Don’t you love it when you fall in love with a dish at your favorite restaurant, only to return and find it off of the menu? That happens to me quite frequently, so I love to try and re-create those dishes at home. Italian happens to be one of my favorite cuisines, particularly when it comes to a good fettuccini alfredo! It is creamy and rich, and goes well with many different kinds of pastas and meats. There is a restaurant chain in our town that used to serve a delicious shrimp pesto pasta. I would order it almost every time we went. I was so disappointed when I found that they had discontinued it! Fortunately, it is so easy to make! If you love alfredo then you will definitely want to give this recipe a try!

The Pasta

There are many kinds of pasta to choose from so you are not limited to just penne. I do love a good fettuccini alfredo, but find that penne is just easier to eat! We also prefer to use whole grain pastas in my house, but use whatever your family prefers. Just salt your water (to flavor the pasta) and cook it according to the package directions.

The Meat

I happen to be a big fan of shrimp. I love how versatile it is. It is great as a standalone, but equally as good in a pasta. There are several ways to cook it too such as boiling or pan frying. When I have multiple things cooking at once on the stovetop I like to make use of my oven when possible. Shrimp cooks very quickly if you pop it into a hot oven. Keep an eye on it because there is nothing worse than overcooked shrimp, unless you enjoy eating erasers! Once they have turned pink and started to curl they are done!

Pesto Alfredo Sauce:

The sauce is actually quite simple. Much more so than a traditional alfredo. It starts with your favorite brand of jarred alfredo. If you prefer to make your sauces from scratch, there are plenty of great aflredo recipes out there. I always liked to use a copycat Olive Garden recipe. But when you are looking for quick, jarred is the way to go. I like to add cream cheese, heavy cream, garlic and parmesan even though some of that is already in the jar. Adding these will give it a little more of a homemade taste. The pesto and sundried tomatoes add a ton of flavor to this sauce! If you have never tried either one you have been missing out! Once all of the sauce ingredients are combined, it might seem a little thick. No worries though, you can add in some of the pasta water to thin it out.

Once your sauce is ready, you can add your cooked pasta and shrimp and give it a toss to coat.

I love to top my shrimp pesto pasta with extra parmesan (you can never have too much cheese!) and crushed red pepper for some heat. Serve with some garlic bread and salad and you have yourself an Italian dinner at home! Happy cooking!

Pesto Pasta Variations/Substitutions:

Pasta: You can really use just about any pasta that you like in this recipe, provided it’s hearty enough to stand up the weight of the sauce and shrimp. Pastas such as fettuccini, linguine and rotini are good choices. You can also use white or whole grain/wheat in this recipe.

Meat: If you are not a fan of seafood or maybe have a seafood allergy, then you can make some other substitutions here. Steak sliced thinly or even strips of chicken would work well. You could also leave the meat out altogether if you prefer.

Sauce: I am all for making a sauce from scratch when possible. If you are looking for a good homemade version, I like the copycat Olive Garden recipe: https://copykat.com/olive-garden-alfredo-sauce/ . If you don’t have time to start from scratch then jarred is the way to go.

Pesto: This recipe uses traditional basil pesto, but you could also change that up and use sun-dried tomato pesto. If you do choose to use the sun-dried tomato flavor, you may want to omit the sun-dried tomatoes that the recipe calls for.