This white pizza sauce recipe is ready in 15 minutes! You’ll love this Alfredo style garlic cheese sauce with parmesan cheese and Italian spices. Smother it on your favorite homemade pizza recipe with chicken, bacon, spinach, or steak. Let’s make it!
Why it’s the best white sauce for pizza
- Super fast recipe. Make this white pizza sauce recipe in ~15 minutes.
- Easy to meal prep. Whip it up over a lunch break or kid’s nap, then add it to pizza for an easy dinner. It lasts a few days in the fridge. Try it on this ravioli pizza.
- It’s bubbling over with cheese. This creamy white pizza sauce is so rich and satisfying!
- Pairs with everything: mushrooms, bacon, chicken, spinach, leftover white sauce is even great on steaks.
Shout out: Thanks so much to foodie Rachel for writing in and asking me how to make Pizza Hut white sauce. I hope you and your family love this recipe!
Ingredients for this sauce
So what is white sauce pizza made with? Lots of tasty seasonings and parmesan cheese…
- Olive oil
- Garlic
- Butter
- Flour
- Milk
- Salt, black pepper, dried Italian seasonings
- Parmesan cheese
- Parsley
How to make white pizza sauce
Here’s a quick overview of the steps, and next I’ll walk you through making the white garlic pizza sauce, photo by photo.
Step 1. Roast garlic and oil on the stove. Turn a small pan to medium-low heat on the stove. Add olive oil and garlic. Sauté garlic for about 3 minutes, stirring regularly, until translucent. Remove garlic oil from heat before garlic browns. Set aside to cool.
Step 2. Heat butter with flour to make a roux (base for the sauce). What is a roux? A roux is a mixture of equal parts flour + fat that hold the sauce together. In this recipe, butter is the fat.
Turn a small saucepan on the stove to medium heat. Add butter, and once it melts, whisk in flour slowly until it becomes smooth. Cook flour and butter roux mixture for about 1 minute until it turns light brown and the air smells nutty. Keep the pan on the burner, on medium, for the next step.
Step 3. Add cold milk to the roux. Slowly pour cold milk into the saucepan with the roux, whisking as it incorporates. Once all the milk is in the pan, turn the heat of the burner to high. Once the milk begins to bubble (usually within 1-2 minutes), reduce the heat of the burner to medium. Then pour the cooked garlic oil mixture (from step 1) to the saucepan.
Continue to whisk ingredients as they bubble for 1 minute. Then turn off the heat of the burner (at this time, it’s okay to leave the pan on the burner to pick up residual heat).
Step 4. Add the rest of the white pizza sauce ingredients. Add the seasonings (salt, black pepper, Italian dried seasonings) to the white garlic pizza sauce in the saucepan. Whisk to combine. Add parmesan cheese and whisk again, until the white cheese sauce ingredients are smooth and well integrated.
To finish: remove white cheese sauce from the burner and stir in the fresh chopped parsley.
Use white sauce for pizza immediately or store it in a sealed container in the refrigerator for 2-3 days.
Related: Does parmesan cheese go bad?
FAQs for making white sauce for beginners
You can use it as a dip for oven baked chicken wings, garlic parmesan wings, or for pretzels in place of traditional beer cheese dip. Or make my recipe for the best Philly Cheese Steak Pizza! This beef pizza has gourmet pizza toppings including Philly steak, bell peppers, onions, and this cheesy white pizza sauce.
Honestly, the sky’s the limit! Sous vide chicken goes well with white pizza sauce, as does bacon. My recipe for chicken and bacon pizza is perfect for this cheesy sauce. I often like adding some sauteed mushrooms, too. Or if you want a super healthy green pizza, try using sous vide asparagus the way I do in my asparagus pesto pizza recipe.
It turns out that parmesan sauce is just another name for Alfredo sauce. Unlike other white sauces which may be simply prepared from flour, butter, and milk, Alfredo sauce always includes a generous quantity of Italian cheese. Parmesan is delicious in Alfredo sauce, as is Romano and Fontina.
Alfredo sauce thickens as it cools, so if your hot pizza sauce seems a little runnier than you expected, don’t panic! Let it cool a few minutes, then check it again.
The white pizza sauce will slightly harden if left for long at room temperature or in the refrigerator. It becomes congealed because the ingredients (particularly the cheese) returns to a semisolid state when cold. It’s completely normal as the cheese sauce cools.
You don’t have to reheat it to spread the sauce on pizza. I find using the back of a large spoon to smear the white sauce on pizza works just fine.
