Fettuccine Bolognese

I’ve been known to use a few impastas (lower calorie pasta alternatives) in my recipes, but this fettuccine bolognese uses real, fresh fettuccine and an ultra-rich meat sauce. It may sound like there’s no way a dish like this could be a healthier option, but each serving has more protein than carbs and just 315 calories.

That leaves room for freshly grated parmesan on top and a side salad or maybe roasted asparagus. Or maybe a second serving since the bolognese is packed with veggies anyway! 

How to Make Bolognese Sauce

If you’ve tried my low carb lasagna, this fettuccine bolognese uses an almost identical meat sauce. Inspired by J. Kenji López-Alt’s ultimate bolognese from his cookbook, The Food Lab, this meat sauce uses a base of onions, carrots, and garlic cooked in bacon grease. Everything cooks down to create a rich and flavorful bolognese that sticks to the pasta and makes you happy inside.

To make the bolognese, you’ll need to spend a few minutes prepping the bacon and veggies. Or if you’re a minimal cook, I bet you could find everything pre-diced and minced except the bacon.

Once you’ve cooked the bacon, remove it from the pan leaving its grease behind. You’ll want to use a bit of red wine vinegar to deglaze the pan or remove any sticky bits from the bottom of the pan. (See far right image above.)

It’s all gravy from here. Add the carrots, onion, and garlic to the pan and cook for 5-7 minutes before adding crushed tomatoes, a few spices, and the cooked bacon.

Cook that for a few minutes before adding cooked ground beef to the tomato sauce mixture. Let that simmer while you prep the pasta, and you’re essentially done.

Add the cooked pasta and a bit of pasta water to the bolognese, toss everything together, and serve!

Update 2/21: I have a new and improved pressure cooker bolognese you should try if you have an Instant Pot or Ninja Foodi.

Fettuccine Bolognese Ingredient and Recipe Notes

Though the ingredient list may look long at first glance, it’s really quite simple beyond preparing the vegetables. I’ll run through a few ingredient modification questions I got for the low carb lasagna.

Red Wine Vinegar, Fish Sauce, and Bay Leaves

The red wine vinegar does have a unique flavor, but the recipe only calls for two tablespoons. If you have a different vinegar on hand, you could certainly make do.

Fish sauce is the wild card ingredient, in my opinion. In J. Kenji López-Alt’s original recipe, he uses both anchovies and fish sauce. While I’m not a fan of anchovies, a fish sauce made from anchovies does wonders for the flavor of the bolognese.

Like every ingredient in this category, you can get by without fish sauce. Though you’ll want to add a bit of salt as it provides a fair amount of saltiness and umami to the bolognese.

And as always, bay leaves provide some great flavor but aren’t entirely necessary. You have my permission to rock on without them if necessary.

Using a Different Pasta

I should have mentioned this somewhere in the intro, but I’m far from expert when it comes to Italian cuisine. Heck, I’m pretty much a rookie. But in my research of bolognese pasta pairings, I learned that flat and wide pastas are ideal.

Pappardelle and tagliatelle are two commonly used with bolognese, but they’re not as common as something like fettuccine. So, here we are.

I’ll save you the research—there aren’t really any impastas out there for this style of pasta, for whatever reason. One of my favorite impasta makers, Banza, has something like 29 types of chickpea pasta without a single wide and flat pasta.

They do, however, make a penne like I used in my Cajun Pasta Bake and a rotini like I used in my Southern Style Pasta Salad that would both work here. And if you’re a low carb eater, you could always use Palmini noodles like I used in my Low Carb Pasta Carbonara.

Update: Check out the Carba-Nada high protein fettuccine I used for my Dan Dan noodles and creamy sausage and mushroom one-pan pasta recipes. 

The type of pasta used may slightly affect the pasta water that goes into the bolognese. Typically, starch that’s in the pasta water helps bind the sauce to the pasta. I wouldn’t worry about fixing this, just a note.

Okay, that’s a wrap. If you have an ingredient question I failed to mention, drop a comment at the bottom of the post. And don’t forget to let me know what you think about this fettuccine bolognese!