Pasta Carbonara

My friend Marie asked me to make this recipe for the blog since she saw pics of it on instagram. Honestly, pasta carbonara is super easy to make, and tastes delicious. This is a dish however that doesn't reheat terribly well. It's kind of like mac and cheese for adults, super charged with bacon.

So here goes. This is what you need:

I was making a big recipe because we had 5 people eating it for dinner yesterday. You can absolutely reduce the amount!

Pasta (Any kind will work. I've made it with fettuccine, farfalle, macaroni, and in this case rotini) Bacon (I prefer the thick cut kind, I'd use about a regular sized packet)
Heavy whipping cream (In this case I used just over a pint)
Parmesan (I used 2.5 bags, each bag was about 1.5 cups)

Cut your bacon into smallish pieces:

Toss those in your preheated pot. I use a dutch oven, but you could also use a sauce pan or whatever works for you.

Render your bacon, the bacon grease will be the base of your sauce.

Now add a bunch of cream. In this case I used somewhat over a pint of cream. You can kind of figure this out by what the desired proportions are.

Now add about 2.5 bags of parmesan.

Make sure you blend the cream and cheese well. If your sauce seems too runny, add cheese. If your sauce seems too thick, add cream. Also add a lot of black pepper. Carbonara comes from the Italian word for coal. The pasta is named carbonara because of all the pepper looking like coal pieces.

Cook your pasta following directions, and then add the pasta to the sauce. You could serve the sauce on the side, but in my experience it's easier to just mix it all together and then serve.

Boom! You now have pasta carbonara. See how easy this is? If you want a vegetarian version of it you can use butter in place of the bacon and bacon grease.
As I mentioned earlier, this pasta doesn't reheat very well in the microwave. The fat separates and it becomes really greasy/oily. To counteract this you can add a bit of extra whipping cream to the pasta before microwaving it. Then stir it up really well. That should help, but it is still a dish better eaten fresh.


Quickie Summary:

Ingredients:
Bacon (1 pack)
1+ pint heavy whipping cream
2-3 bags parmesan
Pasta

Preparation:
Cut up bacon
Render bacon
Add cream
Add parmesan
Mix thoroughly
Ensure all cheese has been melted
Add cooked pasta to the sauce
Serve