Breakfast buffet: National fettuccine alfredo day
February 7th, 2012
09:00 AM ET
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While you're frying up some eggs and bacon, we're cooking up something else: a way to celebrate today's food holiday.

This is some serious comfort food amore - February 7 is National Fettuccine Alfredo Day!

Get your favorite pasta fork (or spoon) ready for some serious twirling action, because this holiday celebrates one of our favorite combinations of long pasta, butter and cheese.

Tossing pasta in oil or butter and cheese has been around as long as pasta itself. Although we know it as a mainstay in American cuisine, fettuccine alfredo was only officially created in 1914 by an Italian restaurateur, Alfredo di Lelio, in Rome. Not to jump the gun, but that gives a pretty good idea of where the name might have originated.

Di Lelio took an Italian staple, fettuccine al burro - which meant butter was added before and after the pasta was placed in the serving bowl - and doubled the amount of butter in the bowl. Paula Deen would have loved this man. Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks also loved him, and his dish, when they stopped in for dinner during their honeymoon in 1927. The famous couple brought it back to Hollywood, and the dish skyrocketed in popularity.

In Italy, the name "fettuccine alfredo" is largely unknown, while many Americans think that "alfredo" means "white sauce" in Italian. Here in the U.S., we also tend to spruce up our version of this dish with broccoli, chicken, shrimp, garlic or cream. Try fettuccine alfredo with shrimp and twirl 'n' slurp the day away!



soundoff (5 Responses)
  1. Sandra LeVin

    So where's the recipe?

    February 8, 2012 at 5:16 pm |
  2. don lardo

    a wafer thin mint

    February 7, 2012 at 7:17 pm |
  3. Arturo Féliz-Camilo

    Now THAT's something that definitely deserves its own official day!

    February 7, 2012 at 9:45 am |
    • CN Red

      Hear, hear!

      February 7, 2012 at 10:07 am |
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