The recipe for bacon-topped carbonara used by coal miners in Italy.
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 20 mins |
| Total Time: | 35 mins |
| Servings: | 8 |
| Yield: | 8 servings |
Ingredients
- 1 (16 ounce) package spaghetti
- 12 slices thick-cut, applewood-smoked bacon
- 2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- 2 large cloves garlic, minced
- ¼ cup dry vermouth
- 1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
- ½ cup whipping cream (Optional)
- 4 eggs, beaten
- 1 tablespoon ground black pepper
Instructions
- Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook spaghetti in the boiling water, stirring occasionally, until tender yet firm to the bite, about 12 minutes.
- Meanwhile, place bacon in a large skillet and cook over medium-high heat, turning occasionally, until evenly browned, about 10 minutes. Drain bacon slices on paper towels. Reserve 2 tablespoons bacon fat in the skillet and discard the rest. Chop bacon when cool enough to handle.
- Add 1 tablespoon olive oil and onion to reserved bacon fat in the skillet. Cook over medium-high heat until the onion has softened and turned translucent, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Pour vermouth into the pan and bring to a boil while scraping the browned bits of food off the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon, about 1 minute. Mix in chopped bacon.
- Drain spaghetti, transfer to a large serving bowl, and mix in remaining 1 tablespoon oil. Add bacon-onion mixture, Parmesan cheese, cream, eggs, and pepper to the hot pasta; stir until spaghetti is well coated and sauce is creamy.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 512 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 48 g |
| Cholesterol | 128 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 3 g |
| Protein | 21 g |
| Saturated Fat | 10 g |
| Sodium | 431 mg |
| Sugars | 4 g |
| Fat | 25 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Loved it, cheers!
Left out the creme, vermouth and eggs. Added Alfredo sauce. Used tortellini instead of spaghetti. Used turkey bacon.
10 out of 10 if you love bacon and looking to try something amazing this is the meal to do it, I made it and it was so good I highly recommend this meal.
Nice and creamy pasta. Thanks a lot.
12/7/22- made with Italian Sausage. Great recepie, will keep in regular rotation.
Wonderful recipe!! Added spinach trying to get my veggies in!!
Excellent, excellent recipe! I used cooking sherry in place of vermouth and whole wheat spaghetti. Delicioso!
This was a very delicious recipe! I’m totally going to make it again! 🙂 My only regret is, I could, not eat this Fast Enough. Is there a way to reheat the leftovers, in a way to bring them back to their original glory?
Very helpful
It was delicious!!
This recipe was so good!! I used a whole package of bacon because why not. This was my first time making carbonara and it wont be the last. Delicious recipe thank you for sharing 🙂
Mine came out much thinner than the carbonara’s that I’ve enjoyed in restaurants. I used shredded parm but think a finely grated parm would be better. I added crunchy green peas which was the only think that made this good
Delicious. Came out great.
Incredibly easy to make and super yummy–though I accidentally forgot to add the eggs! I didn’t have vermouth, so I used chicken broth as someone recommended and I added a good sprinkle of dried parsley on top before stirring. Everyone loved it (4 adults & 5 teens). Oh! and one of our guests is a bacon-aholic, so I used 2 – 12 oz pkgs of bacon. It was the perfect saltiness.
It’s great but way too much pepper unless I screwed up
I wanted a creamy pasta, but lemony, so I substituted lemon juice for the vermouth and added the zest in with the mix. I also added peas. It was exactly what I was after. Thank you for the recipe. It will be used again.
My son loves carbonara so I thought I would surprise him with this for lunch today. Some ingredients were not available to me so I made some substitutions. I used elbow pasta, no vermouth, no cream, and no pepper. I only had the precooked bacon so the onions were sauteed in butter. It still came together into a great dish! I halved the recipe since it was for lunch and my 17 yo ate it all!
This turned out delicious! I used a pound of regular cut smoked bacon, Angel hair pasta, cooking sherry instead of vermouth and added about 1/4 cup pasta water to make it a little creamier. Sometimes I work with what I have on hand, which is why I made these changes. I don’t know what it would have tasted like as the recipe stated but it was amazing with my tweaks!
I realized after making this that maybe carbonara isn’t my thing as I’m not a fan of a lot of egg ones but my husband RAVED about it, ate all of the leftovers (he mixed some sautéed onions and chicken in when he rebated it), and has made me promise to make it again and again.
I have always been hesitant about making a carbonara but this turned out fantastic! I made a vegetarian version but I can only imagine with the bacon it would taste even better. Great for a quick weeknight meal.
Great dinner, very easy and I enjoyed it very much. I didn’t have dry vermouth but used a very dry white wine (which is a substitute) and it worked out well. I think the comments around seasoning in other review are valid, but this recipe is so easy to make your own since it is all put together at the end. Use a good cheese, and use it a lot!