Crappy Carbonara

This recipe comes courtesy of my son. In some ways, I’m mortified that my first recipe post is a bastardisation of a classic (and beautiful) dish, but in others, I’m proud that this comes from him, as he’s a self-confessed lazy cook. Frequently eating straight from the pan, and adept at throwing everything in a pan together to stir whilst warming, there’s not much finesse goes on, I’m sure. But he’s at university at the moment, so I suppose that’s acceptable. I was there once.

When I lived with him (alongside my daughter), he was notoriously difficult to cook for. Eschewing most vegetables, and suspicious of anything new, he was the classic teenager. So when I found something he would eat, I was keen to exploit this, and indeed explore it. I tried to inculcate some cookery skills into him for when he went to uni, but he was an unwilling learner. However, it seems not everything was in vain, as he’s come up with a way to create one of his favourites much more easily than the original recipe. To be fair, the original recipe isn’t that difficult, but when you’re a student, double cream is a bit of a luxury, and only using the yolk of an egg or two might seem wasteful. So I am proud of him for coming up with a way to feed himself well in a manner that suits him.

A word on carbonara. I love it. The salty flavours of bacon and parmesan, the silky smooth mouthfeel of coated pasta, the chewy bacon bits permeating the sauce – it’s a magnificent dish. I would highly recommend you making it properly at least once in your life: that’s a recipe for a different day.

This version cuts out the cream, and uses a whole egg. It can be made in the time it takes the spaghetti to cook, pretty much. That’s about 12 minutes – I prefer not to use the quick-cook pasta on offer these days; I find it to be a bit less substantial than its regular counterpart. Dried pasta is what I’m using for this – after all, it wouldn’t seem right to cook “crappy carbonara” using fresh pasta! I have altered my son’s original recipe a little, in an effort to elevate it a touch, without losing the integral “crappy” element of the dish. It’s still affordable and easy, student-friendly food. Let me know what you think in the comments below.

Serves 1

Ingredients

75g dried spaghetti
Splash of oil (olive, for preference, but whichever suits your taste / budget is fine)
3 rashers bacon (I like smoked for this recipe, but unsmoked is fine if that’s your preference)
2 cloves garlic
25g butter
Plenty of grated parmesan
1 egg
Black pepper

Method

1. Boil a kettle of water. Place the pasta in a saucepan and, once it’s boiled, pour the water over it, pushing the spaghetti down until it’s completely covered. Put over a high heat. You’ll need to keep stirring this as it cooks, to avoid sticking, but you can leave it for a couple of minutes at a time to attend to the other things.
2. Heat a little oil in a frying pan over a medium-high heat. Peel the garlic, but don’t chop it. Put the whole cloves into the hot pan and allow to sizzle for a minute. Add the bacon to the frying pan and cook until done. You want it to be browned on both sides, but not crispy.
3. Remove the bacon from the pan (but not the garlic) and leave to cool for a few moments. Crack an egg into the same frying pan, and leave to cook on medium heat.
4. Chop the bacon into small pieces.
5. Once the spaghetti has had its time and is cooked to your liking, drain it and return it to the pan, off the heat. Add the butter, the bacon, a couple of tablespoons of grated parmesan, and a good grinding of black pepper. Mix well, until the butter has completely melted.
6. Once the egg is done, serve up the pasta into a bowl, and top with the fried egg, some more parmesan and, if desired, some more cracked black pepper.