Italian cuisine

Spaghetti carbonara

Name: Spaghetti carbonara
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 25 min
Yield: 2
Cuisine: Italian cuisine
Ingredients: 200 g Spaghetti; 100 g Guanciale; 3 Egg yolks; 1 Whole egg; 60 g Pecorino romano; 1 tsp Black pepper; to taste Salt for the water

Spaghetti alla carbonara

Pasta from four ingredients: guanciale, eggs, pecorino and pepper. There is no cream in it and never was.

Prep: 10 min
Cook: 15 min
Total: 25 min
Difficulty: Medium

Servings

Units

Ingredients

Spaghetti200 g
Guanciale — cut into short strips; pancetta works100 g
Egg yolks3
Whole egg1
Pecorino romano — finely grated60 g
Black pepper — coarsely ground1 tsp
Salt for the waterto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1
Bring a large pot of water to the boil and salt it properly — this is the only salt in the dish, since the cheese and the guanciale bring their own.
8 min
2
Put the guanciale into a cold pan and turn the heat to medium. The fat should render gradually and the pieces turn golden and crisp at the edges, about 6 to 8 minutes.
8 min
3
While the fat renders, beat the yolks, the whole egg, the grated pecorino and the pepper into a thick paste. Let it sit at room temperature so it does not seize when it meets hot pasta.
3 min
4
Cook the spaghetti a minute short of the packet time. Before draining, save a cup of the cooking water — the sauce will not come together without it.
9 min
5
Take the pan off the heat, add the pasta and toss it through the fat. Let the pan cool for twenty seconds — it should be warm, not hot.
1 min
6
Pour in the egg mixture and stir hard, adding pasta water a spoonful at a time until the sauce turns glossy and coats every strand. Serve immediately.
2 min

About the dish

Carbonara is a sauce that is never cooked. The creaminess comes from an emulsion of egg yolk, grated cheese and starchy pasta water — not cream. Put the mixture over heat and you have made scrambled eggs with pasta.

The other argument is the meat. The classic calls for guanciale, cured pork cheek: its fat is sweeter and softer than pancetta and nothing like bacon. Bacon works, but it is a different dish by then.

Worth knowing

— If the sauce does catch and turns grainy, take it off the heat and beat in a spoonful of cold pasta water — that often rescues it.
— Pecorino is saltier than parmesan. If you swap it, salt the water more lightly.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories: 690 kcal
Protein: 32 g
Fat: 34 g
Carbs: 62 g