Sourdough Spaghetti Carbonara
Coming up next in our journey through the pasta alphabet, we are now on probably my favorite letter, S.
Today, I’m going old school Italian by making one of the most iconic and classic pasta dishes in the world, good old spaghetti carbonara. Spaghetti carbonara is a super simple dish consisting of pasta, eggs, bacon, black pepper, and a ton of cheese, in fact I would argue that it qualifies as breakfast. It is the simplistic beauty that sums up the majority of Italian cooking.
Yet, for some reason we aren’t satisfied with such a classic, we feel the need to doctor it up with things like heavy cream, peas, mushrooms, and even chicken (which does qualify as a sin in Italy, serving chicken with pasta). However, today I am going back to basics by providing the classic spaghetti carbonara recipe that would make every Nonna in Italy weep tears of joy.
Except…there will be one difference in that I will be using my patent pending sourdough pasta.
Sourdough pasta was something that I experimented with for TikTok, the idea being that you can use sourdough discard as a flavor base for fresh pasta, and it was fairly successful so I think I’m ready to share that here, on the blog.
Serves 4
For the Pasta:
(Look, if you don’t have the time to make pasta from scratch, I totally get it. Just boil up some boxed spaghetti like you normally would.)
14oz 00 flour or all purpose flour
4 eggs
1 cup sourdough discard
A pinch of salt
For the Sauce:
8 oz pancetta (or guanciale), cut into small cubes
Salt
4 whole eggs
4 egg yolks
1 cup finely grated Pecorino Romano or Parmigiano Reggiano, plus more for topping
2 tbsp coarse ground black pepper, plus more for topping
Dump the flour into a mound on a clean workbench, then make a well in the center. Add the eggs, sourdough discard and salt, then use a fork to beat and combine the eggs while slowly knocking in and incorporating the flour until a stiff dough forms. Knead the dough for about 5 minutes, or until smooth and elastic, then cover with plastic wrap and let it rest on the counter for at least 20 minutes.
Bring a medium sized pot of salted water to a boil. In a wide nonstick frying pan, cook the pancetta over medium low heat until the fat has rendered and the pancetta becomes brown and crispy.
Meanwhile, use a pasta roller or rolling pin to roll out your dough into thin, even sheets, then cut into 1/4-inch wide strips.
Whisk together the eggs, yolks, pepper and cheese in a medium heatproof bowl until a thick paste forms. Spoon about 1/4 cup of the rendered pancetta fat, and whisk that in.
When the pancetta is close to being done, dump the pasta into the water and let that cook for about 2 minutes, or until the pasta floats to the surface of the water. Reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water, then drain.
(If you were using dried pasta, then just cook according to the package directions for al dente)
Dump the spaghetti into the pan with the pancetta then, working quickly, whisk 1/4 cup of pasta water into the egg mixture and pour that onto the pasta. Off heat, use tongs to twirl the pasta around until the egg mixture thickens up and forms a creamy consistency, adding more pasta water if it seems too thick.
(You do want to work fast, or the egg mixture will setup and you’ll basically have a pasta omelet.)
Twirl up the pasta and serve, topping with more cheese and pepper.
