Pasta Carbonara!

Last night I made pasta carbonara for dinner. That's Italian for: bacon-butter-onion-egg-pasta. It's really really rich, and very tasty. It's also pretty quick too! I love this meal because...well, I think that's fairly obvious, I love bacon and I love butter. So how can I not like this?! Sorry, vegetarians, you're gonna have to skip this one. But those of you who are also in the bacon fan-club, why haven't you made this yet? Eat it for dinner tonight. You really should.

PS. There's a new poll in the side bar for what I should make next weekend! Click the link after the pic for the recipe!

First, chop up the bacon and throw it in the pan. They should be about this size.

If you're doubling the recipe like I did, then you may need to do this in separate batches.

You don't want to cook it all the way, but make sure it's pretty close to done. While the bacon is cooking, chop up an onion and some garlic, and then put the water for the pasta on to boil. You can slice or chop the garlic, whichever you prefer.

When the bacon is done, take it out of the pan and set it aside. But leave the delicious drippings in the pan! Put the onions in the drippings. do it. I know, it's weird and unhealthy. Just do it. Stir them around so they all get some bacon flavor on them. Let them cook for a couple minutes and then add the garlic. See how the onion is getting all brown and flavorful? That's why you cook it in bacon. Now you know the secret to happiness.

When the water for your pasta is boiling, through the pasta in, and keep an eye on it.

After the onions and garlic have cooked set them aside too. (This next step is really only necessary if you are using a stainless steel pan.)Turn the heat on high and let the pan get really hot. When it starts to smoke a little, turn the heat off and pour in the white wine. But if you're like me and can't get white wine, just use chicken broth. Now take a whisk and scrape off all the tasty brown bits on the bottom of the pan. (This is called deglazing by the way) Once you've got all that deliciousness off, pour in the chicken broth and stir it around.

Then add the bacon, onion, and garlic into the sauce. Let it simmer until the pasta is done.

In a bowl, combine the eggs, parsley, and parmesan (but save a handful of parsley to put on top). Mix them up really well with a fork.

If you're squeamish about eating not entirely cooked eggs, then you might want to put the eggs in the microwave first before adding the parsley and parmesan. In theory, the boiling lava hot pasta should cook the eggs, but sometimes they don't cook all the way through. So if you want to be on the extra safe side, just take that extra step.

When the pasta is done, drain it, but don't rinse it! It needs to be realllllly hot. Put the pasta right on top of the egg mixture. Don't mix it up yet, just let the heat cook the eggs. On top, put the bacon and onion mixture, and pour some of the broth on top too. Then, my favorite part, the butter. Put half a stick of butter in there. Then grab some tongs and mix! Mix like crazy! Get it all coated in everything! YUM dinner's ready!

In theory, this is supposed to be enough for 4 adult humans. I doubled it, because I was feeding 5 hungry college students, but we had a lot of leftovers. Remember, this is very rich, and you probably won't eat as much as you think you will. Be prepared for leftovers!

(This is the gluten free one, which I think was just as tasty as the not-gluten free one)

Hope you guys like it as much as I do!

XOXO

Natalie