Creamy carbonara

Have you ever had 'real' carbonara? Not the ones with scrambled egg or ones heavy with cream, a traditional one? You are in for a treat, a simple one at that.  There have been many a carbonara crime committed but I'm here to lay down the law on how it is done.

I had some leftover spaghetti from meatballs the night before which spurred on this dish. Add a finely chopped onion, a minced clove of garlic or two, 1/2 a cup of finely grated parmesan, a few rashers of bacon (pancetta ideally), chopped parsley, al dente spaghetti (around 2 cups worth) and 3 free range egg yolks and you are on your way to pasta heaven.

Once the garlic, onion and bacon have been gently fried in some evoo, toss through the cold pasta or if you are cooking from scratch the hot pasta and add some extra water, say around 1/2 a cup. Don't be shy to use the water the pasta has been boiled in, it will contain some of the pasta starch to help the emulsion.  Turn the heat up high and keep tossing until most of the water has evaporated.  Crack in lots of black pepper, I mean around 20 or so turns of the pepper mill and add the parsley.

Then, the crucial point, take the fry pan OFF the heat and add your egg yolks & parmesan and mix well.  There will be enough residual heat in the pan to cook the eggs but not create a scrambled mess.  Dish up without delay.  It is silky and velvety without being heavy like its cream based brothers, and as this served 2 greedy people, it isn't too bad on the hips but you will feel like you have had a wicked treat.