to make jarred alfredo sauce creamier is to add plain yogurt, cream cheese, or sour cream to thicken the alfredo sauce. This extra dairy adds more smoothness and creaminess to the mix for a tastier version.

Other pasta dishes to try with alfredo sauce is the Carbonara and White Lasagna. Carbonara can be made with green peas, bacon, and chicken. White lasagna is fabulous with spinach, carrots, mushrooms, and ground turkey or ground chicken.

You can even make a chicken pot pie with alfredo sauce and vegetables. Overall buying jarred alfredo sauce and spicing it up yourself is the cheapest version.

For more tips for saving on food, check out “Intermittent Fasting to save money on Groceries?” and “21 Easy Cheap Lunch Ideas for Men who Work Outside.”