Cheesy Pasta Sauce

When I wrote the 'Cook of the Week' column for The Marshall Democrat-News, I interviewed a lady who used cream cheese in her lasagna, rather than ricotta. I thought it was an interesting idea, but I never tried it till I moved to Hong Kong.

Here, cheese in general is not cheap, but cream cheese is one of the least expensive options (about US $3-4 for an 8-ounce block). So, I have taken to using it in my lasagna, and it tastes pretty good.

Recently, I made lasagna but also had some cream cheese left over. So, I decided to try putting it into regular pasta sauce. First, I made a creamy tomato-mushroom sauce, followed by a creamy pumpkin sauce with Chinese greens.

I added the cream cheese in chunks, after the sauces were essentially ready. Then I added a bit of water to make sure they weren't too thick. Both sauces were very yummy, but really, how could adding cheese to anything be a bad idea?!