13 Of The Unhealthiest Jarred Alfredo Sauces

Hey, so we're going to shock you here: Alfredo sauce isn't the healthiest thing you can serve with your pasta. To be honest, though, you'd probably figured that one out years ago. A simple Alfredo sauce is one of the heaviest pasta sauces out there, and because its luscious, rich taste comes from copious amounts of butter, cream, and cheese, it's one of the fattiest options you can go for. However, jarred Alfredo can frequently push things even further than you think. Many food brands manage to cram their jarred sauces with more saturated fat and sodium than you'd think, making them even more unhealthy and causing tiny servings to take up a significant portion of your recommended daily intake.

This saturated fat and sodium can come from the dairy products in the Alfredo sauce, but it can also frequently come from other sources (if you'll excuse the pun). Additional oils and added salt may make these sauces taste better, but they're also taking them far away from the homemade version. Additionally, many jarred Alfredo sauces have an array of other ingredients, revealing themselves to be highly processed and nutritionally deficient. In this article, we selected jarred Alfredo sauces primarily on their saturated fat and sodium contents, which were excessive in comparison to other products on the market. We also flagged certain Alfredo sauces that have specific, unhealthy ingredients, or way more ingredients than they should contain.

At first glance, Botticelli Alfredo Pasta Sauce looks pretty good. This creamy, white sauce declares itself to be a "Product of Italy," and it states that it's made with real Italian cheese on the label, which is always a plus in our eyes. Unfortunately, its nutritional content seriously lets it down. A single ¼-cup serving of this Alfredo sauce contains 6 grams of saturated fat — 30% of the daily value recommended by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (or FDA), and it also has 410 milligrams of sodium.

The saturated fat content in this Alfredo sauce is slightly surprising, given that it's made with ricotta. Ricotta cheese is typically fairly low in both saturated fat and total fat, and while it's not a traditional ingredient in Alfredo by any means, you'd think it might make things slightly healthier here. Unfortunately not, and the saturated fat content remains slightly concerning. 

The problem with eating too much saturated fat is that, over time, it can contribute to raising your cholesterol levels unhealthily high. This, in turn, may increase your risk of cardiovascular disease and associated conditions. It's always a good idea to seek out foods with unsaturated fats wherever possible, to try and limit your risk of higher cholesterol.

Trader Joe's takes a non-traditional approach to its Alfredo, with its Cajun Style Alfredo Sauce. The retailer promises a different take on things by combining the classic creamy and cheesy notes of Alfredo with oregano, paprika, garlic, and fennel, to make a sauce that's simultaneously rich and sharp. Unfortunately, this approach doesn't result in an Alfredo sauce that's any less fatty, and it also means that you end up with one that's way saltier than most. In every ¼-cup serving of Trader Joe's Cajun Alfredo Pasta Sauce, you'll be getting 3 grams of saturated fat and 510 milligrams of sodium, 22% of the daily value recommended by the FDA. In a tiny, tiny portion, y'all.

All this sodium is bad news for your health. Consuming high levels of sodium can cause higher overall blood pressure, which can then lead to a narrowing of the arteries and a buildup of fatty material inside them. As a consequence, your risk of a heart attack can become much higher. It's important to look out for high levels of sodium in relatively small serving sizes, like this Alfredo sauce, and to instead look for nutrient-dense food options where the sodium is also accompanied by other wholesome ingredients.

Wegmans Amore Alfredo Pasta Sauce may taste good, but it's definitely not love at first sight when it comes to its nutritional label. This pasta sauce is one of the fattiest out there, with a massive 10 grams of saturated fat per serving. That's half your daily value in 62 grams of pasta sauce, leaving you with a very small margin for any other food that you consume throughout the day.

What's all the more disappointing is that this saturated fat comes from what seem to be relatively wholesome food sources. Although this Alfredo sauce is quite clearly processed (and while there's the slightly strange addition of sunflower oil in there), it seems to be based primarily around heavy cream, cheese, and butter. Wait, we hear you cry: Why is this disappointing? Well, because we just wish Wegmans had toned it down a little, is why. If it had opted for light cream instead of heavy cream, or just used slightly less, this Alfredo sauce would be one of our favorites for its relatively short ingredients list. As it stands, though, it's just way too unhealthy to consider adding it to our weekly rotation.

Calorie-free Alfredo sauce sounds too good to be true, doesn't it? All that creaminess and all that taste, with none of the saturated fat? Well, unfortunately, folks, we're here to report that yes, it might not be all it's cracked up to be. Take Walden Farms Alfredo Sauce as an example. This sauce promises no fat and no calories, and claims on the back of its label that it's "guilt-free." That's not quite true when you consider the massive amount of sodium in each serving. Every ¼-cup portion of this Alfredo has 550 milligrams of sodium, just shy of a quarter of your daily value.

