Carbonara

More often than not a restaurant Carbonara will be swimming in cream with sliced mushrooms and processed ham... and doesn't include egg. A proper carbonara is basically bacon and egg pasta.

You can use spaghetti but i prefer linguini which looks the same but has egg in the dough. It tastes better to me.

Ingredients: (four people)

1 packet of 'de cecco' linguini
10 oz thick-sliced smoked pancetta
4 cloves of garlic - finely chopped
a handful of chopped parsley
a BIG handful of finely grated Pecorino cheese
4 eggs
Fresh ground black pepper to taste

Method:

1. Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil with a handful of salt and while you are waiting crack the eggs into a bowl and beat with the pepper, and cut the pancetta into 1cm sticks.

2. Add the linguini to the boiling water and cook for 8 minutes.

3. As the pasta cooks place a large frying pan over a medium heat and cook the pancetta - without oil - until golden. Add the garlic and cook for a minute or so. If the pancetta is ready before the pasta simply take it off the heat, though the trick is to have them both ready at the same time.

4. Drain the pasta then add to the pan with the pancetta and a couple of tblspns of water and toss it around.

5. Add the eggs and quickly give the whole thing a good stir and toss to coat the pasta. Turn off the heat.

6. Add the parsley and Pecorino, stir it around then dish it up. Serve with extra Pecorino and a black pepper mill.