Ed’s Easy Eats: Carbonara

No cream? No mascarpone? You may be wondering how carbonara can have the creamy texture that we all know and love without the cream or mascarpone. Fear not, just put your trust in the Italian culinary gods and you will have a quick, delicious, velvety and not too unhealthy dinner.

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:

This recipe makes one serving.

3 slices of streaky bacon or pancetta

3 egg yolks and one whole egg

2 handfuls of parmesan

1 clove of garlic

125g of spaghetti

Pasta water (will explain later)

Method:

• Slice the bacon into strips, grate the cheese and separate the yolks from the whites.
• Put the pasta into a pot on a rolling boil with a glug of olive oil and a good pinch of salt.
• In a separate pan, put the bacon in on a medium heat with a crushed garlic clove, ensuring that you stir occasionally.
• Cook the pasta for ten minutes and remove it from the heat. Do not drain the pasta from the water, but instead use tongs to move the pasta into the pan with the bacon in it.
• Take the pan off the heat and incorporate the beaten yolk and cheese with the pasta and bacon. It’s very important to keep stirring the pasta to ensure that everything is mixed together. If it is too liquidy put it back on the heat for 10 seconds and constantly stir to ensure that the eggs don’t scramble.
• Serve with a pinch of cheese and a few cracks of black pepper.

Edward Camilleri

Image courtesy of Edward Camilleri

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