Main Page
National cuisine
Pasta with ham cream and cheese

Pasta with Ham, Cream, and Cheese

Pasta with ham comes together quickly and very easily. Pasta in a delicate creamy garlic sauce with pieces of ham, cheese, and herbs — a dish like this turns any everyday lunch or dinner into a real treat.

Maria

Recipe author

Watch the video

Composition / ingredients

Servings:

Pasta (long pasta)

300

Ham

200

Cream (20%)

200

Hard cheese

Garlic

Parsley (3 sprigs)

Vegetable oil

Ground black pepper

Salt

Translation table of volumetric measures

Nutrients and energy value of the composition of the recipe

By weight of the composition:

Proteins 18 % 10 g

Fats 32 % 18 g

Carbohydrates 50 % 28 g

330 kcal

GI: 4 / 96 / 0

Cooking method

Cooking time: 45 min

Step 1:

Get the ingredients ready. To make pasta with ham, cream, and cheese, you'll need: 300 g of long pasta; 200 g of ham; 200 ml of cream (20%); 150 g of cheese; 2 cloves of garlic; 3 sprigs of parsley; 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil; ground black pepper and salt to taste.
Step 2:

Cut the ham into small cubes and strips.
Step 3:

Peel and finely chop the garlic.
Step 4:

Grate the cheese on the coarse side.
Step 5:

Wash, dry, and finely chop the parsley.
Step 6:

Boil the pasta in plenty of salted water until al dente.
Step 7:

Drain the pasta in a colander and let the water run off.
Step 8:

Heat the vegetable oil in a skillet. Add the garlic and fry for 1 minute.
Step 9:

Add the ham to the pan. Fry, stirring, for about 3 minutes, until golden. Pour in the cream. Salt, pepper, and stir. Bring the cream to a boil.
Step 10:

Add the pasta to the pan with the ham and cream.
Step 11:

Stir. Simmer everything together for about 2 minutes.
Step 12:

Arrange the pasta on plates. Sprinkle grated cheese and herbs on top. Enjoy!

Of all the kinds of Italian pasta, my favorite is Carbonara with slices of fatty, crispy bacon, egg yolk, cream, and the obligatory grated cheese. But bacon is a bit too fatty, so I often swap it for ham. For this dish you want durum-wheat pasta. It can be a long pasta like spaghetti, tagliatelle, or fettuccine, or a medium one: farfalle (better known here as "bow ties"), conchiglioni (shells), penne (tubes), fusilli (corkscrews), or orecchiette (which look like little curved coins). I love long pasta best, so I used tagliatelle — it comes coiled into small nests and is often used to make pasta nests with some kind of filling. But I just used them as regular pasta. With vigorous cooking, the coils unwound into ordinary long ribbons. You can use any ham, but ideally one you enjoy on its own. With a ham you don't like the taste of, you're unlikely to get good pasta, since the ham is a sizable part of the dish. Once I made this pasta with a new ham I'd never tried, and I didn't like it at all. I figured I'd at least use it up with pasta — but I didn't enjoy the pasta either, because of that ham's flavor.
For how to cook pasta properly, how to get it al dente, how to choose a quality product to avoid disappointment, and much more, read the article "Pasta — the finer points of choosing and the secrets of cooking it."
For tips, life hacks, and all the most useful advice, read the article: "Cream and sour cream in a cream sauce: what to do so they don't curdle?"
For how to properly substitute different types of cheese in dishes, read this article.