Weight Watchers in the New Year
It’s the new year and well, some people want to eat healthier, while not completely giving up on our love of pasta. Weight Watchers is a great way to incorporate pasta into your routine, while still keeping mindful of what you’re consuming. By adding more veggies, using a low-fat cheese, or a low-sugar sauce, you can still enjoy pasta guilt-free and stay within your WW Points goal.
Here we’ve done a round-up of our favorite Weight Watchers spaghetti recipes, and have also included a few tips for making these recipes (including stretching them out into other meals as well.)
1. Weight Watchers Spaghetti with Tomato-Meat Sauce
We start with a tried and true spaghetti and meat sauce recipe. This sauce is a great one as it can be used for several dishes (not just traditional spaghetti). The one ingredient that seems to throw people off are the grated carrots, but they do a couple of things for this sauce…
First off, carrots are 0 points so you can add as much as you want. Plus, the carrots (being high in fiber) will fill you up more so you can eat less of the pasta. They also add moisture into the sauce, along with a depth of sweetness which helps to balance out the sourness of the tomatoes.
The recipe calls for extra lean ground beef along with red pepper flakes, basil, and salt, but feel free to add any other herbs / spices you enjoy as well – oregano or an Italian mix would be great!
While the recipe recommends using whole wheat pasta (which is great for additional protein), you can always change things up. We think spaghetti squash or a baked potato would also be great topped with this decadent sauce.
Since this particular recipe gives you plenty of extra sauce to use for other meals, we like to use the leftover sauce and add it to stock. Any kind of stock would work, especially chicken stock which helps make a great tomato-based soup when paired with the leftover sauce and veggies.
Get the full recipe and directions from Weight Watchers
2. Weight Watchers Spaghetti Bolognese
Bolognese sauce is very similar to a meat sauce, but with the addition of milk and vegetables. While traditional bolognese sauce uses ground pork and whole milk, we can lower the points for this recipe by using lean beef with veggies and and a bit of skim milk. This sauce is a great one simply put over pasta, lasagna, or even veggies. There are some suggested ways to upgrade this sauce with wine and bacon, but keep in mind it also bumps up the WW points as well.
Get the full recipe and directions from Recipe Girl
3. Weight Watchers Spaghetti Bake
This is such a fun take on Spaghetti, and we love that you don’t need to make everything from scratch. For example, the author recommends using canned marinara sauce and store-bought veggie crumbles. The dish is then topped with fat free cheese, and to add to how easy this recipe is, everything is then thrown into the oven and baked.
Another thing to note: this particular recipe would be perfect for when you have leftover spaghetti and want to remix it into another meal. Just pour the spaghetti leftovers into a baking dish, sprinkle in some cheese, and pop into the oven!
Get the full recipe and directions from Slap Dash Mom
4. Weight Watchers Shrimp Spaghetti
Calorie-conscious meals don’t have to be boring and this recipe proves that! Seafood is a good lean protein and this particular recipe calls for shrimp (which is 0 points), and is easy to find at your local meat counter or grocery frozen section.
The recipe also recommends clam juice which can be bought by the bottle at your local grocery shop, or you can use seafood stock or chicken stock if needed. Along with the clam juice or your choice of stock, lemon zest, garlic and parsley create a tasty sauce finished off with cherry tomatoes. This stock is light and tasty and pairs so well with the shrimp.
Get the full recipe and directions from Life is Sweeter by Design
5. Weight Watchers Zucchini Spaghetti Recipe
Everything can be turned into a “pasta” these days and zucchini is no exception. It used to be that you would have to have a spiraling contraption, or grate your own longish strips of zucchini, but now you can actually purchase frozen or even fresh zucchini “noodles” in most grocery stores. This is a great recipe that incorporates these noodles for a healthy and light dinner for the whole family.
You can use any tomato-based sauce (even store-bought), but check the sugar content to make sure this meal remains low in points. Since you will only need one cup of the tomato sauce, you could definitely use any of the previously mentioned tomato sauces as your sauce for this particular dish – another great use of leftovers. Garlic, onion powder as well as black pepper and red pepper flakes add a tasty kick while fat free cheese rounds this out.
Get the full recipe and directions from The Staten Island Family
If you are looking to eat pasta on Weight Watchers, definitely check out these dishes. These recipes are great for indulging while still being mindful of your points!
If you like these recipes, we recommend checking out our favorite Baked Ziti recipe.
