If You Love Spaghetti Carbonara, Try This Popular Variation (2024)

FAQs

How would you describe the taste of spaghetti carbonara? ›

Mostly it's salty, rich, peppery, and a bit smokey. It's such a simple recipe that you should taste the individual components; egg yolk, cured pork fat, salt, pepper, Parmigiano cheese.

The golden rule to silky carbonara is to whisk your egg whites so that they're completely incorporated with the egg yolks. This will create a smooth, velvety sauce. As like any pasta dish, including carbonara, cook the pasta perfectly al dente so that it's soft but still firm, with some bite.

Spaghetti is the most common pasta, but rigatoni or bucatini are also used. While guanciale, a cured pork jowl, is traditional, some variations use pancetta, and lardons of smoked bacon are a common substitute outside Italy.

There may be no more beloved Italian dish than carbonara: hot pasta tossed with a creamy sauce of raw beaten eggs, accentuated with crisp bits of guanciale, and finished with a shower of grated aged Pecorino Romano cheese plus freshly ground black pepper.

The most important thing is that a carbonara contains only eggs, guanciale (cured pork cheek, non smoked), Pecorino cheese and black pepper, the pasta isn't so important (but don't use penne lisce!).

The whites of the egg combine with the starch in the pasta water to add viscosity to the sauce while the yolk adds richness and flavor. Because egg yolks are a powerful emulsifier, they also help bind the fat from the pork to the sauce, creating a smooth, velvety texture without any separation.

My final recipe, which serves four, calls for mostly yolks, with just a couple of whole eggs tossed in. The result is a sauce with an absolutely perfect texture, just thick and rich enough.

What not to put in Spaghetti Carbonara? Don't put garlic, cream, milk or butter. It is not needed. It is fine if you want to make a dish with those ingredients, but if you want to learn how to make this dish correctly, use only pecorino, eggs/egg yolks, black pepper, guanciale, and pasta water.

Must-have ingredients

that there are only five ingredients: pasta, pork cheek, eggs, cheese and pepper. That's it. A real carbonara does not contain onion, garlic, or cream.

What thickens carbonara? ›

Now quickly pour in the eggs and cheese. Using the tongs or a long fork, lift up the spaghetti so it mixes easily with the egg mixture, which thickens but doesn't scramble, and everything is coated. Add extra pasta cooking water to keep it saucy (several tablespoons should do it).

Cacio e uova is essentially Naples' meatless version of carbonara. Its silky sauce is made of eggs—two whole eggs plus an extra yolk keeps everything creamy—and a mixture of grated Parmigiano-Reggiano and Pecorino Romano.

What cheese should I use in carbonara? Pecorino Romano, a sharp sheep's milk cheese, can lean salty, especially when combined with cured pork in carbonara, but a 50:50 ratio of Parmigiano-Reggiano and Pecorino Romano hit the ideal mark, balancing sharp, salty, and nutty flavors.

Carbonara is almost always served with spaghetti or linguine, but you can use whatever pasta you prefer. For a more unusual take on carbonara, try spinach fettuccine tossed with warm pasta and fresh baby spinach; you'll get a vibrant, beautiful dish with some additional health benefits.

Spaghetti carbonara is an Italian main course consisting of spaghetti (long thin strands of pasta) with bacon and a creamy sauce made from eggs, Pecorino or Parmesan and black pepper.

Pasta carbonara is a simple pasta dish originating in Rome. A true carbonara should have five, maybe six ingredients maximum. One of those being pasta. It absolutely does not contain cream of any kind.

As far as its taste, it will have a meaty heartiness from the browned meats, a sweet tang from the rich tomatoes, as well as an herbal kick from the various Italian spices used. If you've ever enjoyed a pasta dish with meat and tomato-based sauce, it was likely a variation of a bolognese recipe.

Flavor. The addition to guanciale in carbonara sauce is the main reason the flavor of Alfredo and carbonara sauce differs to such a degree. Guanciale gives carbonara an earthy, funkier edge whereas Alfredo sauce relies solely upon its buttery virtues to seduce its way into your mouth.