If you follow this recipe to the T your sauce should turn out perfect, but if you decide you want to thicken it after the fact all you need to do is add a little more freshly grated parmesan cheese. Don’t forget to stir it well.
My make ahead zucchini soup (served chilled) is delicious with white pizza recipes. You can also make a green pepper salad with salsa verde dressing or, if you want to get fancy, try bacon-wrapped jalapeno poppers with goat cheese. Finger foods are always a good choice!
The Perfect Pizza Setup
Want to make restaurant style pizza at home? I’ve got you covered! Here are some of my top tips, tricks, secret ingredients and tools for a pizza night everyone will look forward to, again and again.
- NEVER do this… Contrary to what most people believe, when baking pizza on a sheet pan, never add toppings to raw pizza dough. Instead, follow my recipe for making homemade pizza with ready made dough, which will teach you how to par bake pizza dough first.
- Get help from secret ingredients…
– This dough seasoning is the secret to real Italian-tasting homemade pizza dough.
– Add pizza seasoning to store bought pizza sauce. This makes the pizza taste really fresh! - Herbs are for after… In my weekly pizza making practice, I’ve found that fresh herbs, like basil, need to be added to pizza after the pizza is done baking (so the herbs don’t wilt).
- Buy fresh dough and get amazing results. Yup, fresh dough from grocery stores is one of my favorite short-cuts. Learn how to use fresh Trader Joe’s pizza dough and Whole Foods pizza dough with my tutorials.
- Frozen pizza can taste amazing, too!! Learn how to spruce it up with this recipe for pizza using frozen crust.
- Slice pizza pies like a chef with just a few swipes, using big ol’ pizza cutters.
- Want to grill pizza? Here are some pizza grilling tools to check out.
- Do you really need to cook pizza on the rack? Nope! I basically never do. Here are tools you see me using in my tutorials on cooking pizza in the oven…
– Bake pizza on a rimmed baking pan set to get a beautiful golden brown crust.
– Love crispy crust? Let the air flow with this dishwasher safe pizza pan.
– Get personal – let your fam / friends top their own pies with this set of personal pizza pans.
More pizza recipes from Sip Bite Go
Are you a foodie, too?
Hey home chefs, I want to know what you think of this tasty white sauce for pizza recipe and see photos of your food! Find me on Instagram @sipbitego to tag me and connect.
People message me photos of their finished dishes and ask for tips all the time, so don’t be shy! I love seeing your pizza creations. It makes my day.
Want to make restaurant-style food at home? I teach you how here on Sip Bite Go and with in-depth video guides on the Sip Bite Go channel.
White Pizza Sauce Recipe (Alfredo Style) Recipe | Sip Bite Go
Video
Ingredients
- 2 tsp olive oil
- 3 cloves garlic minced
- 2 tbsp butter
- 2 tbsp flour
- 1 cup milk cold
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ tsp black pepper
- ½ tsp Italian seasonings dried
- ½ cup parmesan cheese freshly grated
- 1 tsp fresh chopped parsley optional
Instructions
- Roast garlic and oil on the stove. Turn a small pan to medium-low heat on the stove. Add olive oil and garlic. Sauté garlic for about 3 minutes, stirring regularly, until translucent. Remove garlic oil from heat before garlic browns. Set aside to cool.
- Heat butter with flour to make a roux. What is a roux? A roux is a mixture of equal parts flour + fat that hold the sauce together. In this recipe, butter is the fat. To make it, turn a small saucepan on the stove to medium heat. Add butter, and once it melts, whisk in flour slowly so it becomes smooth. Cook flour and butter roux mixture for about 1 minute until it turns light brown and the air smells nutty. Keep the pan on the burner, on medium, for the next step.
- Add cold milk to the roux. Slowly pour cold milk into the saucepan with the roux, whisking as it incorporates. Once all the milk is in the pan, turn the heat of the burner to high. Once the milk begins to bubble (usually within 1-2 minutes), reduce the heat of the burner to medium. Then pour the cooked garlic oil mixture (from step 1) to the saucepan. Continue to whisk ingredients as they bubble for 1 minute. Then turn off the heat of the burner (at this time, it’s okay to leave the pan on the burner to pick up residual heat).
- Add the rest of the white pizza sauce ingredients. Add the seasonings (salt, black pepper, Italian dried seasonings) to the saucepan. Whisk to combine. Add parmesan cheese and whisk again, until the white cheese sauce ingredients are smooth and well integrated. Remove white cheese sauce from the burner and stir in the fresh chopped parsley. Use white sauce for pizza immediately or store it in a sealed container in the refrigerator for 2-3 days.
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