Real carbonara recipe - how to prepare an authentic carbonara (2024)

Carbonara is for sure one of the most famous Italian pasta sauces in the world, and let me tell you, for one reason! A well-executed, authentic carbonara is one of the most delicious things your taste can experience. So, no surprise you are looking for the real carbonara recipe: you are in the right place!

Carbonara etymology

The origin of its name is discussed, as well as the origin of the recipe itself (but this is very typical of highly successful ones).

The most accredited explanation links carbonara name to workers transforming wood into coal (carbone in Italian). It was a common work in the Apennines of Central Italy, between Abruzzo and Lazio, and also the ingredients suggest this origin, being all very common in the area.

Another explanation, completely different, links carbonara etymology back to American troops arriving in Rome at the end of World War II. At that time, people were starving, and the soldiers’ rations were suddenly an important source of food. Militar rations included bacon and eggs (in powder), and this would explain the genesis of this recipe. Even if it does not clarify the etymology, what is true is that before WWII carbonara recipe was not part of Roman tradition.

Real carbonara Decalogue

Even if the real carbonara recipe seems a very simple one, you need to consider two main factors.

First: the list of ingredients is short and the recipe sounds easy, but perfect technical execution is not!

Second: it is one of the most abused Italian recipes, both abroad and in our own Country.

While to address the first issue I will give you some tips in the recipe instructions, the second topic is developed with typical roman humor in a ‘real carbonara recipe Decalogue‘. Widely spread in roman dialect via social apps, I do my best here to share it with non-Italian readers … hoping the translated version will make you smile half as much as the original one 🙂

1. always use guanciale, not bacon – if we meant bacon, we would have gone to the USA (note: guanciale is the pork cheek, while bacon is part of the belly)
2. no parmigiano reggiano, just pecorino cheese. Who says “half and half” has something to hide (Note: I love Parmigiano Reggiano, I even wrote a guide about it, but always remember that Italian food is regional: with carbonara you are in Lazio, so don’t use a cheese from Emilia Romagna)
3. never cook the egg, it is not an omelette!
4. no garlic, no onion, it’s not a ragù!
5. no oil, no butter, no lard. Just the fat from guanciale
6. no spicy pepper, it is not Calabria (i.e., not from the Southern region of Italy famous for spicy foods)
7. no spices other than black pepper are allowed
8. who adds cream should go to jail (you know, we take it seriously about food, sometimes too much…)
9. never, never say ‘carbonara’ and ‘vegan’ in the same sentence
10. tonnarelli, spaghetti, bucatini, rigatoni (note: four different shapes of pasta). They are all good, just don’t overcook it!

Did you learn anything interesting today? If so, just PIN THIS! 🙂

Since I know that some typical ingredients are not easy to be found abroad, I made some researches, and the best guanciale I found online seems to be this one (as usual, at no additional cost for you, buying from here can help this blog, so thank you!).

The other crucial ingredient for a good carbonara is… the pecorino romano! It was not easy, since this Italian cheese has a lot of fakes online, but I eventually found this that is really a good pecorino romano: let me know in the comments your feedbacks.

Before I start with the instructions, writing about real carbonara I cannot help thinking of one of my favorite restaurants in Rome, Lo scopettaro. I hope you will enjoy at least once their amazing traditional cuisine, including one of the truly authentic carbonara I have ever had! And if you love Italian pasta but you prefer tomato-based sauces, don’t move from Rome and cook with me an authentic Amatriciana 😉 Or travel with me to Sicily and try your first authentic pasta alla Norma, with my step-by-step recipe!

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Buon appetito!