Pasta is often the main dish of struggling college students, who rely on that famous blue box of prepackaged macaroni and cheese. It's also the main dish served the night before a marathon, when marathon-runners need to "carbo-load". Italian restaurants are known for their main-dish pastas, and these platter-loads of pasta, of course, cost substantially more than the blue box of mac and cheese. These restaurant dishes do go a long way toward helping the non-marathon-running "carbo-load", which isn't always a good thing for the non-marathon-running patron. The Italian restaurant indulgences do taste good, but such a high per-noodle price combined with such a high per-forkful calorie count doesn't make for the best regular diet.

Serving pasta as a main dish, however, doesn't have to mean having too little money, spending too much of it, or taking in enough calories to keep every runner in the Boston marathon going.

Some key principles of serving main-dish pasta are:

1. Whole grain pasta is a healthier choice.

2. Keep in mind the amount of pasta in each serving. If the dish contains mostly pasta keep serving size down. Some pasta main dishes are close to, if not, 100% pasta and sauce; others have lots of vegetables and/or protein added. The serving size for any pasta dish should decrease as the percentage of pasta content increases. In paying attention to the calorie count of pasta keep in mind that 20 spaetzle noodles add up to fewer calories than 20 large shells.

Consider serving a good-sized salad (with just a little light dressing) with your pasta main dish. This adds balance and decreases the need for larger portions of the main dish.

3. When the aim is to decrease that percentage of pasta in each serving, adding vegetables increases the nutrition level and substance. Lean protein is a more sensible choice that protein high in fat.

4. Light sauces are healthier than heavy sauces. Sauces made predominantly with dairy products are generally highest in fats and calories. Adding less of any sauce keeps calories (and often fat) down.

5. Most recipes for main-dish pastas can be altered to some degree. While there is no doubt altering will change the finished product, sometimes your version of the finished product can be equally good-tasting. Consider substituting meat with a soy product.

6. A handy way to come up with new main-dish pasta is to know the ingredients you (and your family) tend to like best, and find

• 1
• 2
• next page >>

---

Add your voice

Know something about Recommendations: Pasta as a main dish?
We want to hear your view. Write now!