Jumperless

A healthy, calorie-restricted diet does not leave a lot of room for pasta, especially low-carb diets. The few times I do eat it, it’s usually carefully portioned whole wheat or whole grain variety. During a Costco shopping spree, I flipped through the Eat This Not That! Supermarket Survival Guide and came across a product on the pasta page that seemed too good to be true, House Foods Tofu Shirataki Low Carb Pasta.

At only 20 calories per serving (not 180 to 200 like most traditional pastas), it seemed like a dream come true. I tracked it down at Whole Foods, where the cashier carefully examined and fondled the refrigerated plastic bag stuffed with noodles and liquid and asked how I was planning to cook them.

The first recipe I tried was to make my own ramen noodle style soup (I used to love it as a teen before I knew better:)), I poured a can of chicken broth into a sauce pan, added the Tofu Shirataki Spaghetti, canned shrimp and Cajun seasoning and simply heated it up.  Not bad, I could tell they weren’t authentic noodles with a slightly different flavor and more rubbery texture, but close enough for being well under 100 calories.

The next evening, I tried a little recipe fusion with the Spaghetti by wok-frying yellow squash and brocoli, then adding a can of tomato sauce, italian seasoning and adding the noodles in at the end creating wok spaghetti.  It was very tasty and I noticed the noodles tasted more like pasta when cooked in a wok, there seemed to be more flavor and I really did not notice the rubbery texture.
I also tried Hungry Girl’s Girlfrado and enjoyed it.  Can’t say it tasted exactly like fettuccine alfredo, but had a very enjoyable, cheesy flavor for under 100 calories.  And it’s super quick and easy.

I could easily see these replacing traditional pasta for most of my recipes and found the taste and texture adaptable and hardly noticeable in most recipes.  Plus these are much easier to cook, simply drain, rinse and heat up either in a stir fry, soup base or microwave.  It’s not cheaper than traditional pasta, a 2 serving refrigerated package is about $1.40, but still cheaper than fast food and many times better, a must for any low-carb pasta lover.

Trackback URL