Spaghetti Carbonara

I originally came up with this recipe as a special for a restaurant, as it was incredibly easy to cook on the fly, and utilized very few materials. I was able to have pancetta and shallots precooked together, as well as a prepped sauce. All I had to do was cook pasta and combine in a steel bowl, and it was ready to serve. It was such a fast dish, in fact, that the ticket time for a single order was only around 3 minutes. This recipe is an adaptation of that, because I've found that this method is far easier than any other for eliminating risk of cooking the eggs.

Ingredients

• 40g diced pancetta (~1.5 oz)
• 1/2 medium shallot
• 1 egg
• 25g parmesan (~1/4 cup)
• 10g cream (2 tsp)
• .5g pepper (1/8 tsp)
• 15g salt (~2 tbsp) for pasta water, plus a pinch for the sauce
• 100g bronze die extruded spaghetti (3.5 oz)

Directions

1. Bring 2 quarts of water to the boil with 15g of salt in it.
2. Begin cooking pancetta in small pan starting from cold.

3. Thinly slice shallot, and then cut perpendicular to create a tiny dice.
4. When the pancetta is 80% cooked, add the shallot and briefly stir. The shallot should lose it's harsh flavor at the end of cooking, and be slightly translucent. When this is done, turn off the pan.

5. Grate parmesan into a medium to large steel bowl and combine with egg, cream, pepper, and a pinch of salt.

6. As the water comes to a boil, add the pasta and stir.
7. When the pasta has reached al-dente, remove from the pot with a pair of tongs and incorporate into the sauce while stirring. This will temper the sauce as you slowly add the pasta. Do not strain the pasta as you will lose the pasta water, and you will lose the option to use the pot as a double boiler.
8. When all of the pasta has been incorporated, add the pancetta, shallot, and any residual fat to the pasta while stirring.
9. Use a ladle or measuring cup to add a few tablespoons of pasta water to the pasta while stirring with the tongs. This will make the sauce a bit thinner but also help the emulsion. Stir this together until a desired consistency has been reached. The sauce should be very slightly thinner than desired, as it will thicken slightly as it reaches the table.
10. If the pasta has cooled down too much for your liking, or you would like to thicken the sauce slightly, the metal bowl can be placed over the still boiling pot of pasta water that is left on the stove. While it's on top of the pot, stir quickly with the tongs to prevent cooking of the eggs. This can be useful for slight adjustments of texture and sauce thickness.

11. Remove from the steel bowl to a serving plate or shallow bowl.
12. Top with freshly grated cheese and cracked pepper.

Notes

• If pancetta is not available, or you would like to spend less money, bacon works perfectly fine.
• Pre-grated cheese may be harder to use. I personally use a microplane as it grates the cheese very finely.
• If your knife skills are not the best, don't fret too much over the size of the shallot dice.
• The pepper quantity is more of a suggestion. It would be more advisable to add pepper to taste.
• Bronze extruded pasta typically has a more rough outside coating which I find to be more pleasant to eat. However, the main reason to use it is because it creates a more starchy water. If bronze extruded pasta is too expensive or not your preference, swapping out with a brand such as Barilla is acceptable.
• Pay the most attention to the step where the pasta is being added to the sauce. This is where the most things can go wrong. It is essential to always stir it as you go. However, this method is much less precise than typical recipes as it is not being cooked directly over a burner.
• When it comes to cooking tools for this one, I used a spoon to stir the pancetta and a fork to beat the eggs, as larger tools just aren't needed. The other tools included a kitchen scale, a small cast iron skillet, a large pot, one medium steel bowl, a pair of tongs, and a microplane grater.