To be honest, the fact that salt is the second-listed ingredient on its label is a bit of a giveaway as to how salty it is, but it's still shocking to see that number. Sadly, high amounts of salt are common in processed food options like this one. There's also the way you use this Alfredo sauce to consider. Because it's calorie-free and has no fat, you may well be tempted to add more, assuming that doing so will give you a better consistency without affecting your nutrition. If you do this, you'll end up with a huge amount of salt on your plate.

If you're looking to avoid saturated fat, then you should definitely give Campo D'Oro Creamy Alfredo Pasta Sauce a wide berth. This Sicilian-made Alfredo is disappointingly fatty, and delivers 8 grams of saturated fat per serving, accounting for 40% of your daily value. Although it's not the saltiest out there, it's also definitely not the lowest-sodium option either. Each ¼-cup serving will provide you with 310 milligrams of sodium, or 13% of your daily value.

Now, if you can get past all that, then Campo D'Oro Creamy Alfredo Pasta Sauce may be worth a look. Compared to other jarred Alfredo sauces, this product's ingredients list is pleasingly recognizable — and while we don't love seeing modified corn starch and xanthan gum on there as thickeners, it's pretty far away from the wild list of processed names that plague some sauce labels. The issue is that we just can't quite get past that high saturated fat content, which pushes this sauce into unhealthy territory and makes it one you should probably skip.

One of the easiest-to-find options on supermarket shelves, Ragu Classic Alfredo Sauce is a product that a lot of people have tried. However, anything this mass-produced is likely to be pretty heavily processed, and this sauce certainly lives up to that expectation. Ragu Classic Alfredo Sauce has a pretty extensive ingredients list, and various additions contribute to saturated fat and sodium levels we'd rather not see. Each small serving had 3 grams of saturated fat and 320 milligrams of sodium, giving a respective 15% and 14% of your daily values.

Unfortunately, though, there's also one key ingredient in the mix in this sauce that puts us off: Soybean oil. Soybean oil is low in saturated fat, but it may be unhealthy in other ways. A study published in PLoS One examined the use of soybean oil and concluded that diets high in this fat may have a poorer effect on metabolic health than other fat sources, though admittedly, this study was on mice and not people. However, poor metabolic health could mean a higher risk of health issues like diabetes. Soybean oil is a pretty widespread fat, so trying to find ways to limit your intake — like by skipping this Alfredo sauce — may not be the worst idea in the world.

Bertolli is one of the major names in the pasta sauce space, so it's no surprise that it has an Alfredo sauce widely available in stores. However, it's pretty heartbreaking that this product is just not that healthy at all. Bertolli Alfredo Pasta Sauce, like so many others out there, is high in both saturated fat and sodium. Every ¼-cup serving has 4 grams of saturated fat and 390 milligrams of sodium, covering 20% and 17% of your daily values for each nutrient.

What's more, take a look at that ingredients list, folks. It's as long as your arm, and very clearly reveals an ultra-processed food, or UFP. These foods are classified by having more than one ingredient that you probably wouldn't find in your kitchen at home, and in Bertolli's product, you'll find additions like sodium phosphate, xanthan gum, potassium metabisulfite, soybean oil, modified food starch, and enzyme modified egg yolk. Sounds yummy, huh? Sadly, too, UFPs are typically high in salt and fat, which come at the expense of nutritional quality — as is the case with this Alfredo sauce. We'd skip this one.

We're big fans of Rao's homemade sauces, and they normally taste pretty good. The caveat to this is that sometimes its sauces gain their premium flavor through unhealthy nutrient levels. This is definitely the case with Rao's Homemade Roasted Garlic Alfredo Sauce, which has a high level of saturated fat and sodium. Every ¼-cup portion contains 6 grams of saturated fat and 420 milligrams of sodium, making it one of the fattiest and saltiest mainstream options out there, despite the mellow taste of roasted garlic. 

It's worth remembering that while it's easy to take these levels of saturated fat and salt for granted in Alfredo sauces, it doesn't necessarily have to be this way. There are plenty of Alfredo sauces out there that don't contain such high levels, and some which have barely any fat at all. Primal Kitchen's No-Dairy Alfredo Sauce, for example, has just 0.5 grams of saturated fat and achieves its smooth texture with avocado oil, tapioca starch, and pumpkin seed butter. Its 370 milligrams of sodium is still fairly high, but its wholesome ingredients make this slightly more palatable, and there are other Alfredo sauces that have even lower sodium levels.

