Recipe : Spaghetti Carbonara - Step by step | Food, travel, recipe & sights

Recipe : Spaghetti Carbonara - Step by step

I got this method of cooking spaghetti carbonara from an Italian cookbook.  Usually, I don’t prepare my pasta this way because it seems like so much of a chore.  But I am free today so I cook it according to the Italian method.

First, cut the bacon into tiny strips and put them in the hot pan to fry.  No oil required as the bacon will release the fats.  I use streaky bacon.  (quantities to be given later)  Leave the bacon to fry on the pan until they are brown and crispy.  Meanwhile…..boil spaghetti as per instruction on the package.

When the bacon are browned and crispy, remove the bacon from the pan but leave the oil there.

Next, add in half a bulb of chopped garlic and one tablespoon of butter.  (don’t give that horror look about cholesterol!)

When the garlic is fragrant (but not browned), add in a box of cream and set to low fire.  Leave until it bubbles just a little.  Turn off heat.  You musn’t let cream over boil or else it will turned into a mess of oil.

Now, put the bacon crisp into the container where you are going to serve your pasta.  Knock in one egg and season with some black pepper.  I ran out of black pepper so I used white pepper instead.  Yeah, don’t give me horrific look about raw egg.  :)

By now, your pasta should be cooked.  Drain and quickly put the pasta into the raw egg and bacon mixture.  Give a quick stir.  The heat of the pasta will cook the egg.  Immediately, pour in the cream and garlic mixture and keep mixing.

INGREDIENTS - for four persons

Bacon - 200 grams

Half a bulb of garlic

1 box of cream (about 200 mls) - add some boiled water to ‘wash’ the remnants off the box
1 tablespoon of butter

Salt and pepper to taste

1 egg

Spaghetti - Normally, I use only 2/3 of the packaging of 500 grams for my whole family.  If you wish to prepare for six adults, use the whole packet  but you may need to add some UHT milk for extra sauce.  Otherwise, the sauce will be too dry.

So, you see?  A tablespoon of butter with 200 grams of bacon for a family of six is not that fattening, right?  I found pasta cooked this way very ‘jelak’ so I serve the adult portions with some cubed tomatoes, yellow peppers, emmenthaler cheese and coriander leaves on the side.

My other food blog has several varieties of pasta recipes.  Just surf over to MalaysiaBest and use the search box to search for ‘pasta and recipe’.  You may replace the bacon with ham but one can never get the real taste of carbonara without these fats from the bacon.  If you have white wine on hand, give it a splash.

Posted by lilian on September 8th, 2006 under Food, Pork, Recipe

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5 Responses to “Recipe : Spaghetti Carbonara - Step by step”

  1. Ellena Says:
    September 9th, 2006 at 11:13 am

    Wow.. Lilian.. this looks so delicious and colourful… with those side vegetables… :)

  2. Sooi Sooi Says:
    September 9th, 2006 at 12:59 pm

    is this an excerpt from a horror story? LOL! i prefer to just eat blindly without knowing the ingredients, hahah. cooking this for 6 is ok i guess, but it’s going to be a killer for anything less than that! and many other recipes called for cheese i believe.

  3. Recipe carbonara | Food, travel, recipe & sights Says:
    February 23rd, 2008 at 12:55 pm

    [...] have a complete step by step recipe for spaghetti carbonara sauce. So, if you want the real thing, do use that [...]

  4. Surabay Says:
    February 23rd, 2008 at 10:04 pm

    That looks really tasty, but I have to tell you : Italian real carbonara sauce is not made with cream, but only with the yellow part of the eggs..

  5. Haley Says:
    August 26th, 2008 at 12:07 am

    We would like to feature this recipe on our blog. Please email haleyglasco@gmail.com if interested. Thanks :)

    Haley

    http://blog.keyingredient.com/

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