5 popular pasta dishes analysed

Many people get confused when choosing healthier pasta dishes. As the answer is nuanced, in this article we present 5 popular pasta dishes analysed to help you choose what to eat.

There are infinite variations of pasta dishes and sometimes is tricky to identify which ones are the best choices for you.

Most people are told to choose pasta in tomato-based sauces rather than creamy ones but there are more variables to consider. For example, is the dish meeting your carbohydrate and protein needs? Is the dish too high in calories from fat?

5 popular pasta dishes analysed

For the purposes of this article we chose 5 popular pasta dishes and analysed the nutrition per serve based on published recipes (4 of them from a popular pasta brand’s website and 1 from a major supermarket’s website).

The selected pasta dishes are:

• Fettuccine Alfredo
• Linguine al Pesto
• Spaghetti Bolognese
• Spaghetti Carbonara
• Napoletana

The analysis

The graphs below show a comparison per serve of each of the selected dishes.

Energy per serve of selected pasta dishes

Macros per serve of selected pastas

% of fatty acid types per serve of selected pastas

Carbs and fibre per serve of selected pastas

Calcium per serve of selected pastas

What to do with this information?

If you were choosing from any of these pasta dishes made with the usual ingredients, for example if you are eating at a restaurant or buying a ready-made meal, you could use the information above to decide which pasta dish meets your needs.

If you are making your own, you can use the information above to tweak the recipe to meet your needs. For example, if the standard recipe has too many carbs, you could use less pasta or a lower carb pasta. If the standard recipe has too little protein, you could add protein to the dish, e.g. a some chicken, steak, fish or seafood.

Finally, even if the dish contains some vegetables in the sauce, it never hurts to add more either as a side or in the sauce.

[Photo by Victoria Aleksandrova on Unsplash]

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