Cravings: Carbonara recipe

I was writing for a travel website I recently joined called ExpatPost (my articles are set to publish starting August 5) and I was writing about our Christmas trip to Rome. One of the articles I wrote about are the authentic Roman dishes to eat while in Rome – and that immediately set my cravings for one Italian dish nonstop – carbonara!

I love eating Carbonara! Even if I grew up comfort eating the non-Italian version cooked with cream, I still like eating it as much as I love the authentic Italian version made with eggs! Last month, one of our Italian friends stayed with us for a couple of days as she was still trying to find an apartment for work. And since she came over, she brought along some Italian cured meats and that included guanciale. Guanciale is a piece of pork cheek usually eaten with a warm toasted bread or chopped in small pieces to stir with Carbonara. I used to cook carbonara with pancetta but when I tried eating it with guanciale when we were in Rome – that really changed my mind!

Guanciale had a stronger, salty taste making it a perfect combination to the almost bland egg sauce of the carbonara. Just a few pieces of chopped guanciale is enough for me to season an entire dish of a full plate of pasta!

How to cook Carbonara?

This recipe serves two people and if on a budget, a 250 g of bacon would be a nice substitute, too! The reason why the amount of guanciale is really small in comparison to the amount of bacon I used is that I find guanciale really, really salty! And for somebody like me who prefer less salty food, a few bits is enough to season the dish!

Recipe (serves 2):

6 oz spaghetti
2 tbsp olive oil
150 g guanciale, chopped (or 250 g bacon, chopped)
3 eggs, beaten
1/4 c grated Parmesan
1/4 tsp ground pepper
salt, to taste

Steps:

1. Mix the Parmesan, beaten eggs, ground pepper, and salt (if adding more). Set aside.
2. In a saucepan, boil some water and cook the spaghetti.
3. Get another pan and put over medium-high heat. Pour the olive oil in and cook the chopped guanciale pieces until crunchy.
4. Make sure to check the pasta cooking in the other saucepan so it doesn’t overcook! Get 1 cup of pasta water and drain the spaghetti once the pasta starts to get just about al dente. Set aside.
5. Once the guanciale pieces are crunchy, remove the pieces from the pan. Using the same pan used to cook the guanciale, pour a half cup of the pasta water. Turn off the heat and add the spaghetti on the pan.
6. Mix the spaghetti thoroughly. Add the beaten eggs mixture and make sure to mix quickly to avoid scrambling the eggs. Mix for about 2-3 minutes.
7. Remove from heat and add the crunchy guanciale pieces to garnish.
8. Add more grated Parmesan if you like!

Note: The egg sauce can easily turn to scrambled eggs and I have had my failed attempts a lot of times. So if it didn’t turn out great the first time, don’t despair!