Easy Creamy Pasta Sauce with Mascarpone Cheese

I recently had the pleasure of visting my daughter and her hubby out in sunny CA. Aside from the required day at Disney (tip:  go when it's threatening to rain  ... not as crowded), we did another fave of mine that was more food-related: home cook a few meals. One of those dinners particularly stood out in my mind, and NOT because it was fancy-schmancy. Quite the contrary ... it was one of those surprise dinners where you pull out whatever is in the cupboard and go forward.  Like one of those reality show dinner wars, but without the trophy.

Ooh!  A jar of sauce and a box of spaghetti. Yay! Yay?  I have to explain …


I have to stop a moment and mention that My 3 Spawns almost never agreed on any meal.  Except pasta and sauce. Didn’t matter what kind of sauce or what kind of pasta. So we ate pasta a lot over the years. Had it so often, that I used to refer to it as Dog Food Again (channeling that The Far Side cartoon where the dogs are excitedly watching their owner open a can, with the caption “Oh, boy! Dog food again!”)

Back to recent.

The Whole Paycheck sauce has mascarpone in its name. Okay, cheese, whatever. Anyway, I cooked up a vat of spaghetti on one burner while heating up the sauce in another, tossing in a less-than-half bag of frozen veggies into the sauce (as suggested by son-in-law), which made me wonder who my daughter was since she HATED veggies as a kid.

Have you ever pondered how a mere few ingredients could elicit an orchestra of compliments? I did that evening. So good I thought I could live on that combo for the rest of my visit, if not my life. We had that dog food pasta dinner twice during my short visit.

Delicious as that sauce was, I wondered what exactly mascarpone cheese was, and how it really differed from what I thought was the American substitute: cream cheese. Rather than go to my usual favorite online search engine to find out the answer, I waited patiently until my return to work to asked my favorite live search engine. "What is the difference between mascarpone cheese and cream cheese?” I asked. She replied, with all the wisdom accumulated from years of cooking authentic Italian dinners, “I don’t know.” So I gave up and fired up my fave online search engine anyway, and discovered that while they are somewhat similar, mascarpone cheese has about double the fat as cream cheese.

Whoa, no wonder the sauce was so deliziosa!

My version was made with a tomato sauce containing bits of tomato. If you want a real clone  either start with a smooth sauce or blitz with a hand blender.

Boost the nutritional value with a cup or so of frozen veggies, your choice of mixture. Guild the lily (and your taste buds) by topping each serving with grated cheese and/or fresh julienned basil.

After tinkering with the sauce, I fired up the search engine yet again to see how my version compares to others. Discovered that many cooks add a glug or two of balsamic vinegar. It’s not listed on the original jar, but sounded like a great idea so I added a tablespoon, and didn’t regret it at all … adds a bit of complexity to the sauce, which is a snobby way of saying that it bumped up the flavor.

Easy Creamy Pasta Sauce with Mascarpone Cheese
Yield: 4 servings

1 10-12 oz. box of pasta, any style
1 24-26 oz. jar of tomato sauce, any style
1 Tbl. Balsamic vinegar
1 cup frozen veggies (no need to defrost), optional
1/2 cup mascarpone cheese
1/2 cup grated parmigiano reggiano cheese
6 large basil leaves, thinly julienned (or 1 tsp. dried), for garnish


Cook pasta according to package directions.

While pasta is cooking, combine tomato sauce and balsamic vinegar in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stir frequently until sauce starts to simmer.

Tastes better than it looks.

 Add veggies (if using), and continue to stir frequently until the sauce returns to a simmer. Turn heat down to its lowest setting, then add mascarpone cheese. Stir constantly until sauce returns to a bare simmer and cheese has completely melted and incorporated into mixture. Turn off heat but leave pot on burner to keep warm.

When pasta is done, drain well.

Divide evenly among 4 pasta bowls. Ladle sauce evenly over pasta. Sprinkle with parmigiano reggiano and garnish with basil, if desired. Serve immediately.