#do you like seeing your fav be reduced to a fucking shell of what they really are? robbed of their personality & established traits?

[cookingwithbelloochie]

Carbonara that a roman grandma would get mad at you for, but not as mad as back when you used cr**m in your carbonara lol

reasons she’d get mad: no pecorino unless i already ended up having some at home and personally, i don’t like my carbonara pork too chewy and want it more crispy, so i use a pretty thin cut

what u need: 

x) any kind of pasta, but my favs for it are rigatoni, linguini and the ones that look like little shells 

x) parmigiano (preferably whole, but if u can only get pre-grated, check the ingredience, as long as there’s no binding agent added it should be fine) 

x) any kind of cured pork, ideally pancetta or guanciale, but let’s be real, if you have either of those at home you already know how to make carbonara, sooo... personally, i use breakfast bacon (3 slices per person) 

x) egg (1 per person) 

x) black pepper and look, i’m really not a food elitist, but if you buy already ground black pepper, please block me on all accounts i dont need this in my life lmao. whole black pepper corns in a mill, thats what u want

what to do (i know this seems long but each of those steps takes 10 seconds) 

1) get two pots, fill the smaller one with water and salt (how much depends on how salty your pork is but be generous), put the heat on and when its cooking, you throw the pasta in, you know what to do lol 

2) the second pot you wanna put on the stove at the same time as the water, put it on medium heat (my stove goes from 1-9, i put it on 5 usually)

3) while the second pot is heating up, cut your pork and throw it in the pot. when i do this i usually get my 3 strips of bacon and take the kitchen scissors and just snip the bacon pieces right into the pot lol 

4) stir the pork from time to time, keep an eye on it, you want a bit of browning on the pan but not too much, if its too much your pork will go crispy too fast

5) when you see enough fat on the bottom of the pan, grind the black pepper in, cooking the pepper with the pork makes it like... idk... melt the flavors more together lol 

6) about now your water should be cooking and ready for the pasta, drop the pasta in and give it a stir so nothing sticks at the bottom

7) if you see your pork and it looks done, but you just dropped the pasta, reduce the heat on the bacon, either to the lowest setting or even turn off the stove for a bit 

8) PERSONALLY i like my carbonara yolky bc i really dont fuck with eggwhite, so i, again PERSONALLY, crack the 1 egg per person into a bowl, but i only use the yolk. so i either get two bowls dirty or sometimes i manage to just use one bowl.... anyway get your egg or only the yolk (only the eggwhite is not an option and if you do that, again, blocked) in a bowl, break up the yolk 

9) grate a good handful of parmigiano into the egg bowl and stir until its combined 

10) get a cup (not the measurement, im not american, im normal) of the water your pasta is cooking in. if your pasta is already done cooking while you did all that, save a cup before u strain it. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT!!!! this is what gives the carbonara the gloss 

11) add a little bit of the hot pasta water into the egg bowl and stir quickly. if the sauce in your bowl looks too runny, add more cheese 

12) usually after im done doing all this, my pasta is ready to be strained, so strain the pasta if its done, if not u have a second to relax lol

13) put the strained pasta in the pot with the bacon and stir and especially, try to get the browned bits off the pot. the heat on that pot should be either off or still very low, depending on how comfortable you are with the idea of eating egg that seems to not be fully cooked 

14) put the egg cheese pasta water mix into the pot and stir again until every noodle is covered and glossy 

optional 15) if your carbonara doesn’t look glossy, if the sauce looks kinda lumpy or generally it just seems a bit too dry, add the leftover pasta water (bit by bit, you dont want it too runny either) 

16) some parm on top and ur done :) 

now, if you don’t wanna be scolded by roman grandmas, use pecorino instead of parmigiano or do 50/50 and by god, do not use breakfast bacon lmao but it will 100% be an upgrade from carbonara u get at most restaurants simply bc you put your own effort into it and did not use cream, or even worse, cream cheese lmao