Directions
Italian Four-Cheese Pasta Sauce Recipe is a classic recipe, apparently simple but ineffable: does it exist or does not exist? In restaurants, you never see it, and even at home, few chefs dare to prepare this legendary dish.
Is it a myth of the 80s or a magic formula used by large food industries to create frozen pasta dishes to be sold on the fridge counter?
Fox Mulder would be needed to solve the 4 cheeses enigma, but in the meantime, if you want to investigate the matter, try this proven recipe.
What is the secret of 4 cheeses pasta?
Use “real cheeses” and often change: we live in a universe with hundreds of cheeses, with a thousand-year-old dairy tradition; just think that the venerable Fontina was invented in 1270.
And more importantly, prepare a dish with a cheese sauce, starting from the bechamel sauce. Don’t just cut the cheese into cubes. Put it on top of the pasta and bake in the oven. It would be very depressing, for the cheese, of course. But let’s go to the recipe.
Ingredients for making the Italian Four-Cheese Pasta Sauce Recipe
6 servings
- 500 grams of pasta
- 120 grams of Fontina
- 120 grams of Gorgonzola
- 130 grams of Raschera
- 130 grams of Cacio del Po
For the bechamel
- 60 grams of flour
- 70 grams of butter
- 1/2 liter of milk
- a sprinkle of Parmigiano Reggiano
- a pinch of nutmeg
- salt and pepper
How to prepare the Italian Four-Cheese Pasta Sauce Recipe
Remember to match the cheeses with criteria, there must always be a dominant cheese, and the others will act as a shoulder. If you choose Gorgonzola, let it be the protagonist, do not add Formaggio di Fossa di Sogliano or Puzzone di Moena or Époisses de Bourgogne or it will become a nasty, random mix of lactose.
Ok, let’s go. Prepare the water for the pasta in a large pot and turn on the heat.
Cut all the cheeses into cubes.
Preparation of the bechamel
Let’s move on to béchamel, the base of the cream cheese. Heat the milk separately, which must be warm but not boiling. Melt the butter in a thick-bottomed saucepan, pour the flour and mix well while cooking for 4 minutes: it must get brown but not too dark.
Now add the milk and continue stirring for 5 minutes more. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg, mix, then add Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.
Cook pasta.
When the Parmesan cheese has melted, pour all the other cheeses and continue to mix, always on a low flame.
When the sauce is pretty thick, with perfectly melted cheeses, turn off the heat.
Drain the pasta al dente, season it with the four-cheese sauce, mix again, sprinkle with Parmesan and nutmeg, and cook au gratin for 5 minutes.
Remove from the oven and serve.
If you want, season with finely chopped chives.
A gourmet variant of the Italian Four-Cheese Pasta Sauce is the one with the addition of truffle: just a light sprinkling makes wonders.
Which wine goes well with Italian Four-Cheese Pasta Sauce?
We choose a savory, full-bodied, fragrant white wine such as the Sassaia from Angiolino Maule’s cellar, an elegant, structured, but highly drinkable Garganega. Gewurztraminer and Gruner Veltliner are amazing too!
If you want to combine a cocktail, the freshness of Sex on the Beach is ideal.
