If the mysterious words "carbonara""Parmesan", "guanciale", "pecorino" are familiar to you, then you are one of the admirers of Italian cuisine. And if these tricky terms confuse you, then it's time to get acquainted with such a masterpiece of Italian cuisine as pasta with carbonara sauce. True, we prefer to cook carbonara with bacon or ham. And all because the traditional component of this sauce "guanciale" (dry-cured pork cheeks) is simply not found in our stores. Nevertheless, this sauce has become very popular due to its excellent taste, as well as ease of preparation. Pasta carbonara is prepared both in Italian restaurants and at home. A surprisingly simple recipe combined with affordable ingredients and the unusual (unusual) presentation of the well-known spaghetti make this dish suitable for an everyday and even friendly meal. And pasta carbonara can be prepared in various ways. Therefore, choose a recipe to your taste.
Traditional pasta carbonara with bacon
It should be noted that this recipe is traditional forAmerican version of carbonara sauce. Americans (like the English) generally love bacon, they make salads with it, bake pies and cook soups. So they adjusted the recipe for traditional Italian pasta carbonara to their culinary preferences, replacing exotic guanciale and pancetta with bacon. The cheese, however, was left Italian - parmesan. Ingredients:
- Macaroni (spaghetti, pappardelle or tagliatelle) - 1 package (500 g);
- Olive oil - 2 tablespoons;
- Bacon - 200 g;
- Eggs - 3 pieces;
- Parmesan - 100 g;
- Black pepper and salt - to your taste.
The recipe is designed for four servings.Preparation: The peculiarity of the sauce is that it is ready from the heat of freshly cooked pasta. Therefore, only the bacon is cooked in advance for this sauce, rendering out excess fat. The basis of the sauce - eggs - are put into the pasta raw. The sauce turns out very tender and silky. And for spiciness and piquancy, garlic is added to it. But this is an acquired taste. So, let's prepare the carbonara pasta. Put water on for the spaghetti, and while it is boiling, cut the bacon into thin slices. Pour some vegetable oil into the frying pan, heat it up and fry the bacon "until crispy". Note that you need to manage to fry the bacon so that it does not turn into meat croutons. That is, fry on high heat and for a very short time, so that only the surface of the bacon slices becomes crispy. Then beat the eggs with salt and black pepper in a separate bowl. Beat them with a regular fork, without using a mixer or whisk, which will turn the eggs into egg foam, and we don’t need that at all. Grate the cheese into shavings (on a fine grater) and add to the eggs. The sauce base is ready. By the way, leave some cheese for seasoning the finished pasta. Now boil the spaghetti. Put them in lightly salted boiling water, cook until done and throw them in a colander. There is no need to rinse the pasta and do not add any oil (as we are used to) to them either. After that, put the pasta in a saucepan with the egg-cheese mixture, quickly stir and add the bacon. Stir again, put on plates and sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Eat the carbonara pasta immediately after cooking. Note: Some chefs recommend adding dry white wine (to the sauce) to traditional pasta carbonara, but this is already a refinement of high culinary fashion. By the way, the recipe for traditional pasta carbonara can be varied not only with garlic, but also with basil (dried or fresh), as well as any greens that you like best.
Carbonara with bacon and cream
This recipe differs from the traditional carbonara not only by the presence of cream and onions in its composition, but also by the method of preparation. Ingredients:
- Pasta (any pasta) - 200 g;
- Bacon - 150 g;
- Parmesan cheese - 50 g;
- Onion - 1 head;
- Cream - 1 part glass;
- Butter - 1 tablespoon;
- Olive oil;
- Salt;
- Black pepper.
The recipe is designed for two servings of pasta.Preparation: Also, while we are making the sauce, put on some water for the pasta. Then chop the onion and cut the bacon into thin slices. Fry the onion in olive oil with the addition of butter (until soft). In another frying pan, fry the bacon slices. We will fry them without oil: bacon is fatty on its own. When we see that a crispy crust has appeared on the meat slices, take out the bacon and throw it in a colander, and then add it to the frying pan with the onion. Pour cream over our frying, add salt and pepper to your taste and leave to simmer over very low heat. In the meantime, the water for the pasta has boiled. Boil our pasta in it, drain the water, and put the pasta on plates and serve, pouring hot carbonara sauce over them and sprinkling with grated cheese. These are the different ways of preparing the Italian sauce carbonara and pasta of the same name. Americans liked the carbonara recipe, although they replaced pork cheeks with their favorite bacon. Perhaps we should also master the simple technology of its preparation and diversify our menu with another dish of Italian cuisine (albeit in the American interpretation). We recommend reading:
