Carbonara, recipe from Rome, Italy

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Joined
Mar 19, 2013
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50
Location
Rome
Hi all!

I am an italian amateur cook from Rome, Italy.

I want to learn English, so I have decided to start writing here some italian recipes to check my English level...

I'll show to anyone 100% original italian recipes and I'll try to reply to all your questions, so I hope you'll correct my mistakes...

I want to start with the number 1 typical Roman recpie: CARBONARA!

4 persons

400gr italian pasta (I prefer "mezze maniche", but this kind of dish is usually prepared with "spaghetti")

150gr. guanciale (You'll read a lot of recipes where someone uses bacon: THIS IS ABSOLUTELY WRONG!!! Never try this @ home...)

pepper

100gr. pecorino (as for guanciale and bacon, NEVER USE PARMIGIANO: the pecorino's flavour is stronger, and it highlliths guanciale!)

5 eggs (4 egg yolks and 1 entire)


1 Take a pot and put inside wather, and start to heat it
2 Take the guanciale, slice it to obtain 5x1 cm pieces, put it in a large pan and start to heat it. Never use oil! Guanciale will become transparent and will release self-produced oil when it will be cooked! Fire have to be high and guanciale have be crisp!
3 Take the eggs (yolks and the entire) and start to shake it in a small container. You have to shake eggs for 5 minutes: it will be prepared when you start to see little bubbles all over the cream :)wink:)
4 Add pecorino, pepper to the obtained cream and continue to shake for 5 minutes. The result does not have lumps! It should appear as a cream! You can use a mixer to do it.
5 Add guanciale (with the obtained oil) to the cream and mix slowly with a spoon.
6 Put pasta in the wather (wather have to boli!!!). Take pasta very "al dente", drain pasta and put it in the cream container.

Start to mix pasta and cream for 3 minutes: don't worry if, at the start of this operation, cream will remain on the bottom of the container! If you mix it for 3/5 minutes, taking the cream from bottom to top with a spoon and a fork, it will fix to pasta in a perfect way!

Tip: NEVER TRY THIS OPERATION ON THE FLAME! It will be accompished with no other heat source than the pasta! We wont to obtain a carbonara, not pasta and omelette...

This will be the result! If you want, you can add pepper and pecorino to exalt a little more the indistinguishable carbonara flavour.

Do not be stingy with pepper!!!

I hope you enjoy!

PS: my English is terrible...
PPS: I'll try to answer to all your questions!
PPPS: I hope to put picture ASAP to show you all these steps.
 
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°ç§*éç*ç**°ç*ç°##§ÆÆ}§>{§>}

I have done a terrible mistake....

Italian word "GUANCIALE" have 2 different translations...

PILLOW and GUANCIALE...

Never try to put any pillow on carbonara...

AAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAH
 
Most folks in the US will have better access to pancetta than guanciale. We make our carbonara with pancetta and parmesan. There are as many "traditional" recipes for this dish as there are nonnas!;) BTW, welcome to DC.
 
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Hi CraigC, ty for reply!

I didn't know that in US guanciale was not so easy to buy.

For pecorino is the same?

I have cooked a lot of times carbonara, trying each time to change something (parmigiano instead of pecorino, or parmigiano and pecorino together, pancetta intstead of guanciale) but IMHO I thing that guanciale+pecorino is the best way to obtain a perfect dish.

But the essence of carbonara is that the cream have to be fixed to the pasta: to do this, the only way is to mix without any other heat source than the pasta itself. Otherwise, the egg become cooked and white, as an omelette...

PS: was my English ok?
PPS: what does "nonnas" means?
 
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Welcome to DC your English could not be possible any worse than mine, so you are ok. As far as "guanciale" what is it?
 
Nonna is a grandmother

Guanciale is meat from the pig's cheek that is cured like bacon and pancetta. It's not smoked.
 
This is guanciale:

images


This is pancetta:

images


This is "Lardo di colonnata":

lardo-di-colonnata.jpg


As you can see, the % of "fat" (is fat right?) change.

Guanciale is used to cook amatriciana or carbonara sauce, but often in Italy we use pancetta for the same sauces.

I prefer guanciale, cause its flavour is a little bit "gentle". And I prefer pecorino to parmigiano, cause pecorino's flavour is stronger!

Instead, "lardo di colonnata" is often grilled with some pieces of bread, and never used to cook pasta.
 
There are a lot of variety of carbonara sauce, but the most famous is with guanciale.

If you have not this product, you can proceed by using zucchini!

The process is exactly the same.

You have to chop 2 medium zucchini to obtain little pieces (5x1cm approximately), put these pieces into a large pan with a little bit of oil (just a spoon or 2) and cook it over high heat. After 5/7 minutes (when the oil is very hot), you can put in the pan a glass of wather or a glass of white wine (preferred), until it evaporate, to complete the process.

Zucchini takes more time to be perfectly prepared (I think 15 min.): the result have to be crisp!

Than, you can add this to the cream made of eggs, pecorino and pepper.

The result is fantastic.

You can also use mushrooms or eggplant.

If you are a brave man, you can make "fish carbonara", using shrimps, squids, clams and
mussels! Just cook together all these ingredients and proceed as for zucchini (2 spoon of oil and, after 7 min a glass of white wine).

Remember to clean the fish before start cooking!

TY for your question!
 
Zuccini isn't a substitute for the pork product in carbonara.

Its just something you can add to the dish if you'd like to.

Use a little olive oil or butter instead of the pork
 
So I think I does not understood the question.

Are you searching for a product that should replace the meat (guanciale or pancetta)?

In this case, I swear on my name that I have cooked a lot of times carbonara with no pork product, by using only zucchini, or mushrooms, or varios types of fish.

The result was very different from original carbonara, but always good!
 
Hi CraigC, ty for reply!

I didn't know that in US guanciale was not so easy to buy.

For pecorino is the same?

I have cooked a lot of times carbonara, trying each time to change something (parmigiano instead of pecorino, or parmigiano and pecorino together, pancetta intstead of guanciale) but IMHO I thing that guanciale+pecorino is the best way to obtain a perfect dish.

But the essence of carbonara is that the cream have to be fixed to the pasta: to do this, the only way is to mix without any other heat source than the pasta itself. Otherwise, the egg become cooked and white, as an omelette...

PS: was my English ok?
PPS: what does "nonnas" means?

I'm not even sure we can get the same pancetta that you get in Rome. The Prosciutto de Parma or San Daniele that is imported here from Italy, has to be cured longer than it is for your market. I've been to Italy several times and can tell the taste difference. Cheese we can get the same. I believe most pecorino is called romano or pecorino romano here.

We have a dish called Penne ala Vodka, which I believe is an Italian-American dish with no claims to originating in Italy. Do you know this dish?
 
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Hi all!

I am an italian amateur cook from Rome, Italy.

I want to learn English, so I have decided to start writing here some italian recipes to check my English level...

I'll show to anyone 100% original italian recipes and I'll try to reply to all your questions, so I hope you'll correct my mistakes...

I want to start with the number 1 typical Roman recpie: CARBONARA!

4 persons

400gr italian pasta (I prefer "mezze maniche", but this kind of dish is usually prepared with "spaghetti")

150gr. guanciale (You'll read a lot of recipes where someone uses bacon: THIS IS ABSOLUTELY WRONG!!! Never try this @ home...)

pepper

100gr. pecorino (as for guanciale and bacon, NEVER USE PARMIGIANO: the pecorino's flavour is stronger, and it highlliths guanciale!)

5 eggs (4 egg yolks and 1 entire)


1 Take a pot and put inside wather, and start to heat it
2 Take the guanciale, slice it to obtain 5x1 cm pieces, put it in a large pan and start to heat it. Never use oil! Guanciale will become transparent and will release self-produced oil when it will be cooked! Fire have to be high and guanciale have be crisp!
3 Take the eggs (yolks and the entire) and start to shake it in a small container. You have to shake eggs for 5 minutes: it will be prepared when you start to see little bubbles all over the cream :)wink:)
4 Add pecorino, pepper to the obtained cream and continue to shake for 5 minutes. The result does not have lumps! It should appear as a cream! You can use a mixer to do it.
5 Add guanciale (with the obtained oil) to the cream and mix slowly with a spoon.
6 Put pasta in the wather (wather have to boli!!!). Take pasta very "al dente", drain pasta and put it in the cream container.

Start to mix pasta and cream for 3 minutes: don't worry if, at the start of this operation, cream will remain on the bottom of the container! If you mix it for 3/5 minutes, taking the cream from bottom to top with a spoon and a fork, it will fix to pasta in a perfect way!

Tip: NEVER TRY THIS OPERATION ON THE FLAME! It will be accompished with no other heat source than the pasta! We wont to obtain a carbonara, not pasta and omelette...

This will be the result! If you want, you can add pepper and pecorino to exalt a little more the indistinguishable carbonara flavour.

Do not be stingy with pepper!!!

I hope you enjoy!

PS: my English is terrible...
PPS: I'll try to answer to all your questions!
PPPS: I hope to put picture ASAP to show you all these steps.

Thanks so much for your recipe and welcome to Discuss Cooking!

To help you a little with your English, it would be better for you to substitute the word mixture for the word cream in the text of your recipe where I have indicated. The novice cook would be confused by the word cream rather than mixture, since the recipe has no dairy other than the cheese.
Again, it's a pleasure to have you here....:chef:


 
Yes, the English is great. Much better than my Italian which does not exist.
For Charlie..In your kitchen you are the boss. You can make any changes to any recipe, realizing of course, that it's a new recipe.
 
Ciao ragno!

Welcome! I lived in Frosinone for a few years. Your recipe is a classic version. Over the years, us North Americans have made it with many variations depending on the availability of ingredients, and to suit our tastes. I have made it like your recipe many times but I have also changed my recipe to suit my tastes over time.

Hope you enjoy it here...
 
I just make my carbonara without meat and sub in olive oil. for me it's all about the eggs, cheese, and black pepper
 
There are a lot of variety of carbonara sauce, but the most famous is with guanciale.

If you have not this product, you can proceed by using zucchini!

The process is exactly the same.

You have to chop 2 medium zucchini to obtain little pieces (5x1cm approximately), put these pieces into a large pan with a little bit of oil (just a spoon or 2) and cook it over high heat. After 5/7 minutes (when the oil is very hot), you can put in the pan a glass of wather or a glass of white wine (preferred), until it evaporate, to complete the process.

Zucchini takes more time to be perfectly prepared (I think 15 min.): the result have to be crisp!

Than, you can add this to the cream made of eggs, pecorino and pepper.

The result is fantastic.

You can also use mushrooms or eggplant.

If you are a brave man, you can make "fish carbonara", using shrimps, squids, clams and
mussels! Just cook together all these ingredients and proceed as for zucchini (2 spoon of oil and, after 7 min a glass of white wine).

Remember to clean the fish before start cooking!

TY for your question!

That sounds like a nice variation with the zucchini :yum:
 
I love you all!

I'm very happy to receive all these answers!!! In this way I can learn English!!!

But it's 1:31 AM in Rome... So i'll answer in a few hours, when I'll stay at work...

Ty so much!!!
 
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