Thank goodness for organic canned pumpkin and it’s decent shelf life! Without it, I’m fairly certain I would never have experienced devoured this fresh zucchini pasta coated in rich, creamy pumpkin chipotle sauce in the middle of Spring. This cleaned up pasta dish easily satisfies that white-sauce-creamy-pasta-craving, which even us red-sauce-veggie-lovers get from time to time, without all the carbs and empty calories!
This Pumpkin Chipotle Alfredo Zucchini Pasta is not only enriched with a creamy, luscious Alfredo taste, but it does so without the butter, heavy cream, and mounds of cheese found in most traditional Alfredo sauces. And rather than pouring this delicious sauce over the typical not-so-nutritious fettuccine noodles {forgive me if you happen to be eating pasta as you read this!}, instead indulge in the wholesome goodness of zucchini pasta combined with pumpkin and spinach.
With all these veggies, if you find yourself still needing/wanting a bit of conventional carbs or bread, try adding a slice of whole grain sprouted toast to the mix, curbing that need while adding protein and fiber. Zucchini has become a favorite in our house for getting that pasta or pizza fix. We spiralize it and top it with a variety of sauces or slice it lengthwise and top and bake it like pizza – both tasty and healthy alternatives.
If you’re just getting into the whole zucchini-pasta-thing, check out my Zucchini Spaghetti with Lentil Marinara, Zucchini Pasta with Creamy Mushroom Marsala, and Zucchini Fettuccine and Cauliflower Alfredo for some additional recipes and ideas!
Pumpkin Chipotle Alfredo Zucchini Pasta
Ingredients
- 1 can pumpkin puree organic
- ¼ cup light feta cheese approx 2 oz
- 1/2 cup almond milk
- 2 garlic cloves minced
- 2 tbsp ground flaxseed
- ½ tsp onion powder
- ½ tsp paprika
- ¼ tsp chili powder
- 1/4 tsp turmeric
- ¼ tsp sea salt
- 1 Chipotle pepper in adobe sauce finely chopped
- 2 tbsp ground Parmesan cheese
- 3 medium zucchini spiralized
- 2 cups Organic Baby Spinach chopped
- Additional Parmesan cheese for topping
Instructions
- Combine pumpkin puree, feta cheese, almond milk, ground flaxseed, onion powder, paprika, chili powder, turmeric, sea salt, chipotle pepper, and parmesan cheese in small sauce pan. Cook over medium heat for approx 5-7 minutes, stirring to combine all ingredients.
- While sauce cooks on stovetop, wash and spiralize zucchini and chop spinach.
- Once sauce has cooked 7 minutes or so and is heated through, remove from saucepan and add to nutribullet or food process, blend 10 seconds or until sauce is smooth and creamy.
- Add sauce back to sauce pan and return to heat, simmer on low until ready to use.
- Add spiralized zucchini to medium pan and cook over medium low heat, continuously stirring. It doesn’t take much to heat and cook the pasta, 3-5 minutes. Add chopped spinach and cook another 1-2 minutes or until spinach is wilted.
- Drain water from cooked veggies, then split into two pasta dishes and top with pumpkin alfredo sauce, sprinkle with parmesan cheese and serve!
Nutrition
Adapted from my Chipotle Butternut Squash Sauce with Penne Pasta and Spinach
Katie @ Produce On Parade says
I love using canned pumpkin all throughout the year as well. It’s such a lovely, creamy, spoke in the wheel of the usual spring time and summer dishes. So nice when I’m craving fall ;) I love that you’ve paired it with zucchini noodles! How cool!!
Kaylee Pauley says
Thanks Katie! You are so right, I’ll have to be intentional to incorporate it more throughout the year as well! :)
Jean says
I appreciate the recipe.
That said, there are multiple pictures here of the same thing from different angles. It makes it take forever to get down to the actual recipe. While I understand that when a blogger takes photos, they are proud of them and want to show them off, I really do not understand why bloggers don’t see that this is disrespectful to those who are looking at their blogs. It would be far better to pick the best photo of each phase and just post that. Or, if you must post multiple pics of the same thing over and over again, perhaps there is a “jump to recipe” button that you could add to the top of the page. That would be most welcomed. I have the same comment for people who insist on posting pictures of every minor stage, such as a picture of butter melting in a pan. Absolutely senseless and a complete waste of the reader’s time and patience. We all know what butter looks like when it is melting in a pan, so I don’t understand the point of such a photo.
Kaylee Pauley says
Hi Jean, thank you for your feedback, I’ll certainly consider these things moving forward. I’ve had other readers comment that they love seeing so many pictures, I’ll have to see if I can find a compromise between the two and perhaps we’ll explore adding a “jump to recipe” button as you suggested. Thanks again.
Lauren says
547 g of fat!? Am I reading that correctly for 1 serving!?
I’m sure it’s all healthy fats but all still I’m a little shocked it’s that high.
It looks very yummy and I’m still going to try this recipe anyway!
Kaylee Pauley says
Oh my, thank you SO much for catching my error! I had entered the Potassium number in place of the fat, as it was the next line item on MyFitnessPal which is how I calculate the nutrition info each time – the fat is 6.2, not 547 g! I corrected it on the recipe – thank you again! :)