-A lot of times,
people throw pasta.
I don't. I think that's
an Italian American thing.
Look.
No, it's not ready yet.
♪♪
-Hey, my name is
Chef Michael White,
and I'm in the kitchens
here in Munchies in Brooklyn.
And today, I'm gonna
make carbonara.
I'm gonna do a very,
very simple carbonara,
a little bit of
Pecorino-Parmigiano,
guanciale, and egg.
Carbonara is one of my
favorite things.
There's always bacon
in the fridge,
or there's always
a hunk of cheese.
This is a pasta
that you can do any time,
and it's so satisfying,
because it's like
you're having bacon and eggs
already at the diner,
and it's not even open.
So you can have this,
then go to sleep.
And then you wake up at 11:00,
and then you can go to brunch
if you really wanted to.
And this is a quick recipe.
You can start the water
and you can kind of start
your mise en place
or all the ingredients
at one time.
The misnomer with carbonara
is it's always with smoky bacon,
so when you go
into a restaurant,
you're smelling
this bacon and onions.
This version, we're gonna
do it with guanciale.
I season the water for carbonara
a little bit less
if I'm at home
because of the salt
inside the pancetta
or the guanciale.
You don't even have to
put oil into this pan.
This pan is on medium.
And so a large, open skillet.
And all of a sudden,
the guanciale starts
to become translucent.
So I'm gonna turn this down
just a little bit
because I don't want it to burn.
You know, next time I come here,
I hope Vice has real burners.
No, I'm just kidding.
[ Laughter ]
I know this is crazy,
but it's kind of lean.
So I'm gonna put just a little
bit of oil in here
to kind of help
the process a little bit.
So we have this nice
and translucent.
We're gonna have a little bit
of residual oil,
and then we're gonna remove
this thing,
and I'm gonna use it
on top of the dish.
It's really up to what you like.
If you do like the smoky flavor
and perfume of bacon,
by all means, use bacon.
The difference between pancetta,
guanciale, and bacon,
guanciale is unsmoked,
it's cured pork jowl.
Pancetta is from the belly,
and as well as bacon.
You can start to see this
getting very, very translucent.
And we're doing the render
right now.
And now this...
is the first step
in preparing our carbonara.
And now I'm gonna separate
the eggs.
And, eggs, this is a little bit
of a trick
that sometimes
people will go ahead
and put straightaway the egg
with its egg white
and the yolk together,
the whole eggs.
And what happens is is that
if you're not vigorously moving
that, you can start
to get scrambled eggs.
And what I'd like to do is
I'd like to incorporate
the cheese, the eggs,
and a little bit of water
that helps it whisk together.
So I'm gonna do two whole eggs,
and then I'm gonna
use three yolks.
When I'm doing a pound of pasta,
three egg yolks and two eggs
is the perfect quantity
to do it.
You can also add the addition
of cream,
but that's a real faux pas,
because that really means
that you can't judge
the time and temperature
in bringing the pasta together.
What I'm gonna do is
I'm gonna add
a little bit of Pecorino cheese.
And I like to use both Pecorino
and Parmigiano
because Pecorino maybe
is a tad too salty.
But I get a little bit of
sweetness from the Parmigiano.
And it's a really good balance.
You getting a good picture
of that tatt right there, yeah?
Oh, I am pretty full, yeah.
Yeah.
Pretty full, all the way up.
You just got that on
fucking camera right now.
You can see how this is
a little bit thick right here.
And so I'm gonna add
a little bit of water.
Kind of like when you're making
that omelet
and you add
a couple drops of water.
I mean, at the Vice studios,
I'm using
mineral water here, so...
So I'm going to season the water
right now, okay?
And, again,
I don't want to over-season.
And I lay the pasta in.
When we talk
about al dente pasta,
everybody's idea of al dente
is different.
Al dente meaning "to the tooth."
So this spaghetti is
a seven-minute spaghetti,
so I'm going to cook this
for about five minutes.
After you place the spaghetti,
you do not want to stir
the spaghetti right away.
A lot of times, people start to
vigorously stir the spaghetti,
and what you do
is you break the pasta,
because it is not cooked enough
and it snaps.
So that's something that
you don't want to do right away.
So leave it alone!
Now, spaghetti is
the traditional pasta
to do with carbonara,
but if you had fettuccine
or you had penne, penne pasta,
the little pasta really coats
well with the egg,
and it's probably
even a better pasta.
Any dry pasta is really
fantastic with carbonara.
It would just be that much more
rich if you used an egg pasta
with an egg sauce with bacon.
Now, this is when
it goes very quickly.
The pasta is almost ready.
We're gonna go into the pan.
You have to have
all your mise en place
or all your ingredients
ready to go.
We have cheese, eggs,
a little bit of water.
We're gonna start twisting in
a little bit of black pepper.
And then we'll twist a little
bit more on top,
but you definitely want to use
fresh cracked black pepper.
And you can always add more
if one so desires.
What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna
take a little bit of water
to start with, okay?
And you want to be careful.
But this is on low.
So I'm just gonna add
a little bit of water.
And you can use a colander,
but here, again,
I'm making believe
that it's 3:00
in the morning right now, okay?
You never want to rinse
your pasta,
and taking it out like this
and adding it to the pan...
is really how we would do it
in the restaurant.
So now you can hear,
this is very low,
but you can see the pasta
is not completely cooked,
but it's almost.
Very al dente still.
I have a little bit
of residual liquid.
This is the point where you
can really screw this up, okay?
So you can hear
a little bit of the cooking.
[ Bubbling ]
We're gonna go right over
the top, okay,
and you want to vigorously move
the pasta
the minute you go inside.
So here we go.
We're gonna go inside.
And now it's not going
to cook that fast.
But the minute I apply heat
to it, again,
is when you have
to move it quickly.
So now I'm gonna move back
to the stove right now, okay?
Okay, and now all of a sudden,
you can start to see it
getting thick, all of a sudden.
Now, those white things
you see in here
is the Pecorino
that's starting to melt.
So you can see it right now,
the pasta is loose
and it's moving nicely.
And it's not stuck together,
it's not overly heated,
and I have a nice,
creamy sauce, okay?
We also have the addition
back in of the guanciale.
And I'm just gonna give it
a nice toss like this.
I'm gonna go a little bit more
Pecorino-Parmigiano.
Again, the heat is on low
right now.
Now the green can cannot
be substituted here, okay?
It will not taste anything
like it, all right?
So make sure you really
do have Pecorino-Parmigiano.
And at this point, if you have
it on the stove any longer,
you'd have issues, okay?
So now we're gonna take it
off the stove.
Fixing carbonara
is quasi-impossible
if you're not using cream
or a little light
to make it liaison.
So it's going to cook...
if you leave the pan
on the stove.
And we're gonna go
to the plate.
And just for good measure,
just a little bit more.
♪♪
That's it.
So now here's the moment
we're going to check and see
if it's al dente number one.
I think it is, though.
Al dente.
You know him -- Al Dente.
You know him.
My name is Chef Michael White.
Thanks very much for watching
this Carbonara 101.
If you like the recipe
or would like to make this,
just click the link below.
Thanks very much
from the Munchies kitchen.
♪♪
♪♪
♪♪
