Pasta with ham sauce
30 min · 44 g protein · 528 cals / serving
The Swedish children's favourite: pasta in a creamy, cheesy sauce packed with diced ham, sweet peas and soft broccoli, with a hint of mustard and nutmeg. Kvarg stirred in at the end makes it extra rich and silky, and it is on the table in twenty minutes.
Ingredients
Skinksås
- 1 tsp canola oil
- 1 medium onion, finely chopped
- 10 1/2 oz smoked ham, sliced, 1–3% fat, smoked or boiled ham, diced
- 3 tbsp all-purpose flour (bleached)
- 2 1/3 cups skimmed milk, 0.5% fat, fortified, cold
- 2 tsp French mustard
- a pinch nutmeg
- 1 1/3 cups cooked frozen green peas
- 2/3 cup grated hard cheese, 17% fat, a 17 % hard cheese
- 1 cup quark
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
Steps
- Cook the pasta in well-salted boiling water according to the package, adding the broccoli for the last 3 minutes. Drain, keeping a cup of the cooking water.
- Meanwhile, heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium heat and soften the onion 4 minutes. Add the ham and cook 2 minutes more.
- Whisk the flour into the cold milk until smooth, then pour it over the ham and onion with the mustard and nutmeg. Bring to a simmer, stirring all the time, and cook 4–5 minutes, until smooth and thickened.
- Stir in the peas and the cheese and heat until the cheese melts.
- Take the pan off the heat and stir in the kvarg and pepper. Fold in the pasta and broccoli, loosening with a splash of the cooking water if needed, and serve straight away.
Good to know
How do I get the kids involved?
Children can measure the frozen peas, grate the cheese (with a grown-up nearby) and give the sauce its final stir once it is off the heat. Picking the pasta shape is a powerful vote.
My picky eater picks out the broccoli
Chop the florets really small so they cling to the sauce, or blend the cooked broccoli into the sauce before the ham goes back in; it turns the sauce a pale green they may call 'monster pasta'.
Why kvarg?
Stirred in off the heat it makes the sauce thick and creamy, much like extra cream would, and tastes of nothing but richness. Off the heat is the point: boiled, kvarg can turn grainy.
Per
- Calories
- 86
- Protein
- (34%)
- 7 g
- Fat
- (15%)
- 1 g
- Carbohydrates
- (51%)
- 12 g
- of which sugar
- 3 g
- Fiber
- 1 g
- Sodium
- 243 mg
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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. How
As written, 2113 kcal goes into the pot and 2252 g of ingredients comes out as about 2465 g of food: 86 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.