Prego Homestyle Alfredo Sauce is an infinitely accessible option, and fans of the jarred sauce will be pleased to hear that, nutritionally speaking, it's not the unhealthiest product out there. On the other hand, it's definitely not the most wholesome. This sauce has 3.5 grams of saturated fat, which covers almost 20% of your daily value. As well as this, its sodium content is on the higher side, with 390 milligrams per serving.

However, our biggest issue with this sauce is not its nutritional content, but the fact that it's very clearly an ultra-processed food. You've got soybean and/or canola oil in there (just tell us which one it is, Prego!), as well as a host of thickeners, emulsifiers, and flavorings that clearly mark it as something that's been engineered in a factory. The problem is that this highly processed nature makes it virtually devoid of any other nutrition. For a sauce that's apparently based around dairy, Prego Homestyle Alfredo Pasta Sauce has just 4% of your daily value for calcium, and it has no fiber and barely any protein.

Carbone bills itself as a premium option when it comes to sauces, and there's no denying that its Alfredo Sauce looks pretty good on the shelf. The label is classy, the branding simple, and the sauce itself thick-looking and substantial. The problem is that none of this really matters when the nutrition isn't quite up to scratch, and Carbone Alfredo Sauce is just as fatty and salty as the rest of them. In every serving, you get 6 grams of saturated fat and 410 milligrams of sodium, respectively covering 30% and 18% of your daily values.

It's also worth pointing out that while Carbone clearly puts a lot of thought and care into its selection of ingredients, there's no denying that when you look at the details, its Alfredo Sauce looks eerily similar to other highly processed options on the market. The ingredients list contains modified food starch, xanthan gum, and disodium phosphate, just like so many other, cheaper products out there. Plus, this sauce doesn't exactly shine in other areas: There's just 6% of your daily value for calcium, and just a few grams of protein, despite it including real cheese. We'd prefer to make our own, and use other methods to thicken our Alfredo sauce. 

Yo Mama's Alfredo makes a fair few promises on its label, which point toward it potentially being one of the healthier options out there. This sauce claims to have no added sugar, be gluten-free, and that it's keto friendly. So far so good, right? Well, unfortunately, none of these classifications stop it from being unhealthy in different ways. This sauce is still as high in saturated fat and sodium as some other Alfredo sauces, and contains 8 grams of saturated fat and 350 milligrams of sodium per ¼-cup serving. The saturated fat content is especially high here, covering 40% of your daily value.

It's important to remember that just because something's keto-friendly, doesn't necessarily mean that it's healthy. Keto diets rely on high fat and protein intake to force your body to burn through stored fat, but doing so means that folks can easily end up consuming a larger amount of saturated fat overall. This may then result in a higher risk of a negative impact on your cholesterol level, as well as increased stress on your liver and kidneys as the organs process what you're eating. Additionally, following a keto diet can cause individuals to end up consuming more processed foods than usual — and while this Alfredo sauce is less processed than others, there's no denying that it's not a whole food.

For a company that has the words "whole foods" in its name, Whole Foods Market sure sells a lot of processed options. One good example is its Pesto Alfredo Sauce. This Alfredo mash-up (which we're a big fan of as one of the ways to upgrade Alfredo sauce) has a long list of ingredients, and some pretty eyebrow-raising nutritional facts to match. In each ¼ cup, you get 3.5 grams of saturated fat and 410 milligrams of sodium. Both of these quantities cover 18% of your daily value for each nutrient.

Upon further inspection of the ingredients list, one in particular stands out: Sunflower oil. This oil isn't a traditional component of Alfredo sauce, and while it's a commonly used fat, it also has its own health considerations. Sunflower oil contains a high proportion of omega-6 fatty acids. While these fatty acids are essential, consuming too much of certain omega-6 oils may promote inflammation throughout your body, and an average American diet already contains far more omega-6 than the better-known omega-3 fatty acids. A balanced diet should include a good balance of these two.

Just because a food is made with high-quality ingredients, doesn't mean that it can't be unhealthy. The case in point here is Dave's Gourmet Aged White Cheddar Alfredo. The company that makes this sauce puts quality at the forefront of its priorities, with this Alfredo made with cream, cheddar, butter, and just a few additional additives. However, it still manages to be very high in saturated fat, supplying 6 grams per ¼-cup serving, or 30% of your daily value.

This sauce also manages to be fairly salty, too, supplying 340 milligrams per serving — around 15% of your daily value. That's a fairly high amount for such a small serving size. Despite Cheddar itself being relatively high in protein, this sauce has just 2 grams per portion, and it has a pretty meager calcium content too. The famed and irresistibly sharp taste of Cheddar generally comes with around 710 milligrams of calcium in every 100 grams. This sauce has just 68 milligrams per serving.